More anti-toll legislation (or just posturing) in US Congress

Congressmen Leonard Boswell (D-IO) and Lee Terry (R-NE) have just introduced a fearsome sounding "Toll Road Prohibition Act of 2007." Watch it guys, you're about to be outlawed. Prohibited. No toll roads allowed from 2007 onward. Better start closing down the roads and giving everyone an early retirement.

Well not quite.

Legislation in the US Congress rarely lives up to its billing and this piece of legislation is typical. Indeed the better rule when judging any piece of legislation nowadays is to assume it probably means the opposite of what its title suggests.

True to that axiom the Toll Road Prohibition Act of 2007 (TRPA2007) HR3802 doesn't actually prohibit anything. It requires that any federal funds contributed in the past to a road be repaid with interest before that facility is tolled.

Here is the text of the bill from Rep Boswell's office.

A press release from Boswell's office quotes him: "The American people should not be required to pay for the same highway twice—once through their tax dollars and again through new tolls on federal interstate highways."

This kind of legislation might actually enhance the opportunities for tolling existing interstates by providing a mechanism for buying out the federal taxpayer interest in the road and thereby freeing it of federal restrictions on tolling.

But how to value it to recover the fed-$s?

Is this is a fair or practical way to measure the remaining federal taxpayer interest in a road. Money contributed say 30 years ago for construction is often now rusting old bridge beams and deteriorating pavement. Why should a new owner pay for that junk plus interest?

On the other hand money paid toward right of way has probably soared in value.

The Boswell Terry HR3802 bill would require "the total amount of such federal funds" to be repaid.

Going back how far? They don't say. No limit is mentioned.

So presumably you have to go back as far as the US Government goes - virtually to 1788?

Federal aid for roads goes back to at least 1800 when the National Pike began to be built - exactly three short blocks from where I am writing. The National Pike was built with a mishmash of funding - tolls, state, local, abutting landowners but there was certainly some federal aid. If I-70 is to be tolled then federal aid going back to 1800 would have to be returned under Boswell Terry HR3802.

This isn't an academic point. The National Road or National Pike co-named as Patrick Street here in Frederick MD later became US40. That is within these city limits. But just outside Frederick US40 most of the way east to Baltimore US40 is cosigned with I-70. The interstate was built in many places right on top of the first federal aid highway in the history of the Republic.

Roads are like that. They get built incrementally over centuries.

I-70 is being considered for truck toll lanes in a bunch of states, and indeed the federal government is supporting these toll studies. Going from Los Angeles via I-15 to the western reaches of Utah I-70 then heads east to Denver, Kansas City, St Louis, Indianapolis, Columbus OH, Wheeling WV, joining the Pennsylvania Turnpike for a stretch, then heading to the Port of Baltimore. This is one of the country's premier trucking routes, and truck toll lanes make great sense.

But under Boswell Terry HR3802 in order to toll I-70 you'd have to go back two centuries to repay federal aid. And what interest rate would you apply? A basis point difference on interest going back 200 years would throw up enormous sums now. How would you account for the changing value of the federal dollar?

Working out the repayments under HR3802 would be an accountants nightmare and a lawyers dream. The further back you go the greater the uncertainty about federal aid and larger the interest component would loom. The larger the repayment at stake, the more absurdly unworkable this law would be.

It is totally impractical, as written. (Like the income tax code, US immigration law, environmental policies etc.)

The principle is reasonable

But the principle HR3802 seems to embody is quite reasonable - that taxpayers deserve to get something back to the extent they have created an asset that is being taken over for a toll business. Trouble is the different contribution of different contributors to the road - federal, state, county, city governments, abutting property owners, toll payers - is shrouded in the mists of time.

Who could rationally sort out the relative property shares?

Co-sponsors of the bill are Jeff Fortenberry (R-NE), Reps Phil English (R-PA), and John Peterson (R-PA). The last two are active in campaigning against the Pennsylvania Turnpike's plans to toll I-80.

KB 'Diddun Mean That' Hutchison back in "leadership" role

Kay Bailey Hutchison, a US Republican senator, who told Texas officials she didn't really mean her earlier legislation to put in jeopardy the interstate highway tolling programs that are at the heart of the Dallas area 2030 Mobility Plan, is back in action again on tolls.

She now says she is joining with Rep John E Peterson (R-PA) in sponsoring a provision in a conference report in the FY2008 transport appropriations bill that would "allow states to opt-in to a one year prohibition of the tolling of existing interstate highways."

In other words states that don't want to toll existing interstates will be allowed to prohibit tolling interstates. But those that choose not to opt in to a tolling prohibition could toll?

Here is the perfect posturing legislation.

This enables KB Hutchison to tell her anti-toll constituents she's up there on Capitol Hill fighting tolls while she assures Texas officials having to deal with growing traffic congestion that the state can choose not to opt in to the toll prohibition.

The joint statement by Peterson and Hutchison says they have agreed they will push for a "national prohibition of tolling existing interstate highways leading up to the next highway authorization bill, which will be considered by Congress in 2009."

This is sure to get her lavish praise for "leadership" from pro-toll North Texas officials confident they can get tolls installed on new toll lanes on the region's interstates ahead of any deadline in 2009 or whenever.

TOLLROADSnews 2007-10-11