NYTimes article (free registration req'd) at http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/14/opinion/....html?th&emc=th
excerpts:
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The trust fund was set up with the simple idea of making drivers pay for their roads by taxing the gasoline they bought. It worked at first, giving drivers wide-open Interstate highways, but eventually new drivers clogged the lanes, and the trust fund didn't yield enough money to build new roads or even maintain the existing ones.
The highway money dwindled partly because Congress didn't raise gas taxes to compensate for inflation and the higher fuel efficiency of cars, and partly because the trust fund kept getting raided. Gas taxes have been diverted to museums, a symphony hall, a riverside promenade, downtown landscaping projects, snowmobile trails and suburban transit systems that haven't been much more effective than horse trails in reducing road congestion. ...
[u.S. Representative] Boucher secured $750,000 of highway money for the "construction of horse trails and assorted facilities" in Jefferson National Forest.
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Seems like if they can use chunks of Highway trust funds for museums, symphony halls, and downtown landscaping, as well as horse trails in a forest, we really OUGHT to be able to get some of that money too fund trails for "the Iron Horse". Instead what we get from Washington is the product exiting from the sound end of a northbound horse.
excerpts:
------------------------
...
The trust fund was set up with the simple idea of making drivers pay for their roads by taxing the gasoline they bought. It worked at first, giving drivers wide-open Interstate highways, but eventually new drivers clogged the lanes, and the trust fund didn't yield enough money to build new roads or even maintain the existing ones.
The highway money dwindled partly because Congress didn't raise gas taxes to compensate for inflation and the higher fuel efficiency of cars, and partly because the trust fund kept getting raided. Gas taxes have been diverted to museums, a symphony hall, a riverside promenade, downtown landscaping projects, snowmobile trails and suburban transit systems that haven't been much more effective than horse trails in reducing road congestion. ...
[u.S. Representative] Boucher secured $750,000 of highway money for the "construction of horse trails and assorted facilities" in Jefferson National Forest.
-----------------------
Seems like if they can use chunks of Highway trust funds for museums, symphony halls, and downtown landscaping, as well as horse trails in a forest, we really OUGHT to be able to get some of that money too fund trails for "the Iron Horse". Instead what we get from Washington is the product exiting from the sound end of a northbound horse.