A week ago John J. McGlennon, chairman of the James City County Board, summed up the attitude that many Hampton Roads residents take toward the proposed plan to create a regional transportation authority and empower it to raise roughly $170 million a year in new levies: “Everyone understands that this is pretty terrible legislation,” he told the Virginian-Pilot. “The real question is whether anything better will emerge if we reject it.”
Jim Bowden and other bloggers have attacked the regional transportation authority for its lack of transparency and accountability to taxpayers. I share those concerns. But my problems with the transportation authority run even deeper: By raising revenues through a variety of sources, most of which have nothing to do with when or how far people drive, the funding mechanisms would sever the connection between those who pay for Hampton Roads transportation projects and those who use/benefit from them. Furthermore, there is nothing in the plan that acknowledges the connection between transportation and land use. It’s the same old tax-and-build policy that has gotten the region into its current predicament.
There is no escaping the necessity of raising money from some source in order to build infrastructure for a growing population. There is no free lunch. But it matters very much how the money is raised and what it pays for. To answer McGlennon’s question, almost anything that emerges from a rejection of the transportation authority would be better than the plan now under consideration.
Conceptually, the solution is simple: Devise a system where road users and beneficiaries (property owners whose land is made more valuable by transportation improvements) pay for the improvements. The more direct and transparent the connection between using the roads and paying for them, the better.
Where would the money come from?
- Congestion tolls — user pays. Create transportation corridor authorities empowered to implement time-of-day pricing on the most congested bridges and thoroughfares. Tolls that vary according to the level of congestion would: (1) reduce reduce traffic to the level of optimal throughput, thus maximizing capacity; (2) allow the authorities to fund transportation improvements within the corridor such as adding extra lanes, setting up Bus Rapid Transit bus stations, synchronizing stop lights, or making micro-improvements to improve traffic flow; and (3) incentivize drivers to seek alternatives to the one-car-one-rider commute.
- Community Development Authorities — property owners pay. Encourage builders of large projects, such as Pat Robertson’s proposed 500-acre Blenheim development, to pay for Interstate interchanges and secondary road upgrades by creating CDAs and issuing bonds.
- Hampton Roads Foundation — community pays. Privatize the Ports of Virginia, an idea that has been raised recently, and use the proceeds, conceivably as much as $5 billion, to endow a regional foundation. The foundation could underwrite projects, such as the Third Crossing, an upgraded U.S. 460, or improved rail freight to the ports, that could not support themselves through a user-pays system but might have overriding public benefits such as economic development or hurricane evacuation.
Charging people the full cost of their transportation choices will have beneficial long-term effects. Hampton Roads would see more entrepreneurial approaches to shared ridership systems. Developers would devise communities with a better match between jobs, housing and amenities. Local governments would encourage more transportation-efficient patterns of development. The region would match its commitment to increasing transportation capacity with a commitment to reduce transportation demand.