May/June 2006

The Big Stall

The General Assembly keeps putting the brakes on fixing our transportation problems—but we need to get where we are going now.

By Michael Jon Khandelwal

In March, the Virginia General Assembly closed its regular session with no solutions for alleviating our transportation crisis. For the third time in five years, a special session was called and, at press time, was stalled again.

Hampton Roads has water that divides us, so it’s costly to build roads that connect us. Our problem is congestion on the connectors—our bridges and tunnels.

Here’s what we need to fix our road woes and what it will cost: a third crossing—$4.15 billion; the Southeastern Expressway—$1.47 billion; rebuilding and widening US 460—$1.4 billion; widening I-64 on the Peninsula and Chesapeake—$1.6 billion; and adding a new midtown tunnel and extending the Martin Luther King, Jr. Freeway—$549 million.

Time is running out. Nearly $16.2 billion in exports and $11.2 billion in imports pass through here each year; 58,000 local workers rely on trade for their livelihoods. Close to 318,000 military personnel, civilians and their dependents contribute $11 billion annually to our local economy. Tourism accounts for $2.5 billion in spending in our area and employs 41,000 workers. All of these aspects of Hampton Roads’ economic engine become vulnerable because of poor roads. Do we risk all this because of stubbornness? The competitiveness of our region is at stake.

In the General Assembly session that ended fruitlessly on March 11, the two chambers proposed vastly different plans. The pro-investment Senate’s plan called for an ongoing source of revenue. The anti-tax House’s plan suggested raiding funds from education, public safety (read: homeland security) and health care, and proposed huge amounts of public debt—all without a clear future funding source. Proposals for regional tolls and transportation authorities were added and struck from bills. Our local leaders fought for and against many ideas, sometimes in our best interests, but sometimes out of spite and division. They were too busy arguing over rules and procedures instead of actually working, too busy being Republicans and Democrats and forgetting that they’re citizens of Hampton Roads.

John Warner and Thomas Davis, both U.S. Congressional Republicans, warned the General Assembly that our state would lose federal funds due to procrastination. The $64 million that was spent to just think about a third crossing and 460 expansion will be lost. Air quality will worsen due to increased congestion, and then we’ll lose all federal highway funds due to our bad air quality.

If the local leaders won’t make a decision, I will. Here’s what we can do to stop this insanity:

Make the state help us. If you’ve read Upfront before, you know that we are already owed $423 million in road funding. Use the budget surplus. We need more than $275 million a year to tackle our problems. This year, there’s a $1.4 billion budget surplus—a surplus we may not see again for years—most of that should be dedicated to transportation.

Focus on widening I-64 and the Hampton Roads Bridge-Tunnel. It’s never made sense to only expand I-664’s tunnels. And, 90 percent of trips across the HRBT begin and end in our region, so the proposed idea of not building a third crossing and only expanding 460 will not work.

Increase certain taxes and fees. Our tax burden is already too high, you say. But, in Hampton Roads, congestion costs $240 per person annually through 14 million wasted gallons of gas. And according to The Road Information Program, our cost per driver from poor road safety, increased congestion and vehicle wear is nearly $1,300 a year. We’re already paying for our bad roads by wasting money on unnecessary repairs and gas, so why not increase the gas tax to an amount that equals what we already waste? You only pay the tax if you’re driving on the roads. Plus, accounting for inflation, the cost of gas is lower than it was in 1981, and Virginia’s gas tax is significantly lower than every neighboring state’s. The tax should be raised equally across our region, so one city does not gain advantage over another—truly regional thinking.

Add tolls in a unique way. Most proposals suggest collection sites at our major connectors, the very source of traffic congestion. This is absurd. Instead, put toll booths at every entrance to every interstate in Hampton Roads, including I-64 west of Williamsburg. This way, there will be no congestion at the connectors, and everyone pays their fair share. Once you’re on the system, you’ve already paid. VDOT doesn’t keep the best records due to a lack of funding, but after looking at the numbers, we do have an average of 840,000 cars pass certain points along our entire interstate, bridge and tunnel system each day. Let’s take half that number: 420,000 cars. If we were to put a 50-cent toll at each entrance, we’d bring in $210,000 daily, or $76,650,000 yearly. Each entrance would have an E-ZPass lane and a coin lane. The proposed toll at a third crossing is estimated to be between $1.20 and more than $8. The proposed toll at the downtown tunnel is 65 cents. Using the entrance toll method, the toll is only 50 cents, and it raises more money.

Fine the General Assembly. On March 27, when our legislators reconvened after a do-nothing, 60-day session, the first thing they did was pay themselves. We gave them $19,000 per day for their incompetence. Let’s amend the state constitution to say that if they don’t get their work done in the allotted time, then they have to reconvene and pay their own expenses. Perhaps this will make them work harder in the first place.

We need to act now! The Hampton Roads Planning District Commission issued a June 2004 report noting that throughout the next 10 years, rush hour traffic on I-64 and I-264 will slow to 25 mph, and all major bridges and tunnels will operate below 10 mph.

It’s time to recognize that mindless anti-tax and anti-toll attitudes don’t eliminate hardship now, they put hardship off until a time when it will become unbearable. If we don’t act now, our local economy will shrivel, and we can enjoy our empty roads all to ourselves, since we will have driven the military, industry and most of the tourists to other harbors. But at least there’ll be no traffic.