Improving Efficiency And Equity In Transportation Finance

"...[S]eemingly modest local tax increases enacted as short-term solutions to immediate problems are setting a major national trend. Without any deliberate or conscious change in policy, transportation finance is gradually devolving to local governments and lessening its reliance on user fees. User fees are, however, more efficient and more equitable than local sales taxes for transportation projects. In the short run, increases in fuel taxes are viable and practical. In the longer term, tolls collected electronically promise the most appropriate and flexible method of user fee financing... Continued or expanded reliance on user fees remains the most promising way to promote efficiency and equity in transportation finance."