Lawmakers push privatized toll roads, putting affordable travelout of

On Tue, 29 Mar 2011 07:52:25 -0400, "C. E. White"
> wrote:

>
>"Ashton Crusher" > wrote in message
.. .
>> On Mon, 28 Mar 2011 09:03:51 -0400, "C. E. White"
>> > wrote:
>>
>>>
> wrote in message
...
>>>> reach.
>>>>
>>>> http://www.libertypost.org/cgi-bin/r...?ArtNum=305224
>>>>
>>>> Don't Mess With Texas!
>>>> cuhulin
>>>
>>>The great thing about toll roads is not only do state governments not have
>>>to spend gas tax revenue on them, they still get to collect gas tax
>>>revenue
>>>from drivers that use them. Sort of a double bonus...
>>>
>>>Ed
>>>
>>
>> For most of the Toll roads you've been screwed up front when the state
>> gave away billions in land for $1. No one could afford the tolls if
>> the value of the land was included in them.
>
>That does not appear to be the cae for the extortion road they are building
>in my area. While the state is turning over some land previously purchased
>for the right of way (when it was planned to be a normal "free" road), the
>budget also includes significant dollars for additional land purchases. And
>the buisness case presented looks great - to great in fact. It appears they
>are going to charge tolls about 50% higher than necessary to cover the
>actual cost of building and maintaining the raod. The tolls are not being
>based on covering costs, they are being based on collecting the maximum
>revenue. This seems criminal to me. I assume the profits are going to line
>the pockets of the poiticians that voted to divert money from the highway
>trust fund to other uses and then claimed there wasn't enough money to build
>needed roads...
>
>Ed
>


I was talking about when they convert existing roads. If it's out in
sparsely populated areas they might be able to make a go of it as long
as there are no good alternatives.