"Haslam lays out plans for statewide transportation tour" would be nice to see instead. The restricted context means restricted ideas and answers.

This is the line I am suspicious about...
from Tom Humphrey article …

Right now we have a multi-billion dollar backlog of highway projects across this state

Maybe some different ideas determines some of those projects are not needed.

Haslam lays out plans for statewide road revenue tour

Leland Wykoff's picture

Truck Fuel Taxes Should Increase

Brother Haslam will no doubt *not* be recommending substantially increasing the fuel taxes for trucks in Tennessee.

Which is odd as it is clearly the trucks which cause the vast majority of damage to our highways. Weight is the issue.

Haslam will continue the policy of shifting the cost of road destruction to the public at large and not on the trucking industry where it belongs.

also beware Haslam plans to raise our fuel taxes and then in a classic bait and switch maneuver the Governor plans to siphon off dollars not for roads but for inefficient and ineffective and expensive public transportation projects.

So much for maintaining and fixing our roads. He has much more sinister plans up his slippery sleeve.

Treehouse's picture

Could be a good thing

Public transportation projects are not all sinister.

Leland Wykoff's picture

Better Ingredients, Better Transportation

What happens when people can afford to purchase decent transportation:

(link...)

Unless they plan to substantially reduce and depress wages, or drastically increase the undocumented labor force, mass transit buses are doomed.

Or they could simply use the transit subsidy to fund Uber Trips for everyone currently riding the KAT Buses. Uber would be much more safe, convenient, would take riders the last mile of their trips, and would save millions of tax dollars.

Do the math. Not the meth.

Min's picture

Nonsense.

I would ride the bus, if I didn't have to catch it at 6:15 am and then sit on it for an hour and a half, before it arrived in downtown Nashville. The routes are not laid out in a convenient pattern, and until they are, no one except state employees and students, who get passes, will use the public buses.

zoomfactor's picture

TCA § 54-5102

Legislation to connect all county seats by a four-lane divided highway to the interstate system, whether any cars/trucks travel on them or not. That is what they are "behind" on.

Rachel's picture

Yup. This happened to my

Yup. This happened to my home town, which is south of I40 and east of I24. There's a lovely four-lane road now from McMinnville to Sparta. The old two-lane road was a curvy bitch definitely in need of improvement. The four-lane is, however, overkill. Hardly any traffic on it.

zoomfactor's picture

Good-bye curves and trees

Not only are quaint landscapes of little towns being ruined, but formerly pleasant motorcycling routes are being trashed, as well. All to produce mind-numbingly boring, bleak, 4-laners that TDOT doesn't even bother to plant grass between. So lovely.

Rachel's picture

The drive along the

The drive along the particular road I'm talking about is really quite lovely. It's just way more road than was needed.

yellowdog's picture

Fix it First

If Haslam would commit to prioritizing TDOT expenditures in line with the Fix It First principle, I might support finding more money. As long as he will not eliminate unneeded and harmful new roads like the Pellissippi Parkway Extension or the eight lane airport bypass in Blount County, I see no reason to take this financial jam as a serious crisis.

TDOT's own extensive effort to ask the public for input has revealed that the public supports prioritizing maintaining the current road system over building new highways, but Haslam seems not to have embraced the finding. I cannot find the results of this process on the TDOT website but I have seen presentations about it.

Similarly, missing from the TDOT website is a report done by TDOT and Smart Growth America several years ago. That report outlined reasonable ways to prioritize projects.

If Haslam et al really want support, they should commit to sensible and really needed work, not roads of convenience for Blackberry Farm.

If you are interested, contact TDOT and ask them to put the Smart Growth/TDOT study on the website.

TDOT.Comments@tn.gov

bizgrrl's picture

I might support finding more

I might support finding more money. As long as he will not eliminate unneeded and harmful new roads like the Pellissippi Parkway Extension or the eight lane airport bypass in Blount County

Exactly.

jbr's picture

Structurally deficient bridges in Tennessee

Elwood Aspermonte's picture

I'd be trying to persuade the legislature first, public second

Last time I checked, I don't think the public will be voting on a statewide gas tax hike, it will be the 132 legislators and the Republican super majority that will decide whether or not to add to the gas tax, which would ultimately be paid for by the motor fuel consuming public.

Unlike many civic and municipal improvements, there is no debt associated with our state highways, bridges, and state maintained thoroughfares and the state (and the 5 or 6 contractors that do virtually 95 percent of the highway work) should be in a road maintenance and repair mode, not building more roads so somebody can collect a large condemnation award on the old farm that is too far from a Wal-Mart site to have any commercial value.

Anonymous2's picture

Cut jobs and let live. The Haslam way.

jbr's picture

To me you take the list of

To me you take the list of intersections with accidents and in order of most accidents on down, that is the list on which you work. At the same time you take the bridge list above, and in order of most dangerous, highest accident rate, on down you work on that roughly in parallel. Several years from now when those are significantly done then you re-evaluate your tasks list.

yellowdog's picture

Won't help the Pavers.

The Pavers who think they have political clout do not make money improving intersections. This has not been about what makes sense. Maybe now it can be.

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