Higher gas tax or tolls choices to fund roads

March 24, 2007

By Suzanne Ashe, The Herald-Zeitung

Gov. Rick Perry said Friday that he and his supporters took a bold step authorizing a private and public partnership to build roads and get traffic moving in the state.

He made the remarks at the 41st Annual Texas legislative Conference in New Braunfels.

“Some criticism has escalated on the issue of toll roads,” he said. “I simply ask if you have a better idea to get traffic moving in this state, lay your ideas on the table, let’s debate them. Our options are simple — either build toll roads, slow roads or no roads.”

A panel of experts discussed Perry’s plan — the Trans Texas Corridor — at length in a morning session of the conference. It included Ric Williamson, chairman of the Texas Transportation Commission, State Sen. Jeff Wentworth, and Ric Ridings, project manager of the Central Texas Mobility Authority.

Wentworth said that there are three options to decrease congestion and increase mobility in the state.

“We can do nothing. We can raise the gas tax. Or, we can build toll roads which is the way we’re going but it could change some this session,” he said.

Wentworth said that 23 million people live in Texas today. By 2040, there will be 45 million people living in the state, he said.

“We have to build more transportation infrastructure for our children and grandchildren,” he said.

Wiliamson said that 45 million people living in the state by 2040 was an underestimate.

“The high end is 53 million people,” he said. “The density of growth will be spread out over a geographic area roughly the size of the state of Ohio.”

Williamson said that 80 to 88 percent of that growth will be along the “golden triangle” which includes Interstates 35, 45, 10, U.S. Highway 290 and Texas 59.

“The only alternative is to plan now for parallel roads to handle that traffic,” he said.

Perry said he is against an increase in the gas tax, which he said could be raised to provide the funds if toll roads are not built. Currently, the state levies a 20-cents per gallon tax.

“The only way we can access as much money and build roads nearly as quickly is if we raise the gas tax by 75 cents to one dollar a gallon,” he said. “The fact is if you want roads, either pass record tax increases on gasoline or we implement a user fee like we have started that charges you for that road.”

“In a fantasy of dreams, we say, if we don’t build it they will not come — that’s what the city planners in Austin hoped for 30 years ago,” he said. “That didn’t happen and they have a nightmare. It’s the largest city in America that doesn’t have a loop around it.”

Williamson said that toll roads will get trucks off of the existing roads and shift containers onto freight rail. He also said that no one forces drivers to pay a toll, that it’s up to the consumer to use the toll road or not.

Williamson also addressed a hot button issue cited by many toll road opponents: Letting a foreign company build roads in Texas.

“The Spanish company competed in a fair competition and won the right to plan the program,” he said. “The state reserved the right to take the Spanish plan and can use it. They don’t have the right to build anything.”

Perry also took a hard stance about foreign companies operating in Texas.

“There are those who complain about foreign companies building our roads. I guess I missed the letters of protest over Toyota, Nokia and other foreign owned companies that do business in our state that employee thousands of our Texans,” he said. “We live in a very interdependent global economy and those states and nations that recognize the economy beyond their borders and welcome free trade are the ones that will grow and prosper. The ones that take an isolationist approach will only harm their own people.”