A Woman Who Speaks Her Mind


I was very impressed with Gail Achterman’s remarks at the City Club presentation on Friday. [Not that I was not impressed with your remarks too, Rex, but I’ve heard them before :-)]

You can download the full program (MP3, 21.1M) from City Club’s web site for a few weeks.

Gail says what she believes. Here are a few highlights:

  • Replacing our current funding model with something like a public utility commission model that set rates not just for roads, but also for rail and other modes. This would take rate setting out of political mode and lock it into a fiscally sound model.
  • Replace the gas tax with a new revenue stream that is not constitionally dedicated to one mode.
  • Replace JPACT with a body that has both a broader scope (e.g., includes rail and marine transportation) and has a more inclusive membership.
  • Take ramp meters to their logical conclusion and close some freeway ramps to keep the system flowing.

She did not pull any punches. I was impressed. One friend suggested she wished Gail would run for Governor…


50 responses to “A Woman Who Speaks Her Mind”

  1. Take ramp meters to their logical conclusion and close some freeway ramps to keep the system flowing.

    I’d like to see this. I read once (wish I could remember where, or who said it) that if all freeway trips under five miles were eliminated, freeway congestion would vanish. If true, that’s pretty easy to accomplish: one set of ramps every five miles or so. In the case of the Banfield, there might be an unbroken ribbon of freeway from downtown or MLK/Grand to I-205. !-205 itself might have access points at Airport Way, Powell and Sunnyside Road. Leave freeways for long-distance trips, and let traffic disperse over the arterial grid for shorter ones.

    I doubt we could close that many ramps at once, but it would be reasonable to start closing some of them and see how traffic patterns and congestion are affected.

  2. I think that the Banfield and 205 should’ve been built with thru-lanes. Same idea as djk, but with two dedicated lanes from downtown Portland non-stop to 181st or further. This gives drivers the opportunity to bypass all those on-off ramps, the 205 interchange, etc.

    And if we’re going to push for local traffic on local arterials, that includes 99E, which the streetcar DOES NOT belong on! Contradictory isn’t it?

  3. Take ramp meters to their logical conclusion and close some freeway ramps to keep the system flowing.

    So the proposal is to reduce some people’s access to the freeway so that others can drive faster? It sounds like a proposal from someone from the state highway department to relieve the burden on state highways by dumping the traffic onto local streets.

    Put this in the context of I5 and you can see the direction the DOT’s are going. First you widen the bridge. Then, to deal with the extra traffic, you close on/off ramps in North Portland that aren’t heavily used by Clark County commuters.

    The result is that if you live in North Portland it takes you just as long to get downtown as if you live in rural Clark County. And if you work in Wilsonville, it will take you longer than someone living in Clark County. And there will be extra traffic and congestion on the local streets as people use them to get to and from the remaining access points or as alternatives to using the freeway.

    Yeh, I know people in North Portland who work downtown are supposed to use transit. But then, so are the people who live in Clark County.

  4. This is one of the few times that I disagree with Ross. While I acknowledge that there are equity issues that need to be addressed, I would hope that Ross agrees that encouraging short trips on freeways is part of the triple-convergence effect of concentrating trips on one corridor that causes congestion. There are a lot of public policy ends served by encouraging short trips to use the street grid (although I don’t know that 5 miles is the magic number).

    This could also be managed by time of day. Closing some ramps during rush would be an interesting signal about usage of the system. Or you could look at doing it with pricing. If you’re using a transponder-based tolling system, you could put a premium price on short trips.

  5. I live in NE Portland. Sometimes I take MLK into town but sometimes I take the freeway. Whether I do or not depends on how busy the freeway is — if it’s too busy then I can figure out myself to take the other way. I would be mad as hell if the onramp was closed to make the commute easier for people living further out. But this is mostly moot for me because I live close enough to be able to ride my bike, unless I have to drive far someplace else after work. If those folks driving in from Clark County weren’t busy using our freeways five days a week (and adding their pollution to my neighborhood) I might have some sympathy for them.

  6. Actually San Francisco has a law on the books that states that the state or the city is not allowed to expand the 101 freeway between i think Potrero hill and downtown San Francisco because it would induce local freeway trips. It also discourages through trips at rush hour from the South Peninsula to the East Bay because they know the freeway is full. It also encourages transit and the use of the existing grid which can handle traffic better than a freeway which dumps everyone onto one street where the exits are. It also strengthens the urban core as a destination. I think you might get the same effect in Portland.

  7. I would hope that Ross agrees that encouraging short trips on freeways is part of the triple-convergence effect of concentrating trips on one corridor that causes congestion.

    I do agree. But the length of the trip from Portland Avenue downtown is the same whether one is already on the freeway or not.

    Maybe the solution is to close the downtown exits off the freeway to SOV’s during rush hour. That would reserve the freeway for people who are trying to get past downtown. And it would encourage people who work downtown to use its very robust transit system.

  8. I want to expand on that a bit. It seems to me the purpose of the transportation system is to provide access.

    For someone living in North Portland getting to Wilsonville via transit is possible, but difficult. Same with many of the office parks in Washington county. These destinations are, given the current state of the alternatives, reasonable uses of an automobile. The same is true if you live in Clark County and work in Wilsonville or Beaverton.

    Shutting freeway entrances in North Portland either eliminates that access for people living there or channels all that traffic to a few remaining entrances (in effect transferring the congestion from the freeway to the local street network). In effect you are making Clark County a better place to live for someone who works in Wilsonville than North Portland.

    My somewhat off the wall suggestion of closing freeway exits to downtown really addresses the problem by limiting access where there are alternatives. People who need to go to Wilsonville will have a relatively quicker trip, while those who work downtown will either make use transit or have a longer trip on local streets.

    Of course the question is does limiting freeway access at rush hour also reduce downtown’s competitiveness. I suspect it does and probably in ways that are unacceptable. The same is true of closing other ramps. Reducing people’s access to jobs and services to benefit people who choose lengthy commutes is not just an equity issue. It is setting up incentives that are counterproductive.

  9. “Replacing our current funding model with something like a public utility commission model that set rates not just for roads”

    Any rate setting for transport must follow two basic principals: “User Pays” and be “financially self-sustainable” (without non-user and so-called development tool taxpayer subsidies for infrastructure, operations and maintenance). In other words, taxes and fees assessed on driving would only pay for and be directed to streets, roads and highways, transit fares would completely cover the costs of providing the service, and bicyclists would be totally responsible for paying for bike lanes and other specialized bicycle infrastructure. Eliminated would be using the tax code for social engineering purposes such as using the taxes from one mode to subsidize another mode, and using the tax code as an attempt apply government controls to the choice of mode people make.

  10. Terry,

    Sam Adams is asserting at his street maintenance town hall meetings that a mere 1.5% of PDOT capital funds go toward bicycle infrastructure (for an approximately 3% commuting mode share). Your persistent assertions that this minor siphoning of motorist fees constitutes an injustice has not convinced me. I appreciate your position but I don’t think that a few scraps for some paint on an existing roadway is unjustified, given the rapidly growing demand for other transportation options. Honestly, what is the opportunity cost that motorists pay for a bike lane or 2?

  11. what is the opportunity cost that motorists pay for a bike lane or 2?

    Motorists get more benefit for the buck from bike infrastructure than they do from more roads. But Terry’s complaint seems to be with the benefit to bicyclists, not that motorists aren’t getting their money’s worth of benefits.

  12. “Sam Adams is asserting at his street maintenance town hall meetings that a mere 1.5% of PDOT capital funds go toward bicycle infrastructure…”

    Hearing it at all five meetings, I believe Sam stated that 1.5 percent of PDOT’s “budget” goes towards bicycle infrastructure. This is in addition to all the Federal gas tax dollars funneled through Metro and gas tax dollars from state grants that go to pay for bicycle infrastructure. Also at each meeting, the issue of bicyclists paying a tax was brought up by the public. Sam needs to listen to these voices, put that question on the next survey and then tax bicyclists an appropriate amount so that after administrative costs, bicyclists directly contribute that 1.5 percent of the PDOT budget.

  13. With capitol projects muddying the waters of what Sam is billing as a need for street maintenance funding, I can not support a Street Maintenance Fee because it attempts to bypass the “User Pays” tax fairness principals by taking dollars paid by non-users of specialized bicycle infrastructure as another subsidy to pay for what bicyclists should be directly taxed to pay for. A Street Maintenance Fee also does not address collecting funds from people that regularly use Portland streets but live outside the city. I could only support a Street Maintenance Fee under one of two conditions; either motorists would be allowed to receive tax credit deductions for gas taxes paid out while driving, and/or the condition that all monies derived from the fee could only be used for street maintenance and not for building new infrastructure and/or redirected to capitol projects.

    Furthermore, a person only has to look at the history of the sewer tax also applied to City of Portland utility bills. It was sold to the public and put in place as a fifty cents a month “temporary” tax. Once in place it became permanent and continued to balloon. Now Portland has some of the highest sewer taxes and fees in the nation, in part because the developers of increased and high density development are not paying their own way. Payments from household utility bills are already going to subsidize the development costs of one platinum project, the big pipe. Ratepayers must not be exploited again to also subsidize a platinum bicycle plan that would allow bicyclists to continue freeload and pedal free.

    Sam has asked for other funding suggestions and ideas at each of the town hall meetings. Each and every time a bicycle tax has been brought forward by someone in attendance. As Transportation Commissioner, Sam has the duty and responsibility to respect his constituency advice and advance those suggestions not only by including a bicycle tax on the list of proposals in the next public survey, but also by implementing a bicycle tax under the “user pays’ tax fairness principals in an amount that would pay both the administrative costs of administering the tax, and contribute an amount equal to the approximately one and one half percent of the PDOT budget that is spent on bicycle infrastructure. Additionally, as unpopular as it may be, under the “user pays” tax fairness principals, Sam must also look to increasing transit fares or adding a surcharge to transit fares to help pay for street maintenance since as he said at four of the five meetings, TriMet’s busses (with two axles) do the heaviest damage to Portland streets.

    From my own prospective, any tax increase must include a combination of ideas. Good policy requires that “user pays” be first and foremost before any additional taxes are increased on those users who already directly pay. Since motorists already pay fuel taxes, registration and license fees that pay for roads, a bicycle tax and a transit surcharge for roads would be first on the list to implement. Then to make sure both those who live and/or work in Portland pay a share, a payroll or employer tax would be in order. Because a Street Maintenance Fee would further add to the higher costs of living in Portland and only drive even more families to the lower cost suburbs it should probably be dismissed. I would also consider implementing a commercial parking tax, but only if it is used for street maintenance. Finally, with all of the funding sources in place, street maintenance must come first and take total priority over adding any new infrastructure or capitol projects. Separating the funding requests would even be better.

  14. even though i pretty much disagree with terry parker, and ignore his mostly repetitive posts, i am starting to think that some sort of bicycle purchase/registration fee might be a good idea. this has nothing to do with the miniscule, yet determined, percentage of the population composed of bitter drivers (and other assorted curmudgeons) who feel inconvenienced by bicycles. it’s just that a nominal bicycle fee dedicated to infrastructure improvements above and beyond what our current revenue sources are capable of providing could really get more cyclists on the roads, thus generating more revenue, providing more funding for infrastructure improvements, etc…

  15. Whenever you look at tax policy, the method and cost of collecting the tax has to come into play.

    If you want a bicycle registration fee, then you need a system to register bikes and collect the fee. All the informed folks I’ve spoken to about this say that this would cost more than you would collect.

    An alternative would be to add a fee to the sale of every new bicycle, but that would punish bike shops inside Portland versus those outside and still require some new bureaucracy.

    That’s one of the reasons a Street Maintenance Fee is high on Sam’s list of proposed funding solutions – there’s already a collection mechanism (your water bill).

  16. “Ratepayers must not be exploited again to also subsidize a platinum bicycle plan that would allow bicyclists to continue freeload and pedal free.”

    Terry, you are of course referring to the 1/5 of one penny that each citizen was forced to pay (robbed?) for the social engineering agenda the city has adopted to force our fair citizens to use; namely that dastardly bicycle.

    When will this madness stop?!?!? More importantly, how do I get my 1/5 of one penny back?!?!

  17. ^ You could always pick a WHOLE penny off the ground. Downtown is littered with them, since they otherwise have no real value by themselves.

    ;)

  18. blah blah blah “user pays” blah blah blah

    Most people at the meeting I was at seemed to be more into the progressive tax based system for the roads, instead of users pays. The rich generally get more value out of our civilized society, (which includes our transportation system,) than the poor, who are generally just trying to get by…

    “All the informed folks I’ve spoken to about this say that this would cost more than you would collect.”

    The issue isn’t just the actually cost of staffing the DMVs to collect the money, it is the cost of enforcement, and plates themselves and everything else, with the realization that for every dollar you raise the fee, less people will bicycle… Yes, I wouldn’t mind paying $100/yr now, but if you told me that I needed to do that when I first started riding, I never would have started in the first place. At some price, there would be so few bicycles that PDOT wouldn’t spend any money on bicycle infrastructure, which would mean that they’d have 1.5% more money to spend on auto infrastructure, and the 3.5% that were bicycling would then start driving and end up paying more gas taxes, (which is only part of PDOT’s revenue.) In the end, you’d be talking about ~2.5% more money to spend on cars infrastructure and 3.5% more cars… Yes, it would be fairer than the current system, but it would make PDOT’s problems even worse than they are right now…

    pacowan, I totally agree. I don’t know of a way to directly pay for bicycle infrastructure right now, (although I imagine that if you wanted to give PDOT a bunch of money and told them to spend it someplace, they probably wouldn’t turn you down,) but you can join the BTA or the CCC or any number of other political groups that try to get more bicycles and bicycle infrastructure in the system, via a combination of lobbying politicians, and outreach to potential riders, (which both have better return on investment than directly funding the infrastructure anyways.) Likewise, if you want to do the work yourself, there are various clean up activities: I know of a group that cleans the I-205 path, and one that does the paths in N Portland. (There are probably others too, but I don’t know about them.) See either the calender on this site, or on BikePortland.org for info on those.

  19. The “who pays” is an interesting argument. There has NEVER been a pure “user pay” system in the US. I was perusing the new book on Streetcars put out by Reconnecting America and there is a section on how the streetcar companies, through farebox revenue and land sales, paid for building and paving most city streets in the country. One reason that streetcar couldn’t compete with the auto is that motorists were “free riders”, using the streets built by the streetcar companies yet not paying a cent!

    The one jurisdiction with the best condition roads in the region is Washington County. Where do they get the money to build new roads and maintain the old ones? Property Tax! The MSTIP program had three successful property tax levies that were rolled into their tax base by Measure 50. But, if one was to look into how the roads were built and paid for even in Portland, the gas tax/user fee on motorists paid for very little: the land was required to be dedicated (for free) by land developers, the streetcar companies paid to pave the streets and property taxes were and are used to pay for most improvements.

    The “who pays” argument is just a red herring. The real question is: “how do we want our communities to look and function?” We all want clean air, safe streets, less time on the road, access to opportunity. What investments buy us the most of these goods at the least cost is what we should be debating.

  20. The “who pays” is an interesting but misdirected and unhelpful argument. There has NEVER been a pure “user pay” system for paying transportation in the US. There has always been subsidies of one sort or another for every transportation mode (maybe not for walking cross country). Land was given to railroads, developers put in streets in order to sell houses, electric companies subsidized streetcars to build markets for their power, the feds subsidized the auto, concrete and oil industries to build manufacturing and control other countries.

    I was perusing the new book on Streetcars put out by Reconnecting America and there is a section on how the streetcar companies, through farebox revenue and land sales, paid for building and paving most city streets in the country until after WWII. One reason that streetcars couldn’t compete with the auto is that motorists were “free riders”, using the streets built by the streetcar companies yet not having to pay for construction or maintenance!

    The one jurisdiction with the best condition roads in the region is Washington County. Where do they get the additional money to build new roads and maintain the old ones? Property Tax! The Major Street Improvement program (MSTIP) were three successful property tax levies that got rolled into their tax base by Measure 50. Its not gas taxes or motorist fees that are making the difference.

    But, if one was to look into how the roads were built and paid for even in Portland, the gas tax/user fee on motorists paid for very little: the land under streets was required to be dedicated (for free) by land developers (and pays no property tax), the streetcar companies paid to pave the streets and property taxes paid for many improvements.

    The “who pays” argument is just a red herring. The real question is: “how do we want our communities to look and function?” We all want clean air, safe streets, less time on the road, access to opportunity. What investments buy us the most of these goods at the least cost is what we should be debating.

  21. The “who pays” argument is just a red herring.

    While I agree that is true as it is often used, the “who pays” question is an important part of the discussion of equity and environmental justice. If the issue is how fairly burdens and benefits are apportioned, then who pays is part of the discussion of burdens.

    And that is not an abstract question. It goes to the heart of the discussion of tolling that is used to pay only a portion of the costs of the tolled facility. “Who pays” the rest of that cost is a significant issue. Especially if the only benefit is to those paying the tolls.

  22. Well, right now nobody is paying. Or at least, not at the level that we need to be. And that means that our children will pay, either in the form of actually paying to fix the roads, or because the roads will be so bad that the US will be uncompetitive…

    But that is the same problem we face at all levels in our society, from Social Security, to our houses…

  23. And that means that our children will pay,

    Perhaps this is as appropriate of a time as any to bring up (once again) that the financial (not to mention human) cost we are paying for the war in Iraq could have bought:

    * 766 light rail lines (based on MAX Green Line costs) or
    * 4,966 streetcar systems (based on Portland Streetcar capital costs to-date.) or
    * 18,375 starter busway/BRT projects (based on Eugene EmX costs) or
    * 116 underground, high-capacity, heavy rail subway systems (based on initial phase of NYC 2nd ave. subway)

    Or any combination of your preferred, currently-neglected government-funded projects or programs.

    – Bob R.

  24. “If you want a bicycle registration fee, then you need a system to register bikes and collect the fee. All the informed folks I’ve spoken to about this say that this would cost more than you would collect.”

    The simple answer here is to charge a higher fee, one that includes both covering administration costs and provides funding. The playing field for the “user pays” Tax Fairness Principals concept (which Sam presented slide 60) must be leveled before any increased transportation taxes, be it a Street Maintenance Fee or otherwise, are imposed on those stakeholders who already carry the financial load and currently subsidize others. Additionally, if initiated, a Street Maintenance Fee should be just that, and not a building fund subsidizing capitol projects. Furthermore, it is bad public policy for politicians and bicyclist advocates to continually block polling citizens on implementing a bicycle tax just so they can continue with their freeloading ways. Both a bicycle tax question and a transit fare increase/surcharge need to be included on Sam’s next transport funding survey. It is all about establishing tax equity and stopping the political proliferation of the absence of a full range of “user pays” funding options.

  25. “The simple answer here is to charge a higher fee, one that includes both covering administration costs and provides funding.”

    Terry, I trust that you want to extend the same approach to trucks and autos? And what happens with the admistrative costs take more than the benefit to the cyclist? Keep in mind that most of the costs for cycling “infrastructure” have to do with keeping cyclists safe because of cars. So, in effect, you want to tax me for “benefits” that I wouldn’t need in a balanced system.

    Finally, there is nothing stopping you or any group from conducting a poll on taxing cyclists. I don’t think anyone is spending my time and effort to block a poll…it’s just that it’s not a very good idea. Why would we waste time and money on that when there is so much else to do?

  26. Terry, there’s an issue of ‘efficiency’ in collection. If we wind up with a bicycle tax where 80% of the tax is going to cover collection costs and only 20% goes to covering the actual costs of cycling infrastructure and operations, that’s not a very good deal for taxpayers, however they feel about cycling!

  27. In a previous post, Rex Burkholder stated several times how the streetcar companies paved streets, and as property developers, built roads. However, what was left out is how this “model” could be applied today. Streetcars then and now use public right-of-ways and TriMet’s busses currently do the heaviest damage, more than any type of vehicle, to Portland streets. Therefore transit farebox revenues should help pay for streets and roads. Instead of giving property tax abatements and other PDC subsidies to developers, the developers of new, increased and high density development should be helping to pay for transport infrastructure, parks and other public amenities.

    Rex also questioned how our communities should look and function? There is however no single right or wrong answer. It is different to different people. For example, just look at the exodus of families fleeing the cities for the less dense suburbs. Just look at the complaints from the East county part of Portland about overly dense infill and how that is destroying greenery, trees and a lifestyle. Currently developers are handsomely rewarded, some at taxpayer expense, for designing what Metro and Portland planners have concluded the public should accept. Alternative transport mode users are also heavily subsidized at taxpayer expense. These are is by no means the correct answers. They lack freedom of choice and diversity. Decisions should be market based, not always about the developers making as much as possible from a piece of property, and not socialistically controlled by government entities.

  28. “Decisions should be market based, not always about the developers making as much as possible from a piece of property”

    If the developer isn’t allowed to maximize his profit, then it isn’t market based.

    “and not socialistically controlled by government entities.”

    Uhmm, your post doesn’t make any sense.

  29. Streetcars then and now use public right-of-ways and

    And, like buses and light rail, they use it much more efficiently than single occupancy vehicles.

    TriMet’s busses currently do the heaviest damage, more than any type of vehicle, to Portland streets. Therefore transit farebox revenues should help pay for streets and roads.

    I don’t think this is actually true if you look at it on a per passenger mile basis. The public right of way is there to move people and goods, vehicles merely provide one means of doing that and buses are particularly efficient at it. Not as efficient as a bike, but close.

  30. Terry: TriMet’s busses currently do the heaviest damage, more than any type of vehicle, to Portland streets.

    Ross: I don’t think this is actually true if you look at it on a per passenger mile basis.

    This came directly from Sam Adams’s meetings with the public. I think he was referring to a vehicle-by-vehicle basis, because the next thing he said afterwards was ‘because they have two axles,’ so the weight of the entire bus (2 tons+passengers?) exerts more force than a similar-sized/weighted big-rig, which has more axles. I’m probably wrong about something (and one of the least qualified to talk about this type stuff), but that part of his presentation made me sweat.

  31. A bus weighs about 15 tons (empty) and road damage is proportional to (weight/axle)^4, so compared to the average 2 ton car, it does ~3,000 times more damage per mile, (everything else being equal*.) Most trucks of that size have more axles, and if TriMet used three axles, it would cut it down to 600 times the damage of a car…

    *1) It only damages streets that it runs on. Burnside, for instance, it in bad shape, and it has a lot to do with buses… A lot of the residential streets with problems have nothing to do with buses.
    2) A well constructed street, with the right base, and properly maintained will handle a bus just fine. Again, see Burnside, (more or less built for cars,) vs state highways, (which was built for heavy trucks and buses.) Obviously, building them better in the first place is more expensive so this is a trade off. For streets that never expect to see a bus, they can be built cheaply, and then later when the population grows, and the bus starts running down that street… (Part of the reason people are interested in the couplet is PDOT is going to rebuild Burnside from scratch, and changing it to a couplet at the same time is the best time to do that…)
    3) Starting and stopping is the worst thing you can do for a street, and buses tend to do a lot of that. That is why a lot of bus stops have a piece of concrete at the bus stop, (“bus pad”,) that will pretty much never wear out.

    My point is: yes, there is a few streets that TriMet is wearing out faster than they were designed to, but it is actually a fairly small portion of the streets in the city. Mostly it is the local streets that have problems, and TriMet doesn’t run down them…

  32. “And, like buses and light rail, they use it much more efficiently than single occupancy vehicles.”

    Speaking of efficiency and what can be called red herrings, the Eastside Streetcar as proposed is a 152 million dollar project in today’s dollars. If the farebox rate per passenger ride was increased only slightly in today’s dollars to $2.00 per ride, and say 100,000 passengers rode this line alone annually, it would take 760 years to actually pay for the capitol costs through the farebox. But wait, the current farebox revenue only covers about a quarter to a third of the annual operating expanses, and that still leaves an annual operating subsidy of 5.6 million dollars that must be funded through some other method by taxpayers. All of a sudden the word ‘efficiency’’ coupled with “streetcar’’ simply “does not compute”. In that something seems fishy here, and given that transit rail in Portland must now have colorful names instead of where they go or don’t go, the Eastside Streetcar can easily be called the “Red Herring Line”.

    And then there is the proposal to have Max extend into Clark County with a price tag of approximately two billion in today’s dollars for just the light rail portion of the Columbia Crossing project (not to mention the price tag for Max on the Transit Mall, the I-205 alignment and the proposed Milwaukie line). Even at an unheard of 500,000 riders annually using Max to cross the Columbia, and even increasing the fare to ten of today’s dollars per ride, it would take 400 years to pay off the Max bridge if the entire ten dollars went solely to paying for the capitol costs and nothing went towards covering the operating expenses.

    The transit systems in Portland can hardly be called “efficient” when they monopolize and consume so much of the regional transportation funding, and require such obese annual operating subsidies for only a small minority percentage of the actual transport mode split. Any expectation that transit usage will surpass personal motorized transport options is unrealistic. There is no way the region could even begin to afford a go anywhere transit system that operates that has such negative financial efficiency.

  33. ll of a sudden the word ‘efficiency’’ coupled with “streetcar’’ simply “does not compute”.

    Well no, not if you compare it to bicycles or walking. But if you compare it to the shared public costs to move those same people by automobile its downright cheap.

    But that is really changing the subject. The discussion was about the efficient use of the public right-of-way and streets. The fact is you can move far more people in buses (or streetcar or MAX) over the same public right of way than you can if they are in automobiles.

  34. Terry said:
    [Re: Streetcar loop] If … 100,000 passengers rode this line alone annually

    That would be less than 400 riders per weekday. Current ridership on the rest of the line is around 9,000 per weekday, and a lot of the stops see more than 400 people per weekday. If we assume 9,000 riders per day for the loop, (I don’t know what the actual expected ridership is, but it is closer to 9,000 than 400,) that is 2.3M riders per year, (on just weekdays. Closer to 3M in total,) and using your math, only 32 years to pay off, (just counting weekday ridership. 25 years if we count total ridership.)

    “Even at an unheard of 500,000 riders annually using Max to cross the Columbia”

    That is less than 2000 riders per weekday. More people than that currently cross the river on a TriMet bus, so it isn’t exactly an unheard of amount…

  35. This came directly from Sam Adams’s meetings with the public.

    I have no doubt that an individual bus causes more damage than an individual auto. But that was not really the issue that was being addressed here. The question was which was causing the most cumulative damage, transit buses or automobiles. And which causes more damage moving a busload of people or those same people in their individual autos.

  36. i hadn’t thought through the gritty details of a bicycle registration fee, but i did have a few thoughts about implementation. the only place i’ve lived that required a fee was new orleans (here’s the legal code), where you had to pay a $3 registration fee for any bike that cost over $100, and you got an official bike license plate that was just about the coolest thing ever. i would say that enforcement was pretty close to zero.

    so, if i were suggesting a program, i would make it voluntary, and for paying the fee you would get a very cool, awesome, excellent official pdx bike license plate (janway makes them for $.50 a piece if you order 1000 or more), which of course, everyone would want to have.

  37. Terry estimated, based on extremely low estimates of annual ridership, that “it would take 400 years to pay off the Max bridge”.

    The Congressional Research Service today released new figures for the ongoing costs of the Iraq War: $10 billion per month — appropriations so far this year are up 40% over 2006.

    At that rate, just for example, the costs of the entire MAX Green Line project to Clackamas, including the rebuild of the transit mall, could be paid in full in just 1.6 days.

    The new eastside streetcar loop project could be paid in full in less than half a day.

    Misplaced priorities?

    – Bob R.

  38. My ridership estimates may have been somewhat low, but the point being made is that at the current rate of transit rail expansion and wasteful spending on such things as curb extensions coupled with the exorbitant price tags, the region as a whole is taking on unsustainable and continual debt that undoubtedly will be passed on for generations to come. Not requiring a “user pays’ system NOW for new transit and bicycle infrastructure is creating the ultimate government organized pyramid scheme that will eventually collapse under its own money gobbling weight, and possibly take the regional economy with it. The reality is that mass transit options and bicycles will never replace personal motorized transport options. The reality is that at current transport spending ratios, the vast majority of transport dollars are being spent to construct infrastructure and subsidize operations that move less than one quarter of the trips made in the region while allowing the current roadway infrastructure to fall apart due to lack of maintenance. The reality is that with a transport based economy, one that relies on the movement of goods, that unless the users of alternative transport systems start directly paying for the systems they use, the financial livability and quality of life in Portland will be severely challenged. That means bicyclists must be directly taxed – not three dollars a year but at 50 dollars a year, transit fares must better reflect the true financial costs of providing the service, both must directly make financial contributions to maintaining the roadways used, and the taxes and fees motorists pay must be 100 percent dedicated to paying for roads and road maintenance.

  39. The reality is that mass transit options and bicycles will never replace personal motorized transport options.

    But they don’t have to to justify their investment. They only need to replace use of a personal automobile for some trips. In particular those rush hour trips where it is extremely expensive or impossible to provide facilities for autos.

    The point is not that transit doesn’t replace an “average” auto trip. It replaces a lot of relatively expensive auto trips.

    the vast majority of transport dollars are being spent to construct infrastructure and subsidize operations that move less than one quarter of the trips made in the region

    Actually its far worse than that. Virtually all the investment is for a limited number of rush hour trips using automobiles. We spend enormous sums serving a small number of trips that all happen about the same time.

  40. I totally disagree with any statement that suggests spending public dollars does not have to be justified. This is includes the extreme spending and trip costs for transit and freeloading spending mentality for bicycle infrastructure. It is also a valid reason why the costs should be user paid for both. The cracks of over spending are already beginning to appear within the TriMet network. Not only does TriMet spend approximately as much money planning new systems as they do operating service on the street, but also the service on the street on some routes is being cut back to help pay for their wish list of frills. An example of proposed bicycle infrastructure that lacks any justification is the cost of providing a bridge connection for the 200 or so riders a day using the I-5 Columbia Crossing. This is just wasteful pork barrel government spending to satisfy some highly vocal lip service from a small group of pedal pushers. It would be considerably of less of an expense to taxpayers to require bicyclists to purchase a ticket on a bus when crossing the river.

    Furthermore, just like electricity transmission systems are designed to respond to peak periods of usage, so should the roadway systems be treated, maintained and improved, also to meet peak period demands.

  41. “just like electricity transmission systems are designed to respond to peak periods of usage, so should the roadway systems be treated, maintained and improved, also to meet peak period demands.”

    We agree. Sadly, our road system is not maintained like a utility. As you know, one way that utilities respond to peak demand is by pricing peak hours more steeply- not by building to any potential max use.

  42. That goes straight back to one of the things that Gail talked about. She suggested one approach would be to treat the transportation system like a regulated utility. That would imply a rate setting body (like the PUC) that would ensure rates sufficient to maintain the assets, which we lack today!

    Note that one of the things utilities are required to do is encourage conservation and demand shifting to smooth out those peaks.

  43. “As you know, one way that utilities respond to peak demand is by pricing peak hours more steeply- not by building to any potential max.”

    And if such a system is ever applied to highways, so must it be applied with increased transit fares to cover “all” the additional peak period expenses for any extra Max trips, and for the increased number of busses and operation costs that are scheduled during peak periods – or maybe just the increased fares rather than building to the/more max and more busses…and including the not spending the near two billion dollars for Columbia Crossing Max that will never have a financial return on such an extravagance.

  44. “the not spending the near two billion dollars for Columbia Crossing Max that will never have a financial return on such an extravagance.”

    The two billion dollar figure was the low-end cost for a new freeway bridge.

  45. Note that one of the things utilities are required to do is encourage conservation and demand shifting to smooth out those peaks.

    Is that true of the phone company?

    I think it is a very big assumption that PUC style regulation will encourage conservation. Until the 1970’s utilities encouraged increased use of energy and PUC’s routinely approved rate increases to pay for the new facilities required, along with a profitable rate of return on the utility’s investment. Electricity was, in the words of the utilities’ advertisements, “penny cheap” and they were promoting its use like any other product.

    Currently PUC’s regulate private utilities, not public agencies. What seems to be being suggested here is that we take the responsibility for raising taxes needed to finance our transportation system out of the hands of elected government officials and put that power into the hands of appointed government officials.

    Its hard to see where that gets us. It seems to ignore the fundamental problem that we have no way to charge people according to their use of the transportation system. The problem isn’t who sets the rates, the problem is that we don’t really have a rate to set. The relative amount of gas different people use has almost nothing to do with the relative amount of use they make of roads.

  46. I think the reason the legistlature is shy about raising gas taxes is the 80% No vote on the last effort. The public is not convinced of this need, nor is AAA or OTA or they would be cutting a deal.
    The public understands two simple truths: transportation does not drive our economy like it used to….a lot of lumber, wheat and logs have been replaced by chips, shoe designs and engineering, and
    building more roads just does solve the problem, and gas taxes for for roads only. And remember approximately half of the annual regional transportation investment..$630 Million…goes for roads and highways. That’s over $300 Million per year in the region. Sounds like plenty to me.

  47. “The two billion dollar figure was the low-end cost for a new freeway bridge.”

    Going back to when Metro Councilor Robert Liberty analyzed the of the higher total six billon price tag for the entire project, two billion was for the freeway bridge, two billion was for the light rail bridge and infrastructure, and two billion was for other infrastructure such as interchanges within the project area, bike and ped infrastructure, nature trails, Vancouver Mayor Pollards freeway cap etc.

    Since the middle ground alternative/third option alternative committee chaired by Metro Counselor Rex Burkholder FAILED to come up with a less costly option for the transit component crossing the Columbia, such as using a lane in each direction and routing transit on the existing bridges, the two billion dollar figure for Max still stands.

  48. Readers might be interested to learn more about Oregon’s bicycle taxes of 1899 and 1901. (This is a long post, and I hope it doesn’t duplicate material you’ve published elsewhere on the site.) I am researching the taxes that paid for Multnomah county’s first bicycle paths, which included east side routes along Willamette Boulevard, Portland Boulevard, Base Line Road (Stark), Section Line Road (Division), and 12th/Milwaukie Avenues. I hope to have a more complete history later in the summer or fall.

    As I read the history, in 1899 there was no system for funding roads and most resisted paying for roads. The haphazard results appear to be an expression of uncoordinated, 19th century laissez-faire markets. In this vacuum, bicyclists took things into their own hands. On the one hand it’s a great story of bikey initiative; but on the other it’s yet another symptom of neglect for the commons & for sharing.

    At his inaugural address in 1899, Governor Geer (R) made specific mention of roadwork and road funding:

    GOOD ROADS

    Few questions demand more serious consideration at your hands than the enactment of some system that will give our people better roads. ….we will always have bad roads until we overcome them by systematic legislation. This we have never had, not has any serious attempt ever been made in that direction. Surely, there is no reason why this matter would be further postponed.

    Our present road laws, taken as a whole, amount to a mere travesty on the object for which they were intended. They are the result of haphazard, patchwork legislation from session to session, usually amendatory of previous acts that were themselves mere apologies for existing conditions. There is ample justification for the statement that, with exceptions so few as to be unworthy of mention, the average country roads in our state are in no better condition than they were 30 years ago….

    While our people are a unit as to the necessity and desirability of better roads, it is not possible to bring about that condition until our present system is wholly revolutionized and our road taxes [are] collected the same as other taxes, to be disbursed under the intelligent supervision of some competent person authorized by each county to look after the roads of that county. The experience of a generation should be sufficient to convince the most hopeful that even another generation of our present haphazard method would give us no improvement whatever. After all these years we should be satisfied that the system of “working” roads is a dismal failure, and adopt a system that contemplates the building of roads. I believe our people are public spirited enough to welcome a law imposing a moderate levy for road taxes if attended by an ironclad provision that would secure its economical and effective application to our roads. This should be attended by a provision encouraging the use of v road tired wagons and discouraging the use of narrow tires after a specified time in the future. In France, as well as in some other countries, many wagons no used have tires five inches wide, and with the hind axle some wider than the front one, a heavily loaded wagon traveling the road is a positive benefit to it. We will never emerge from our present condition of deplorable roads until some legislature goes far enough at one stride to leave permanently in the rear the mockery that binds us now.

    He notes that the problem – so bad it’s a “mockery” – is two-fold: Someone needs to coordinate work on the roads, someone needs create a consistent method to fund the road work. The best entity to do both is the State, he says. The turnpikes & tollroads of private enterprise were inadequate; counties and cities weren’t able to coordinate connections in the spaces between themselves.

    This was the context of the bicycle taxes of 1899 and 1901.

    Up to that point the main road users, rural and urban, farmer and delivery driver, weren’t willing to step up to fund serious roadwork, in part because of the ways assessments were administered. The haphazard system had been “good enough,” and the prospect of more taxation was a threat to many. Who wanted more taxes? In crucial and understandable ways, the road users were dodging the burdens of road repair, and dodging the burdens of road building. Long-term thinking was difficult then as it remains today.

    Facing this resistance, bicycle owners carved out a smaller project: They would volunteer to be taxed in order to get better roads built for themselves & for pedestrians. Separate facilities was a compromise solution. Since funding roads for everyone, for the common good, encountered too much resistance, they did something mainly for themselves. (They also made it illegal to attack the paths or bicyclists with glass, tacks, or other pointy detritus. The second law also required bells and lights.) It was a moment of great initiative, but it also perhaps helped initiate the institutionalization of the opposition between large road users, whether teams & carts (or autos & trucks), and smaller users like bicyclists.

    With both bicycle laws, the funding was never really adequate. The Oregon Supreme Court invalidated the first bicycle tax in 1901, and the Legislature enacted a second law that used the language of licensing rather than taxation in order to satisfy the court’s requirements. In 1913 the Legislature repealed that second law and concurrently started the State Highway Commission and its own set of taxes. These property taxes proved inadequate as well. It wasn’t until 1919 that the Legislature hit on the first Oregon gas tax. This finally provided the first stable and adequate fund for roadways. The tax on gasoline was the right solution at that time.

    Whether a bicycle tax to fund bicycle infrastructure is appropriate today, I have my doubts. As others have said, the costs to administer it seem likely to consume an excessive proportion of its revenues. My own opinion is that because gasoline is heavily subsidized and a large number of costs associated with gas and auto use are externalized, a bicycle tax is neither fair nor reasonable today. Even paying taxes on gasoline and paying licensing fees, motorists still get several courses of their lunch for free (see Mr. Burkholder’s post on streetcars), and investing in bicycle infrastructure is a small way to recover some of the externalized costs of gasoline and motor vehicle use. In any case, in some important ways bicycling today exists in a very different environment than it did a century ago, and we shouldn’t assume without careful argument that the validity of past solutions extends into the present.

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