All
the tax "reform" programs now on the
table in Virginia -- proffered by the
governor, the Senate and the House of
Delegates -- have one thing in common.
Every one tinkers with old, tired
revenue-generation vehicles.
Rather than reform governance practice
or revenue policy, our "leaders" aim
to generate funds for the programs that have
been on state, municipal and lobbyists' wish
lists for decades (aka, Business As Usual).
There
is, however, an even bigger problem with the
current tax "reform" proposals.
While some of the schemes may be more
"fair," they propose to raise
money under false pretenses.
Every
supporter of
"revenue enhancement" claims
they are supporting this or that scheme
because of the need for funds to improve
transportation, education, health and safety,
environmental protection, economic development
and, of course, transportation again.
Money for transportation is
almost always the first and the last
reason that is given to raise additional
funds. This
is because "everyone" agrees
transportation congestion is growing worse
every day.
How
many times must it be said?
Without
"Fundamental Change" in human settlement
patterns, more money will not ameliorate traffic
congestion.
We
will leave it to others to determine how much
money and what changed conditions are needed
to improve education, health, security,
environmental sustainability, economic
prosperity and other important priorities of
intelligent governance at the state and
regional levels.
However, it needs to be made very clear
that suggesting that more money for building
more roads is the "solution" to
transportation congestion perpetuates a fraud.
The
primary cause of transportation congestion
in the Commonwealth is dysfunctional human
settlement patterns, not the lack of funds
for transport facilities.
More transport facilities without a
Fundamental Change in human settlement
patterns will only make traffic congestion
worse. In
fact, as noted in our last
column ("The Shape of Richmond's
Future," February 16, 2004), too many
road projects are a root cause of the
Richmond New Urban Regions immobility as
well as other dysfunctions.
Anyone
who says they need more money to "solve"
the mobility crisis is attempting to take
money under false pretenses.
To solve the mobility crisis,
governance practitioners must put their
efforts behind creating functional human
settlement patterns and Balanced Communities.
One
might hope that the media would help citizens
sort out this fraudulent delusion.
No such luck.
Here is just one example.
On the front page of the Metro section
of The Washington Post for 21
February, Jo Becker and Michael Shear's story
on the House of Delegates version of the tax
plan it states:
"Commuters would see far less in
the way of road improvements under the House
spending plan..."
This suggests that "commuters"
under some other plan might hope to see not
just more "road improvements" but
improvements in mobility that would make
commuting easier.
Road
improvements and mobility improvements are
very different animals.
Road improvements spend citizens' tax
dollars on roads.
Improving mobility usually has little
to do with laying asphalt.
At best, without improvements in the
settlement pattern, commuters will encounter
road construction projects that slow
their daily travel.
When the road projects are finally
completed, more housing projects generating
more single-occupant vehicles will have moved
to more dispersed locations.
Study after study shows this process
makes mobility worse after construction than
before the construction started.
Sometimes projects improve flow in a
specific corridor by removing a bottleneck but
on a regional and subregional scale there is no
improvement. Before
long, the measures of congestion in the
"improved" corridor grow worse
unless there is a change is the settlement
patterns. Based
on the recent vote in Loudoun County, this
problem will get worse faster in some
jurisdictions.
Let
us get the facts straight.
First,
the amount of new money generated by any of
the three major tax schemes on the table in
Richmond is a drop in the bucket compared to
"needs" given the evolving
dysfunctional settlement patterns.
The
current VDOT Six Year Plan has many fewer
projects than were on this plan just a few
years ago.
The Allen/Gilmore fantasy projects were
eliminated because there was never the money
to pay for them.
In spite of this paring back, last week
the Transportation Planning Board (TPB), an
arm of the Metropolitan Washington Council of
Governments (COG), reported that the portion
of Virginia within their jurisdiction -- not
all of the Virginia portion of the National
Capital Subregion by a long shot -- was
$4-billion short for the next six years.
That does not include most of the
projects that Business As Usual road advocates want.
It is a drop in the bucket of the $43.4
billion overall shortfall TPB noted in 2001.
Second,
in the Virginia portion of the National Capital
Subregion, COG numbers document that, as is the
case in large New Urban Regions nationwide, the
measures of congestion are growing faster than
they could be addressed by any "fiscally
constrained" long-range plans.
Herculean
efforts far beyond any revenue package now
contemplated will be needed even to maintain the
current level of congestion, much less to reduce
it.
The most optimistic analysts do not see
"improvement" but rather fantasize
about conditions not deteriorating as fast if we
pour in mountains of money.
What
is going on here?
If citizens realized the magnitude and
the cause of the traffic congestion and mobility
problems, they might alter their actions which
collectively cause congestion to grow.
They might demand that their governance
representatives tackle the Fundamental Change necessary to create functional
human settlement patterns.
They
might also toss out the office holders who
support Business As Usual at the municipal and
state levels. Now
there is a plan to improve mobility!
--
March 1, 2004
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