"Over the past fifteen years alone, America has spent well over $100 billion on rail transit construction projects but has little to show for it."

Via The Antiplanner:

The National Surface Transportation Policy and Revenue Study Commission has recommended a 40-cent-per-gallon increase in federal gas taxes. Supporters of the increase say it is necessary to replace aging bridges and roads.

But U.S. Secretary of Transportation Mary Peters and Arizona Congressman Jeff Flake dissented, saying that there is plenty of money to repair roads if Congress would only stop diverting it to non-highway purposes and if you add tolls into the mix.

Advocates of the tax increase know that Congress has had a policy since the early 1980s of dedicating at least 20 percent of any gas tax increases to transit. Since 1991, cities can spend an even greater percentage of their share of federal funds on transit because Congress made some of the funds “flexible,” i.e., available for either roads or transit. Add various other earmarks, and at least 40 percent of federal highway user fees don’t get spent on highways.

So the real goal of a tax increase is to make vastly greater sums of money available for light rail, streetcars, and other boondoggles. Tolls are an excellent source of funds for repairing roads and replacing bridges because they insure that the users pay for the facilities they use.

But advocates of tax increases don’t believe in user pays. Instead, they want auto drivers to pay for their pet projects: expensive rail transit lines, bike paths, and other facilities that move few people at a high cost.

Over the past fifteen years alone, America has spent well over $100 billion on rail transit construction projects but has little to show for it. As mobility advocate John Semmens pointed out a few days ago in a recent Washington Times op ed, transit’s share of urban travel has actually declined since 1995..