Merrimack Toll Revolt Day

[Rochelle]

Thinking about this further, the small number of people buying gasoline for farm equipment could be exempted at the pump somehow, or file for a rebate at the end of the year, or something similar.

Too complicated--who decides who qualifies for an exemption or rebate? How do we know this won't turn into political favors in the long run? How will we pay the people who will go through those who have filed for rebates at the end of the year and then reimburse them? Too many complications and complications make bad laws.

Another thing that I remembered when I was taking a shower is that tolls are not just collected as a way to pay for the roads--they are also used as a way to discourage people from using the roads. Stockholm introduced peak load tolls a year or so ago to decrease the number of traffic jams during rush hour in downtown Stockholm and so far it has worked well, actually improving the flow of traffic. The toll is only in effect during those hours. The rest of the time it's free. Couldn't we introduce peak load tolls during those times when I-93 is extremely busy, thus encouraging people to car pool or find alternate routes?

[J’raxis 270145]

Thinking about this further, the small number of people buying gasoline for farm equipment could be exempted at the pump somehow, or file for a rebate at the end of the year, or something similar.

Too complicated--who decides who qualifies for an exemption or rebate? How do we know this won't turn into political favors in the long run? How will we pay the people who will go through those who have filed for rebates at the end of the year and then reimburse them? Too many complications and complications make bad laws.

It is too complicated (or could become so), but I was trying to make it fair by exempting people who use gasoline but not the roads. A straight gas tax for road funding would of course be easiest to implement. Perhaps a tax on the purchase of the cars themselves, to fund the roads? Or, of course, registration and driver's license fees, but since those are collected so infrequently they'd probably have to be raised by incredible amounts to actually fund the roads. People who wouldn't mind a 15¢/gallon tax on fuel would probably balk—to put it lightly—at a $1000 driver's license...

Another thing that I remembered when I was taking a shower is that tolls are not just collected as a way to pay for the roads--they are also used as a way to discourage people from using the roads. Stockholm introduced peak load tolls a year or so ago to decrease the number of traffic jams during rush hour in downtown Stockholm and so far it has worked well, actually improving the flow of traffic. The toll is only in effect during those hours. The rest of the time it's free. Couldn't we introduce peak load tolls during those times when I-93 is extremely busy, thus encouraging people to car pool or find alternate routes?

This sounds like London, England's congestion tax, something that Manhattan is also considering. I generally don't like the idea of using taxation to engineer social policy. This is basically just a new form of a "sin tax" without the religious justifications.

[lildog]

, but see my other post—you could do this through gas taxes instead of tolls. Not only are tollbooths disruptive to traffic, but you can't put toll booths on all the roads, and those roads need funding, too.

I agree with toll booths being disruptive to traffic--that is the downside in regards to them. But I can't see raising a tax for everyone in order to pay for some roads, that is, highways. If you don't use highways, then you shouldn't have to pay for them.

The key problem with the tolls right now is they are not equally distributed at every on and off ramp of every highway in the state.

Not to mention more then 50% of the toll goes to simply running the toll booth itself.  It is a very inefficient method of taxation. 

A gas tax while taxing everyone equally and yes taxing some who may not use the highways would be slightly less unfair in that it wouldn't put 100% of the burden solely on single locations as the tolls currently do.  Think about it, what is worse charging one person unfairly $100 or charging 100 people $1 each and maybe 20% of those people don't use the road?  I would consider the large burden on the 1 person to be far greater a travesty then a small burden on a group of people.  And in fact it would actually be $200 on that one person since $100 of the $200 is simply the money needed to run the method of collecting the tax.

Ideally it should be a pay per use for those who use it but other then gas and tolls I can think of no other ways to collect.

The state uses around 715 million gallons of gas per year.  The Merrimack tolls collect (after the cost of running the booths is subtracted) about $1.3 million.  A 1 cent tax on gas would turn into $7.15 million in revenue collected without the over head of toll booth employees, electricity for the booths, etc.  Not to mention it would save gas because you wouldn't have long lines of cars idling at the toll booths.

A lot less negatives to a gas tax over tolls.  Although the perfect solution would simply be to cut spending by $1.3 million and hence eliminate the need for the tolls.

[J’raxis 270145]

A lot less negatives to a gas tax over tolls.  Although the perfect solution would simply be to cut spending by $1.3 million and hence eliminate the need for the tolls.

But we're also trying to figure out how to make the highways self-funding. Even if you cut $1.3M spending from somewhere, money from somewhere else—some other general tax, most likely—is still paying for these roads.

[lildog]

A lot less negatives to a gas tax over tolls.  Although the perfect solution would simply be to cut spending by $1.3 million and hence eliminate the need for the tolls.

But we're also trying to figure out how to make the highways self-funding. Even if you cut $1.3M spending from somewhere, money from somewhere else—some other general tax, most likely—is still paying for these roads.

The only two ways I know how would be either tolls which are inefficient in that over 50% goes to running the tolls and they would need to be equally distributed or they would place unfair burdens on some while ignoring others.  Or a gas tax which again isn't perfect in that not everyone using gas uses it for highways but it would at least distribute the tax much more evenly.

What other options do you see?

[J’raxis 270145]

A lot less negatives to a gas tax over tolls.  Although the perfect solution would simply be to cut spending by $1.3 million and hence eliminate the need for the tolls.

But we're also trying to figure out how to make the highways self-funding. Even if you cut $1.3M spending from somewhere, money from somewhere else—some other general tax, most likely—is still paying for these roads.

The only two ways I know how would be either tolls which are inefficient in that over 50% goes to running the tolls and they would need to be equally distributed or they would place unfair burdens on some while ignoring others.  Or a gas tax which again isn't perfect in that not everyone using gas uses it for highways but it would at least distribute the tax much more evenly.

What other options do you see?

The gas tax. Read back to see what I was saying about it.

I was only responding to your comment that seemed to imply we could eliminate the tolls by cutting $1.3M elsewhere—as if the highways were free or something.

[NH]

There's a report that EZPass is screwing people by overcharging them, and the customer support has been trained to deny their requests for refunds.
http://redtape.msnbc.com/2007/07/millions-of-dri.html

Luckily NH doesn't have distance based tolls - yet, but watch for this if they do.

Who uses E-Z Pass? That's a sure way to get a ticket on revolt day.
Better to use up those old tokens or just throw pennies in there.
It won't register as paid, but you can be gone before anyone knows you've done it.
With E-Z Pass you will be charged.

[Crocuta]

There's a report that EZPass is screwing people by overcharging them, and the customer support has been trained to deny their requests for refunds.
http://redtape.msnbc.com/2007/07/millions-of-dri.html

Luckily NH doesn't have distance based tolls - yet, but watch for this if they do.

A government bureaucracy that is unresponsive, unhelpful, and unconcerned about it's customers?  Say it isn't so!