Verona Road/US 151 study alternative

[ET21]

Still trying to figure out what is supposed to magically happen between 2017 and 2020 that will magically make these funds appear...

Unless they raise the gas tax, the money won't be there.

Unfortunately as stated before, the entire state would revolt against a gas tax especially considering the volatility of prices over the last decade

[tchafe1978]

Still trying to figure out what is supposed to magically happen between 2017 and 2020 that will magically make these funds appear...

Unless they raise the gas tax, the money won't be there.

Not to get political, but I no longer like Scott Walker. What exactly is he trying to accomplish here? You can't just cut taxes/regulations and let it be a free for all. I thought there was supposed to be a dedicated fund for transportation monies?

It's a tough situation.  Walker isn't the only politician that doesn't want to raise the gas tax.  Congress doesn't want to raise the federal gas tax either because people will revolt against it, and gas prices are a sensitive issue as it is.  John Oliver on HBO did a segment on crumbling infrastructure, and he showed a CSPAN segment where everyone who called in was against a gas tax increase and no one called in for support.  There was an automatic 1cent/year gas tax increase, but that ended under Jim Doyle.  At the same time, he doubled auto registration fees.  The reason why the gas tax doesn't go up is because it's a hard sell and considered political suicide.

It wasn't "1 cent/year", it varied based on the rate of inflation.  One year (early 1990s), the rate went DOWN slightly in the annual adjustment.

I'm to the point of strongly advocating repealing the segregated transport fund and special fuel tax entirely, replacing it with the regular retail sales tax, and putting roads and other transport on the general fund.

One counterpoint to the 'revolt' thing, how many incumbent Republican legislators in Michigan lost their seats in the first election after they approved an increase in their fuel tax rate a few years ago?

Mike

Unfortunately, you're not going to see the transportation fund get rolled into the general fund anytime soon. If you may recall, in last fall's election, voters passed a constitutional amendment stating that the transportation fund was to be used for transportation only. One argument for the amendment was that keeping transportation money for transportation only may help the fund stay solvent, but obviously that isn't happening, because revenues are down. Walker is too focused on scoring political points that you'll never see any kind of tax increase (that he'll admit to anyway) as long as he is governor. In my opinion, all the borrowing he proposed in the budget wasn't the way to go either. The gas tax needs to be raised one way or another. Gas prices have been falling, so people aren't going to feel it as much. Another thing is I think the state did take on to many big projects at once, which I think is another reason for all these projects getting delayed. I think they need to prioritize them, and finish one before starting another.

[I-39]

Still trying to figure out what is supposed to magically happen between 2017 and 2020 that will magically make these funds appear...

Unless they raise the gas tax, the money won't be there.

Not to get political, but I no longer like Scott Walker. What exactly is he trying to accomplish here? You can't just cut taxes/regulations and let it be a free for all. I thought there was supposed to be a dedicated fund for transportation monies?

It's a tough situation.  Walker isn't the only politician that doesn't want to raise the gas tax.  Congress doesn't want to raise the federal gas tax either because people will revolt against it, and gas prices are a sensitive issue as it is.  John Oliver on HBO did a segment on crumbling infrastructure, and he showed a CSPAN segment where everyone who called in was against a gas tax increase and no one called in for support.  There was an automatic 1cent/year gas tax increase, but that ended under Jim Doyle.  At the same time, he doubled auto registration fees.  The reason why the gas tax doesn't go up is because it's a hard sell and considered political suicide.

It wasn't "1 cent/year", it varied based on the rate of inflation.  One year (early 1990s), the rate went DOWN slightly in the annual adjustment.

I'm to the point of strongly advocating repealing the segregated transport fund and special fuel tax entirely, replacing it with the regular retail sales tax, and putting roads and other transport on the general fund.

One counterpoint to the 'revolt' thing, how many incumbent Republican legislators in Michigan lost their seats in the first election after they approved an increase in their fuel tax rate a few years ago?

Mike

Unfortunately, you're not going to see the transportation fund get rolled into the general fund anytime soon. If you may recall, in last fall's election, voters passed a constitutional amendment stating that the transportation fund was to be used for transportation only. One argument for the amendment was that keeping transportation money for transportation only may help the fund stay solvent, but obviously that isn't happening, because revenues are down. Walker is too focused on scoring political points that you'll never see any kind of tax increase (that he'll admit to anyway) as long as he is governor. In my opinion, all the borrowing he proposed in the budget wasn't the way to go either. The gas tax needs to be raised one way or another. Gas prices have been falling, so people aren't going to feel it as much. Another thing is I think the state did take on to many big projects at once, which I think is another reason for all these projects getting delayed. I think they need to prioritize them, and finish one before starting another.

And the Verona Road and I-39/90 rebuild projects should be at or near the top of the list. Both are long overdue.

This goes back to what I've stated MANY times on this forum. WisDOT spends WAY too much money overbuilding it's roads, such as making every major corridor a four lane high-quality expressway or interstate-like freeway. Then when it comes time to rebuild major things, they don't have enough money. They press ahead with unnecessary (and overbuilt) stuff like US 10 between Marshfield and Stevens Point, WIS 26 between Janesville and Watertown, the US 12 Baraboo bypass, US 14 upgrades south of Madison, and the list goes on and on.

The only highways that need to be full-blown freeways or high-quality expressway are the backbone routes in the Connections 2030 plan.

And it's a good thing they have a separate Transportation fund, otherwise, this money would go towards other things. Since cars are only getting more fuel efficient, the gas tax should be raised. I don't think people understand the consequences of not maintaining and upgrading infrastructure over the long term.
I have no idea what Walker and the Wisconsin Legislature is trying to accomplish here? 

[GeekJedi]

Ahhhh, the repeal of the annual indexing to keep the fuel tax rate level with inflation was repealed under James Doyle, Walker's predecessor.

Mike

And yet, neither Walker nor anyone else in Madison makes any effort to improve the situation. So you can't really blame it on Doyle, all these years later.

[peterj920]

If there's anyone to blame, it's public opinion.  The public does not want a gas tax increase.  When Jim Doyle repealed the automatic indexing of the gas tax, it was a politically popular move, and he took advantage of it by campaigning that he repealed it and even used it in re-election ads.  Neither party is going to increase it.  Republicans won't because they have the reputation for keeping taxes low, and they would be seen as betraying the public if they would increase taxes.  In states where Democrats are the minority and the US Congress, they won't propose increasing the gas tax either because if they would, that issue would be used against them when trying to regain control.  Politicians from both parties do campaign on fixing roads and infastructure, but they don't say how to pay for it.  I can guarantee that you won't find a single political campaign anywhere in the country that wants to increase the gas tax.

[Roadguy]

I wouldn't expect this to be the last delay for Verona Road (and other majors projects http://wisconsindot.gov/Pages/projects/6yr-hwy-impr/maj-hwy/default.aspx)...  if the next budget passed 2 years from now doesn't add funding expect more delays. 

It has been interesting to watch WisDOT adjust to this sudden change in funding.  They have been a very expansion oriented DOT and basically been given a blank check by the legislature and governor over the past 25 years.  I don't think they realize how good they had it compared to other states (many have ended any expansion projects and cannot keep up with the existing system).  This funding shift hit them suddenly and they were not prepared for it.  Many of the ongoing projects (Verona, Zoo, 441, North-South) all assumed the funding stream would remain as is to stay on schedule.  Other states fully fund their projects before projects hit the ground running (a hard learned lesson for WisDOT).

This news release of delays for Verona and 39/90 are only the first of many that we will see in the next few months.