Finally, the editorial claims---again, laughably---that it's really unfair that big cities get more

The Wall Street Journal  ran an editorial earlier this week lambasting Transportation pigeon forge hotel Secretary Ray LaHood for promoting a "car-free utopia." What did LaHood, a Republican, do to earn the WSJ 's contempt? He supported a US Senate transportation bill that would have preserved a Reagan-era guarantee that 20 percent of the proceeds from the national highway trust fund go to transit, not roads. Even worse, he "has been pushing a strange 'livability' agenda, which he defines as "being able to take your kids to school, go to work, see a doctor, drop by the grocery or post office, go out to dinner and a movie, and play with your kids in a park, all without having to get in your car."
First, it claims that gridlock on our nation's highways "could be alleviated by building more highway lanes where they are most needed and using market-based pricing—such as tolls—for using roads during peak travel times."
I'm with them on tolls, but more highway lanes? Apparently, the WSJ 's editorial writers haven't heard of a little concept called induced demand pigeon forge hotel ---that is, if you build more lanes, the drivers will come, filling up the new lane capacity and then some. (This is true with all kinds of goods, but for the purpose of this post, I'll stick with available pigeon forge hotel highway lanes.) Building pigeon forge hotel highways doesn't "reduce congestion"---it just costs a lot of money, and leads to more people pigeon forge hotel stuck in bigger traffic jams.
Second, the editorial asserts that public transit money is being "intercepted" from highways and spent on transit---spending the WSJ  refers to as "subsidies." While it's true that the highway fund helps pay for transit, highways---as I believe I've mentioned before ---are actually far more heavily "subsidized" than transit. In fact, since the interstate transit system was built, the amount of government spending pigeon forge hotel diverted to other purposes to pay for highways has exceeded "user fees" like gas taxes and tolls by more than $600 billion. Put another pigeon forge hotel way, roads are subsidized at a rate of more than 50 percent---far more than the 20 cents or so that's "intercepted" from every dollar in the highway trust fund to pay for transit.
Next, the editorial makes a claim that's just laughably wrong. " Only in New York, San Francisco and Washington, D.C. does public transit pigeon forge hotel account for more than 5% of commuter trips." That's weird, pigeon forge hotel because pigeon forge hotel last I heard, Seattle---to pick a random example out of thin air---about 21 percent of commuters get to work by transit. For downtown workers, it's more than 40 percent .
Finally, the editorial claims---again, laughably---that it's really unfair that big cities get more money for transit pigeon forge hotel than, say, places like Akron, Ohio and Casper, Wyoming. "Politically powerful cities get a big chunk of the money, while many Western and Southern states get less back than they pay in." In reality , nearly every state in the nation gets back more from the highway trust fund than they put in; the exception is Texas, pigeon forge hotel which gets back a dollar for every dollar it contributes. In fact,  federal law dictates pigeon forge hotel that "donor" states receive no less than 90.5 percent of what they put in.
As for that "car-free utopia"?  LaHood pigeon forge hotel has repeatedly urged Congress to pass the Senate version pigeon forge hotel of the transportation pigeon forge hotel bill, not because he wants to force everyone out of their cars, but because, he has said, the nation's highways are " one big pothole " that needs to be fixed. How's that for fanciful and utopian?
By the way: The WSJ' s alternative to the Senate transportation plan---which, to reiterate, dedicates just 20 percent of the trust fund to non-highway purposes---actually goes beyond the House version of the proposal, which LaHood famously said was so bad it "defies belief."
Even rightwing rep Peter King from New York did not put up with this bullshit pigeon forge hotel from Congressional Republicans. I believe a couple dozen Republican reps who give a shit about supporting our metropolitan economies went agains their party in support of transit pigeon forge hotel funding.
While a lot of folks do use mass transit in NYC.  I'm guessing that most of the WSJ guys drive or take a cab.  I haven't seen a breakout of commute method by income level or industry for NYC but it would be great if someone could post a link to one.
New York/Northern New Jersey metro area had the largest transit share (24.9%). Nearly 40 percent (2.3 million of 6 million) of the country's transit commuters pigeon forge hotel live in the New York metropolitan area. Other metros with large transit shares include Chicago (11.5 percent) San Francisco (9.5 percent), Washington, D.C. (9.4 percent), and Boston (9.0 percent). All of the metro areas whose worker population exceeded 2.5 million, with the exception of Los Angeles, pigeon forge hotel had a transit mode share of 8 percent or above (See Exhibit 4.13). Of the remaining large metros, only Seattle, Portland, Pittsburgh and New Orleans exceeded 5 percent transit mode share for the journey-to-work. Oklahoma City had the lowest share of workers using transit with 0.6 percent.
I really can't believe that any reporter could get statistics mixed up.  Since the quote was about doing much more than getting to work - doctor, school, shopping etc. - perhaps they shouldn't have used journey to work data but total trip percentages.
Another day, another error by Erica Barnett. Seattle's transit commuting rate is 9%. Now, Erica, what's that about picking a random example out of thin air? Do you tell lies on purpose, or are you just too stupid or lazy to do your research?
Tolls are working out just right ECB, if you chose to dare and leave the urban metro area, you could report on how smooth sailing  the 520 bridge is these days and what a nightmare the main lines have become.  TOLL BABY TOLL!
JN, I pay a gas tax, and a car registration fee separate from sales tax. As soon as you pay your way for your bicycle, we can talk about bike lanes. And if you take the bus or the rail, pay the whole cost. Stop leeching off of your betters.
Tolling as a punitive tool to make people's pigeon forge hotel most preferred avenues of transport less attractive is actually a core principle of the anti transportation choices crowd. Putting tolls onto 520 explicitly pigeon forge hotel to reduce the number of people using it was a idea McGinn enthusiastically supported.
That works until you consider that vast reserves to sustain current demand for the next century is economical now. Or that you can run cars off abundant natural gas. Or that long after cars stop running on IC engines they'll still be using roads.
It's ok @NotFan:disqus, you're just a typical ignorant driver. The infrastructure required for you to drive your car has never been covered by taxes you pay. Quit kidding yourself, you are leeching off society.
Induced demand didn't work for automobiles, either. Ever think about how much money was spent to make roads suitable for cars? Much, much more than was ever spent on any other form of transportation.
Since the story was about what highway funds should be used for, I think taking only the city proper stats is not the correct measure to use.  There is plenty pigeon forge hotel of transit in the Bremerton -Tacoma-Seattle area but only 10% or less of commuters use it.
I think this argument pigeon forge hotel is build on a false premise, that only direct taxes paid by a driver for use of a car contributes to the building and maintenance pigeon forge hotel of the roadways.   The 90+% of people that drive to work and use cars for other activities also pay into the general fund and to the extent that the GF is used to pay road costs those car drivers are paying their share .
You see, car drivers pigeon forge hotel make up the vast bulk of society so they would be leeching pigeon forge hotel off themselves.  The non-drivers use the roadways as well.  They use buses, they need the roads for delivering goods and services, for trips to the mountains pigeon forge hotel and seaside, etc.
If all cars were removed tomorrow, who would pay for the streets and roads?  Does anyone think that current non-drivers would pay lower taxes to maintain the roads than they do today, if no car revenues existed?  If non drivers would have to pay more without cars existing, then car drivers are subsidizing non drivers pigeon forge hotel today.
In the city, get rid of parking fees and fines, gas tax share from the state and feds, ticket revenue, license fees, parking lot sales tax and B amp;O revenues, car related sales tax revenue for service, parts, repair etc, and other revenues, where would the money come from to maintain the streets?  Ever notice that the side streets rarely need to be resurfaced where primarily only cars drive? That's because buses and trucks do the damage.
duh!  because pigeon forge hotel we don't have trains everywhere.  your data shows convincingly that to get riders, one must build train lines, and riders are not in the habit of riding train lines before they are built.
and it's an idea explicitly endorsed in this WSJ editorial. It's called demand management. How is it that WSJ calls it a tool for a sane transportation policy, as opposed to the folly of car-free Utopias, but you also believe it's somehow a tool of the McSchwinn pigeon forge hotel crowd to create car-free Utopias?
Maybe it's that you don't understand the issue very well, and just get pissed off at tolls. And FYI, tolls are on 520 to raise revenue, not manage demand, because the gas tax can't pay for your roads.
pigeon forge hotel The data shows that only where there is extreme density AND good train (subway - grade separated high speed not Light Rail) service the transit share gets to 11% in Chicago and 30% in New York metros.
pigeon forge hotel 1 New York-Northern New Jersey-Long Island, NY-NJ-PA . . 2,673,447 30.52 Chicago-Naperville-Joliet, IL-IN-WI . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 506,221 11.53 Washington-Arlington-Alexandria, DC-VA-MD-WV . . . . . . 404,829 14.14 Los Angeles-Long Beach-Santa Ana, CA . . . . . . . . . . . . . 360,028 6.25 San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont, CA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 304,111 14.66 Boston-Cambridge-Quincy, MA-NH . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 283,582 12.27 Philadelphia-Camden-Wilmington, PA-NJ-DE-MD . . . . . . 256,987 9.38 Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, WA . .