The pending rebuilding of Highway 40 will have significant impact on MetroLink and MetroBus. Buses will be rerouted with the rebuilding of major bridges across the highway beginning with Kingshighway this coming spring. Metro, with the opening of the
Cross County alignment and the scheduled opening of a 1200 car parking garage at the Brentwood I-64 MetroLink Station at
Eager Rd. will provide alternatives for commuters from the south commuting to Clayton, the
Central West End and downtown.
But much of this extra service will cost Metro additional money. Larry Salci estimates the number to be $7 million in additional costs to provide additional buses and more frequent MetroLink service. Who should pay for it? MoDOT says not us. MoDOT Head Pete Rahn hides behind the Missouri Constitution supposed prohibition of spending state gas tax dollars of things other than roads and bridges. What Rahn fails to point out that MoDOT has many times spent gas tax dollars on mitigation for road projects such as adding park land to Creve Coeur Park when the Page Avenue extension went through the park. Several years ago under previous leadership, MoDOT funded extra bus service when the Blanchette Bridge was being rebuilt.
What’s more the federal dollars in the Highway 40 project face no such restrictions. State Senator Joan Bray said Ohio recently completed funded new bus service that paralleled a major road reconstruction project. Missouri is one of the lowest ranked states in terms of flexing money from highways to transit and should do better.
The St. Louis political and business leadership should insist that MoDOT fund additional costs incurred by Metro during the reconstruction of Highway 40. After all, how many times have you heard state officials complain about “no unfunded mandates” from the federal government. The same should hold true from the state government. Rahn at some future date will want voters to approve additional tax dollars for roads and bridges. He should keep this in mind when trying to win favor with large voter blocks in the Metropolitan St. Louis area where voters are more likely to support tax increases.
1 Comments:
Drivers should pay, that's who. Put tolls on the highway to pay for its maintenance. Use EZ-Pass technology to do this without slowing traffic, and vary the tolls so they are priced based on market demand at the specific time and place. Roads and highways should be paid for by their users; not the general public. General revenue should go to transit because it is socially, environmentally, and economically healthier. We're artificially subsidizing the cost of driving so it's far less than its true environmental cost. We should be subsidizing lower fares for transit (St. Louis' are quite high now) and raising them for cars.
Raising the low state gas tax, with rebates to the lowest income drivers like Canada does, is worth considering too. So is raising the sales tax on expensive and high-polluting vehicles. Part of why Europeans don't drive so much is that far fewer of them own cars, which is largely because sales taxes on cars there can be 40%. If you can pay $30,000 for a car, you can most definitely pay a 10% sales tax on it.
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