archBOSTON ARCHIVE

[statler]

Mass. faces cuts in road projects
Federal funds $107m less than expected

By Mac Daniel, Globe Staff | January 28, 2006

Massachusetts will receive 20 percent less in federal road and bridge construction funds than federal authorities had estimated for this year, and the state faces cutbacks for years to come, state officials said yesterday.

The state will get $107 million less than expected this year and could get about $60 million less than expected next year.

The cutbacks, which federal transportation officials outlined this week, are bad news for the Commonwealth's roads and bridges, ranked the second and third worst in the nation, respectively. They are also a setback to Governor Mitt Romney's 20-year transportation plan, which was expected to get as much as half of its funding from the US government.

In addition, officials said the cuts will affect the timing of future projects, which will now have to wait longer for federal help after projects ahead of them were delayed by the cuts.

In a letter sent to legislative leaders yesterday, Transportation Secretary John Cogliano said state officials and regional planning organizations are starting to decide which projects to cut and which will be delayed. He expects a list of cuts to emerge this year, but warned that future cuts, though less drastic, were likely.

''This federal reduction will obviously have an impact on road and bridge projects throughout the state," Cogliano wrote. ''We expect that future reductions, though not of the same magnitude, will be required in the near term."

Cogliano said the cuts were ''beyond the control of the Commonwealth."

He explained that the Federal Highway Administration estimated in March that Massachusetts would receive $533 million a year in highway funding under the transportation bill that was pending in Congress.

When the new, multiyear highway funding bill finally passed in August, it was far less generous to Massachusetts, including only about $470 million a year.

President Bush signed into law the $286 billion transportation measure in August, after a long back and forth over the size of the bill that led Congress to trim the spending.

But by then, Massachusetts and other states had used earlier, more optimistic estimates to begin planning their road and bridge projects.

State Senator Steven A. Baddour, cochairman of the Legislature's Joint Transportation Committee, said yesterday that while specific cuts are unknown, the impact could be significant, not just for road and bridge repairs, but for the state's economy, as well.

''Transportation funding means jobs," he said. ''And the way you jump-start an economy is to spend construction dollars. This sort of pulls the rug out, and there's no need for it. It's just sloppy politics."

Representative Joseph F. Wagner, the other cochairman of the Joint Transportation Committee, said the impact could be minimal if the projects ready to be funded were already going to be delayed by environmental concerns or right-of-way or design issues.

But some localities ''are going to have to deal with bigger cuts than others," he said, and the state's ability to keep projects moving will diminish.

Baddour said the news also ''throws a monkey wrench" into the governor's transportation plan, a 20-year strategy announced last year to renovate the state's roads and bridges and avoid mega-projects such as the $14.6 billion Big Dig.

''These reductions mean that Governor Romney can't even break ground on his transportation plan," he said. ''His goal of bringing the state's roads and bridges into good repair and reducing choke points is clearly going to be delayed by many years and cannot be nearly as aggressive as he promised."

Despite concerns from Beacon Hill, Jon Carlisle, spokesman for the Executive Office of Transportation, sought to downplay the cuts.

Regarding bridge work, one of the most crucial issues in the state, ''we'll find a way to fund them," Carlisle said. ''Does that mean that another project may not move forward? Yes, it does."

Projects currently under construction, such as the expansion project on Route 128-Interstate 95, won't be affected by the cuts, he said.

Governor Romney's $31 billion transportation plan, unveiled last year, promised to spend $1.2 billion to repair 600 of the state's worst bridges over the next five years.

Romney said that he was counting on more than half of the $31 billion to come from federal funding, though state officials at the time conceded there was no guarantee the money would be received.

Decisions about which projects to cut will be based on their readiness, practicality, and the availability of state funding, officials said. In most cases, the public will have a 30-day review period to comment on proposed cuts before they are made.

Decisions on those cuts are expected to be made in the next several months. As part of the 20-year plan, state officials have said that the state's bridge needs alone amount to about $200 million a year. The MBTA requires about $450 million per year to maintain a state of good repair. Link

[dudeursistershot]

[Charliemta]

One solution to the budget shortfall for Massachusetts is to build more toll facilities, rather than relying on tax monies alone. The last toll highway to be built in Massachusetts was the Mass Turnpike extension in 1963. Other states, especially out west, have been building new toll facilities for years, and even partially converting old free expressways into partial toll ones to increase capacity and fund reconstruction of the entire roadway.

Southern California already has added toll high-occupancy lanes to old freeways. Congestion pricing is collected via EZ-pass type high tech toll collection. Varying toll rates are charged, depending on time of day and whether the car has a solo driver or a carpool.

Several aging expressways around eastern Mass could have these express lanes added via this toll funding, plus the remainder of the road fixed up using this funding as well. Also, it wouldn't hurt Massachusetts to build a few completely new toll highways where needed.

[quadratdackel]

Another solution is to raise the gas tax. This isn't quite as fair as tolls because money raised is independent of which roads get used, because people can refill out of state, and because this undertaxes those using fuel efficient vehicles (which isn't necessarily a bad thing, for other reasons). However, it's much easier to implement than tolls, especially for local roads. Well, technologically easier, if not politically easier. Either way, tolls and gas taxes are really more user fee than tax because they're how roads are in part paid for by those using them, just like we all pay to ride the T to help pay for that system.

Does anyone know if local roads and state highways receive any gas tax revenue or if they're 100% subsidized? I heard that only interstates receive gas tax revenue.