Here is my olive branch to environmentalists: let's rid the planet of those smog-inducing menaces called toll booths. A trip from Massachusetts to DC and back reminded me of how costly, mostly in terms of time, toll booths are. A back-up leading into the Mass Pike from 290 made a 15-mile ride last an hour. On the return trip, the New York Port Authority charged me $8 for the privilege of driving over the George Washington Bridge. The state's highwaymen not only took my lucre, but stole more than an hour of my life as I sat in a traffic jam on I-95. Upon paying, and perversely saying "thank you" to the toll taker, I realized my trouble had just begun. The scores of lanes necessary to more quickly--relatively speaking, of course--facilitate the state's highway robbery now merged into a few scant lanes on the bridge, which resulted in another traffic jam.

In my 400-mile journey through six states, only Connecticut--which, perhaps not coincidentally, has the most expensive gas and the least trigger shy of shootists of the radar gun--refrains from impeding my trip with a toll booth. Several tolls, like the $5 fees levied by Maryland and Delaware, don't lead into a tunnel or onto a bridge. What, precisely, I am paying for, I am ignorant. Adding to my confusion is the presence of these state tolls on I-95, an interstate highway that, by federal law, is supposed to be free of toll booths. Alas, loopholes allow states to claim stretches of interstate highways as state highways, refusing federal money to get at travellers' money.

Removing these choke points would eliminate useless, tax-supported jobs (Do we really need to pay people to hand us tickets on the Mass Pike?), save drivers time and money, and, yes, result in cleaner air. I understand libertarian arguments preferring user fees to taxes, but aren't taxes on gasoline that pay for road construction, repairs, and maintenance, in effect, user fees? Certainly eliminating tolls would save America as much gas as Obama's tire-inflation gauge idea. Leaving all those reasons for eliminating tolls aside, we are confronted with millions of idling cars emitting noxious fumes into the air every day. Wouldn't removing the cause of all that pollution help the environment?

So why haven't environmentalists been clamoring to rid the world of toll booths with a volume and pitch equivalent to their screeching appeals to render SUVs extinct? My suspicion is that they want to feed the beast--big government--and are reluctant to see it miss a meal. Environmentalism, particularly in the last forty years, has been a trojan horse to enhance the power and extend the intrusiveness of the state. When environmentalism imposes costs upon private citizens and employers the response of environmentalists to the aggreived parties is, essentially, "tough." When the state incurs the costs, environmentalists--who at heart are statists--balk.

If you think that trip was a waste of money in your auto you should try it in an 18 wheeler.

Hey, come on. Are you attempting to make fiscal common sense of this?

Let's stab back at the b'stards this fall and vote to repeal the Mass. State income tax.

Dan,
The construction and maintenance of the highway is similar the sort of commercial services provided by transportation concerns. It is perfectly appropriate for the state to charge a price for it. The alternative is construction and maintainance through tax collections. In that circumstance costs are socialized accross the population rather than being paid by beneficiaries. There are purposes to socializing costs, but achieving an economic pareto optimum is not among them. Economic efficiency is achieved through charging in accordance with marginal cost if that is possible - for the twinkies you buy, for the electricity you use, and for your road trips.

Read the piece more closely. I address your concern. Gas taxes are the price charged for road use. Use the roads a lot? Well, you pay higher gasoline taxes than those who don't. Tolls are arbitrary--some roads have them and some don't. Gas taxes are uniform--the more you drive the more you pay.

The powers that be in Mass. have been floating bonds for years to keep ‘the job’ alive at the Pike. The toll booths should have and could have come down a long time ago but the Pike organization has been a huge receptacle for state jobs for state connected personnel.

Most of the Capital expenditures derived from bonds have been wasted on unnecessary pet projects and largesse for a chosen few corrupt administrators and employees instead of being used to cover project expenses. So, the ‘projects’ never end!

If you just consider the cost of perpetuating the infrastructure and manning of the tolls based on maintenance and personnel, you could do away with the them and save over a third of the budget.