Planetizen Newswire
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Transportation Ballot Measures
Two years after voters in the nine-county Bay Area agreed to hike tolls on the region's seven state-owned bridges, regional business leaders are hoping they will approve a one-cent regional sales tax to fund $100 billion in transportation projects.
San Francisco Chronicle
Nationwide, voters approved nearly 70 percent of transportation ballot measures on the ballot.
Eno Center for Transportation
A modest toll increase, $3 over six years, took a major step forward with the approval of a key Bay Area Toll Authority committee. With the exception of the Bay Bridge, the round-trip toll on each of the region's seven state-owned bridges is $5.
SF Gate
Colorado Springs and El Paso County voters agreed to add the highway widening to a list of projects that a regional transportation authority can fund. They passed an additional funding measure enabling county funds to be spent rather than refunded.
The Gazette
Voters around the country will go to the ballot box tomorrow to consider transportation- and infrastructure-related measures.
U.S. News & World Report
Transportation ballot measures are popular this November: over 70 populate ballots across the country. In California and elsewhere, they supplement declining federal and state funds for local infrastructure.
San Gabriel Valley Tribune
However, neither state will ask voters to increase the gas tax. Instead, they ask voters to assure that gas tax and other transportation-derived revenues are spent on transportation. Neither state has raised the tax in over 25 years.
Governing
After extensive outreach, the BART Board of Director settled on the $3.5 billion sum to be on the November ballot. 'Unmet capital needs' are the target of the property tax
measure.
Bay Area Rapid Transit District
With so much attention placed on the woes facing D.C. Metro, it's important to recognize that it is hardly the only subway facing critical infrastructure investment needs.
The New York Times
Missouri has come up with a unique way to pay for roads, and it's even a user fee, though it bears no direct relation to road users other than for those driving to the store to buy their cigarettes. So much for using the tax to address public health.
Missourinet
Instead of voting on new taxes to reduce transportation revenue shortfalls, Illinois voters will decide on a constitutional amendment to ensure that transportation fees and taxes are only spent on roads and transit, the so-called "lockbox" measure.
Chicago Tribune
Prop. 1, a quarter-cent sales tax that would benefit public transit in Wasatch Range counties, passed in 10 counties but was defeated in seven, including the populous Salt Lake County where supporters have yet to concede due to the narrow loss.
The Salt Lake Tribune
Prop. 1, a $930 million, nine-year transportation levy backed by Mayor Ed Murray, was approved by 54 percent of Seattle voters on Nov. 3 to the delight of bus, bike, pedestrian and good roads advocates. First order of business: Safe Routes to School.
The Seattle Times
A week before a Nov. 3 Maine transportation referendum on a *general fund bond issue to address roads and bridges, TRIP released a report showing that over a third of the state's bridges "are structurally deficient or functionally obsolete."
Kennebec Journal
Seattle voters will decide on Prop. 1, a $985 million transportation levy known as Move Seattle, unanimously endorsed by the City Council and strongly backed by Mayor Ed Murray. However, the bus and bike priorities attracted a well-funded opponent.
King 5 News
Refusing to raise the 20-cent gas tax, creative Texas legislators have devised another scheme to divert existing revenue streams to roads. Last year it was a portion of the Rainy Day Fund. This year, from general sales and motor vehicle sales taxes.
KCBD
This St. Louis Patch-Dispatch editorial analyzes the legislature as well as the bill to raise gas taxes two-cent a year for three years, taking aim at Republican House members who will be "automatic no votes." Illinois may also increase its gas tax.
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Thanks to voters, at least $1.2 billion in oil and gas taxes a year that would normally have been directed to the state's Rainy Day Fund is diverted to the highway fund, where it will be used to improve the state's crumbling road infrastructure.
Newsradio 1200 WOAI
For the first time, Rhode Island voters will be tested on their support for public transit by whether they approve authorizing $35 million for Mass Transit Hub Infrastructure Bonds on Nov. 4. In addition to hubs, statewide bus service is targeted.
Transportation for America
Bloomberg News investigates a rash of road deaths in the Midland-Odessa region, attributing the fatalities to underfunded road infrastructure, increased population, and truck traffic. A November ballot measure may provide some relief.
Bloomberg News
