quincunx wrote:Pro tax side has all the money, but the no side has all the ink.
Stltoday.com - Editorial: MoDOT's list of shiny objects can't obscure problems with Amendment 7
This is very exciting. It’s sort of like the day after Halloween, when Christmas catalogs start to arrive in the mail. The kids sit down on the floor with a marker and circle the expensive toys they’d like to have. And not just the kids! Mom might tear out the page with the lovely cashmere sweater on it. Dad might swoon over the massaging rocker-recliner-flat-screen-TV-cum-beer-keg in the Sharper Image catalog. Everything’s cool until January, when the credit card bills arrive.
This constitutional amendment would impose a 0.75 percent increase in the state sales-and-use tax for 10 years to be used for transportation purposes.
Why it sounds like a great idea, in four words or less: God loves free highways.
First question normal people might want to ask themselves: Why on earth should Missourians turn their backs on the untold tens of millions of dollars that could be coming from out-of-state users of its highways in the form of higher fuel taxes and tolls?
My math has it at about $1,172,000,000 in road work and $320,000,000 in other modes (bike/ped being about 50% of that). So that's about 78.55% roads/bridges and about 21.45% other modes. (I docked 2% of all road/bridge totals and put it into bike/ped because generally any road project has about 2 to 10% bike/ped work, so I went with the lower number across the board)
Now if we bring in the EWG numbers from the Where We Stand: Transportation Issue, 87.6% of the region drives to work and 12.4% uses other modes. Amendment 7 in our region spends 78.55% of roads and bridges and 21.45% on other modes.
Also the $320m in other modes could leverage another $250-350m from other sources, so in total we could see an extra $600+m spent over the next 10 years on other modes (not counting existing funding metro, grg, ect have) and most of it will be in the city limits.
So you're saying we could MAYBE get a whooping $60m dollars a year to split between public transit, biking, pedestrian (and maybe some other stuff), and all we'd have to do is fully commit to maintaining and expanding a system of sprawl and make sure we in no way tie paying for that maintenance and expansion to the actual usage of the infrastructure.
Man. I don't know why I didn't see the light earlier.
Now if we bring in the EWG numbers from the Where We Stand: Transportation Issue, 87.6% of the region drives to work and 12.4% uses other modes. Amendment 7 in our region spends 78.55% of roads and bridges and 21.45% on other modes.
Just because a high percentage of our region drives to work, doesn't mean we should continue spending money on it. If we had a more extensive transit system, you would have a larger percentage using transit. This money shouldn't be spent to exacerbate our road problem.
Pat, you are right. But currently we aren't using our transit system to even close to capacity. If we could easily double the usage from 2.4% to 5.8 with the current system.
Jstriebel. $60m a year is nothing to sneeze at, two agencies that would benefit from is are metro and grg, it would push their combained yearly budgets to probably around $350 million a year, compared to MoDOT stl district around $350m with the additional $117m from A7
pat wrote:^Where? System wide? Are you including buses and rail in that?
Yes the whole system bus and rail, and yes I know buses aren't "sexy" like rail but places like Chicago bus more people then rail
Take a bus on some of the routes in stl county, you may be the only person on it
I agree that $60m per year is nothing to sneeze at, obviously there are things that can be done with it. But it's also not nearly enough to get excited about when considering the horrendous trade offs it will take to get that money.
It's no where near a fair or reasonable compromise.
As for not using our current transit system to capacity, that is NEVER going to happen. You can't judge the usage of an extremely flawed and often unusable system and then hold that against making the system better. When we optimize our bus routes and add a way for the densest part of our city (south city) to connect the existing infrastructure (without wasting an inordinate amount of their time) and stop pandering to people who just don't want to use the transit, then we can judge usage numbers.
Until then, using them as any sort of argument against creating a better system is nothing more than hogwash. Of course a poorly designed system isn't excelling. That's why we need to optimize the design.
Well you're not going to double bus usage in the county. It's not practical there. Its practical in the city. Something like BRT or rail would be better used in the county.
The point I'm trying to make is that we shouldn't continue to fund roads because that's 1. the most used option or 2. our transit system isn't the most efficiently designed. Roads are the most used transportation option because we haven't funded transit enough. If we actually put more money into transit, we'll have a more extensive and efficient system and thus a more used system.
Its illogical to put more money to one mode (roads) and think we'll somehow improve the other (transit). It seems reasonable to me that if you want to improve our transit system, your money allocation should reflect that. That's the only way to change it.
If our funding is 80% roads/20% transit, we will continue to have an 80/20 split on usage. That's just how I see it.
^ that's what I'm trying to say, before we expand we need to re-evaluate the current system and make the best use of it..after that is done and we see how usership is, then you expend where it's needed. You don't just expend now when the system isn't being used correctly. The re-evaluation process/re positioning is a 3-4 year thing. And expansion can follow that...unfortunately projects for A7 had to be selected yesterday and not in 2018 but by then metro should be swimming in that system expansion money known as Prop A
I have concerns about investing so much money in 1950's highway technology just before the world changes. According to this story in the Guardian, by 2025, the economics will make transition to driverless cars unstoppable.
"According to the Cisco trend watchers, the cost of owning a driverless car will be 75 percent less than the cost of owning a traditional vehicle. They attribute this to the elimination of traffic jams (less gas being spent), reduction in car accidents, and the likelihood that these vehicles will utilize cheaper, renewable resources like electricity (solar and wind), and/or hydrogen."
pat wrote:
Roads are the most used transportation option because we haven't funded transit enough. If we actually put more money into transit, we'll have a more extensive and efficient system and thus a more used system..
That's just not true. Just because metro has mishandled it's funding doesn't mean we don't fund transit. Local sales taxes fund transit at a tune of $220 million a year...again on par with MoDOTs stl district budget (MoDOT has
5 counties and metro 3)
Also if we get to 20% transit usage we would be #2 in the country behind NYC who has 31% transit useage by workforce.
Something people rarely talk about is peak oil and what implications that will have on driving everywhere. You got to wonder if it is a smart idea to rebuild I-70 without a HSR line in the middle.
Nobody worries about peak oil today unfortunately. It was big when I was in college 2004-2008, it's really died down since. Partly because of the rate of extraction of shale oil
^ Yes, but the cost of fuel is inevitable going to become more and more expensive, possibly making driving unaffordable to many people in our lifetime. I don't see electric cars as the solution either, because they will depend on burning fossil fuels behind the scenes. Alternative energy (wind, solar, etc.) sounds promising but they are underdeveloped and likely wont yield enough energy to fuel our current standard of living. What is sad is that nobody is talking about how we will downsize some of our major metropolitan areas. Sprawling into St. Charles and doubling down on autocentric living seems short sighted to me.
That's just not true. Just because metro has mishandled it's funding doesn't mean we don't fund transit. Local sales taxes fund transit at a tune of $220 million a year...again on par with MoDOTs stl district budget (MoDOT has
5 counties and metro 3)
Also if we get to 20% transit usage we would be #2 in the country behind NYC who has 31% transit useage by workforce.
We as a region have funded transit, yes. But that mostly goes to maintenance. State has given diddly squat.
To your first point, you don't expend on a system (roads) that is already overbuilt and its use is declining.
It sounds like you want a better transit system. How does this sales tax do that? Do you like the way our region's transportation is currently configured? This tax gives us more of the same.
And that's the main argument. What will this tax give us? It gives us the same but nicer roads. New roads in St Charles. Some bike stuff. And money for studies and maybe a bus on the highway. That's not a system I want or think the region needs. It doesn't do enough to improve transportation where people have been asking, transit.
goat314 wrote:^ Yes, but the cost of fuel is inevitable going to become more and more expensive, possibly making driving unaffordable to many people in our lifetime. I don't see electric cars as the solution either, because they will depend on burning fossil fuels behind the scenes. Alternative energy (wind, solar, etc.) sounds promising but they are underdeveloped and likely wont yield enough energy to fuel our current standard of living. What is sad is that nobody is talking about how we will downsize some of our major metropolitan areas. Sprawling into St. Charles and doubling down on autocentric living seems short sighted to me.
As oil prices increase consumption, due to improved fuel inefficiencies, will decrease possibly offsetting much of the cost.
dbInSouthCity wrote:^ that's what I'm trying to say, before we expand we need to re-evaluate the current system and make the best use of it..after that is done and we see how usership is, then you expend where it's needed. You don't just expend now when the system isn't being used correctly. The re-evaluation process/re positioning is a 3-4 year thing. And expansion can follow that...unfortunately projects for A7 had to be selected yesterday and not in 2018 but by then metro should be swimming in that system expansion money known as Prop A
I don't fully disagree with you. What I disagree with is the idea that we should commit to a bunch of haphazard road build outs and mediocre transit projects while we work on developing a smarter transit plan.
A7 is bad, bad, bad because bringing gas tax to where it should could fund the necessary infrastructure rebuild that is needed and tolling could offer a revenue source to give you a six lane I70 and or I44 as desired. At the same time, gas and tolling distributes the economics on more of a market base. First, users pay more but have the option to pursue more fuel efficient vehicles and or drive less. Second, the increase cost due to tolling of transporting goods is passed onto the consumers who buy those goods not a blanket tax that brick and mortar stores have to carry while the likes of Amazon gains twofold, first they have a competitive advantage with no sales tax collected on online sales and two, A7 increases such tax for infrastructure that clearly benefits online retailers just as everybody else.
Finally, Whether your with Rex or not, eliminating the income tax will still require a means to replace those revenues if you want to continue the level of services and school funding desired. A7 hurts those chances of decreasing income tax in the future. Otherwise, you get an outcome such as Kansas. I believe KS is having a tax shortfall from budget of three to four times greater than MO They are going to be in a world of hurt but at least they have a higher gas tax to maintain the road budget as well as some select tolling.
A little off the current topic, but I enjoyed (er, "enjoyed") this comment on the P-D Editorial:
(emphasis mine)
The "frills of "complete streets" is the problem and most expensive, barely mentioned here. You see evidence of the push in small towns like mine, and the initiative is NOT local...it is international. It is called "sustained development" which is social engineering. It would rob us with less freedom to get around, keeping people in controlled central locations and tiny housing. There are also considerations for a mileage tax to add to the abuse of human beings and the dwindling supply of our money. Some who may think this will be a good thing, do not understand the squeeze on individual freedom or a form of slavery. Watch out in your smaller areas for tall black street lights, sidewalks, bike paths, greenways, watersheds ad nauseum.
VOTE NO while you still can.
1. Few people here have said it's too much highway expansion, to me it's really not. Most of the road work is taking care or fixing existing system and anyone but total homers understand the need of fixing some of those roads, especially all the safety issues in Franklin and Jefferson counties. I-70 and 270 in north stl county are highly important to the economic life of the region. You just have to accept that people and companies rather be out there then in the city. I love living in the city and tossing a beer from my deck to my neighbor next door on his deck, but I understand some people like living on 2-3 acres. All of the road projects on that list will get done with or without A7 because gas tax will be raised if this doesn't pass (more later on gas vs sales tax later) what won't get done is the $320 million of other projects that will leverage another 300-400m in those modes.
2. Why those others modes won't get done.. Some of you have said vote no on this and let's pass a local tax...there is literally 0 chance of that in my book, this area just passed a tax for GRG/arch and metos prop A. If the city (slay) proposed something, the project list would be the same as this one. I trust MoDOT more to get these other modes done then I would trust metro or grg ...metro is horrible at managing its money and projects and grg just doesn't have the people (side note; really worried that they can pull off the arch thing without outside help) MoDOT has a long history of getting these things done on time and under budget and they have the people. Despite what some of the options you hold about MoDOT, they really are one of the top 10 DOTs in the country when it comes to getting this done.
3. I really like the city project like, I think it will make the city a better place to live and a friendlier place for biking, walking and transit. With 2 of the brt routes funded by this and metro only pitching in less then half, the next thing on metros expansion list is MetroLink...so this would move up the timeline on that.
4. Gas tax vs sales tax. I've ran numbers before and posted here. Since a gas tax will most likely be raised by 20 cents because they will go for a homerun since you can't pass gas tax all the time...a cost of a 20 cent gas hike is $80 to $160 a year extra for 87% of the people. Sales tax that excludes groceries , meds, rent/mortage ect will cost an average person between $20 and 45$ extra a year. And it will benefit 100% of the people, gas tax would benefit the 87% that drive. (Side note, the 87% that drive would probably pay 98% of this sales tax too)
5. Truckers don't pay their fair share...this is pure rhetoric to me...whatever the funding mechanism is the truckers won't pay it, you will. And besides most of the truckers in are small independent business run by people that buy a lot of things that are taxable by this sales tax
That's all I can think of for now. I'll add things later
