Bacon's Rebellion

“Blow Right Over”–Isn’t That What We Want?

—

by

James A. Bacon
in

The Virginia Progressive

thinks Jerry Kilgore has “gone crazy” for saying this in defense of his support for a third Potomac River crossing to relieve I-95 congestion:

“We’re coming through. It’s necessary to this region. If you don’t want an exit ramp in your locality, fine. We’ll blow right over you, but we’ve got to move people that are just going north-south through this region more quickly. “

Inartful as his phasing may be, don’t we want new roads to be limited access so as to move existing traffic, not spawn development and more traffic around interchanges?

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  1. Paul Avatar
    Paul

    Couldn’t agree more. It’s one thing for a road to cut through open space – but it’s much worse when that road spawns massive amounts of development in that open space.

  2. Tom G Avatar
    Tom G

    I would agree as well. The reason downtowns are deteriorating is because of beltways with exits every half-mile.

    Sprawl is an interesting issue, because on the one hand, I think anyone with a piece of land should be able to develop it however they want (within reason of course), but on the other hand, growth/sprawl needs to be done much more intelligently than it is now.

  3. E M Risse Avatar
    E M Risse

    Boys, Boys…

    First you plan the human settement pattern, then you crate a transport system that provides mobility. Actually, you plan them together.

    It may be better to have fewer interchanges. It is better to carefully plan the land uses around both interchanges and shared-vehicle system station areas to balance the travel demand with the system capacity.

    Given what in now known who can say a PRT system would not be better than a roadway system to serve the needs. And what, exactly are those needs?

    Kilgores views are more than an uninformed choice of words they represnt an arrogance borne of trying to say what the Road Gang wants him to say if he is to get any more of their money.

    EMR

  4. Will Vehrs Avatar
    Will Vehrs

    EM, the human settlement pattern in this case may not have been planned, but it is THERE.

    Thousands upon thousands of people settled on the East Coast. They and the trucks supplying their needs travel north-south on I-95 between Florida and Maine. A long stretch of I-95 travels through Virginia and it reaches gridlock somewhere around Fredericksburg all the way to the two existing Potomac River crossings.

    Maybe we can do something about our Virginia settlement patterns so we not using I-95 as a local commuter route, but until we do, we have both a daily traffic nightmare and a potential national security problem if the Capitol area had to be evacuated during rush hour. We also have some obligation to the interstate system to move people through VA rapidly.

    I don’t understand why a limited access bypass around I-95 from Fredericksburg to Maryland is not the most promising way to relieve traffic congestion without adding to sprawl and why you attack Jerry Kilgore for being in favor of it.

    If we can’t get to your favored fundamental change anytime soon, maybe this is as good as it gets.

  5. Jim Bacon Avatar
    Jim Bacon

    Regardless of the merits of the third crossing (and I happen to be very skeptical of it), I think Kilgore’s comments give a pretty clear indication of where he stands on transportation funding. There will be no way to build finance the third crossing with tolls alone. The state will have to kick in a significant chunk of money. But the money ain’t there. There’s only one way to get it….

    Raise taxes.

    I’m not dogmatically opposed to raising taxes. I’m only opposed to raising taxes as the default option for transportation policy. As has been explained endlessly on the pages of Bacon’s Rebellion, and in this blog, there are so many alternatives: reforming land use, telework-hoteling (see my “Network of Space” column), traffic demand management, using technology to increase the capacity of existing infrastructure… The list goes on and on. But our legislative leadership seems interested in none of them. To my mind, there are only two possible explanations. One is a breathtaking intellectual torpor; the other is that our politicians have become shills for the developer/road builder lobby. In Jerry Kilgore’s case, both possibilities might apply.

  6. Paul Avatar
    Paul

    The proposed “Western Bypass” with exits every 6 miles or more is estimated to cost $1.6 billion, according to the Northern Virginia Transportation Alliance (take that for what it’s worth). Compare that to the cost of adding one Metro station (roughly $1 billion per station) and taking a miniscule amount of cars off the roads…

    Do taxes have to be raised to fund that? I don’t know…if we could heavily tax out of state drivers who are passing through, that might be an option.

  7. Chris Brancato Avatar
    Chris Brancato

    Will,
    What would you connect a fourth VA/MD river crossing to on the MD side?

    There isn’t a road currently on the DelMarVa that could support the connection even it the Greenies would sign off on it. Route 301? Seems to me that’s problem shifting to MD. NO?

    After looking at a map, I think if effectiveness is the paramount question over feasiblity, then creating another 95 bypass (oopps, I live in Charlotteville…that’s a dirty word here!) would mean having to tie it well beyond any of the existing loops around the Capitol City since the development boom on both side of said beltways would create such havoc on the local economies that I can’t see any local government signing up for that.

    If you don’t create a large scope solution, you’re exacerbating the issue only to be addressed again in the next 20 year development cycle. Talk about good money after bad.

    Frankly, it’s a pig in a poke. Even if there was money (there isn’t), the NIMBYists would have a field day with such a broad reaching project. I predict that we’ll never see it in our lifetimes. If ever!

    Cheers!
    CB

  8. Will Vehrs Avatar
    Will Vehrs

    Look, we are waiting for Godot when we can’t see past the taillights of all the Smiths and Joneses in front of us.

    I know the reality. Some people deal with the reality by imagining new roads that somehow get funded and somehow get past NIMBY syndrome.

    Some deal with the reality by imagining new settlement patterns that miraculously wipe away decades of helter skelter development.

    I deal with it by staying home as much as possible, but occasionally engaging in the debates we hold here, thinking I’ll hear something new or something that is actually “doable.”

  9. Chris Brancato Avatar
    Chris Brancato

    I too wish it were different. I travel to DC about three times a month and regret it everytime.

    My salvation is to find a favorite eatery or shopping experience to sooth the savage beast that enrages whenever I hear the word “Inner or Outter Loop”.

    Every time I traverse that system, I lament every wasted second. The least they could do is put up a large area WiFi network so I can get SOME work done as I sit and produce the hydrocarbons of idleing.

    Have a good weekend, Will.

  10. Chris Brancato Avatar
    Chris Brancato

    One more thought…

    After my extensive education lobbying the GA, I was somewhat shaken out of my “everybody loves Charlottesville” syndrome. And it was clear to me that there truly are two congenital formations of Virginia.

    The point of clarity came when I witnessed transportation issues being discussed and how crystal clear it was that NoVa’s transportation issues are of almost no concern to the rest of the OD with the exception of…”we ain’t paying for it!”.

    Wow. I was pretty naive and awed by how strong that sentiment was. I also think it’s tragically short-sighted.

    Shame on us for thinking that it’s not our problem.

    Again, wow.

  11. Jim Bacon Avatar
    Jim Bacon

    It is short-sighed indeed for downstaters to take no interest in the health of Northern Virginia. NoVa, after all, pays a wildly disproportionate share of state taxes. It’s in the interests of us downstaters not to kill the goose that lays the golden egg.

    That said, as a downstater, I have to say that NoVa’s transportation mess is largely of its own making. I’d hate to pay higher taxes to bail out their screw-ups. I can well understand the sentiment in NoVa land in favor of tolls — at least the revenue raised there stays there.

  12. E M Risse Avatar
    E M Risse

    Will:

    You seem to have caught a case of geographic illiteracy from Mr. Hyde. I will try one more time:

    [SORRY FOR THE ALL CAPS, IT IS THE EASIEST WAY TO SEPERATE OUT THE QUOTES FROM THE RESPONSES.]

    “EMR, the human settlement pattern in this case may not have been planned, but it is THERE.”

    WHAT IS THERE IS NOT “THERE” FOR EVER; HUMAN SETTLEMENT PATTERNS ARE AN ORGANIC SYSTEM. A FREE MARKET WOULD CAUSE THESE PATTERNS TO EVOLVE TO BECOME TRANSPORTABLE. THEY WOULD BE MADE WORSE BY MORE BAD TRANSPORT DECISIONS.

    “Thousands upon thousands of people settled on the East Coast. They and the trucks supplying their needs travel north-south on I-95 between Florida and Maine. A long stretch of I-95 travels through Virginia and it reaches gridlock somewhere around Fredericksburg all the way to the two existing Potomac River crossings.”

    BASIC PHYSICS CONFIRMS EXPERIENCE ACROSS THE COUNTRY: IF YOU SPEND BILLIONS TO EXPAND CAPACITY WITHOUT FUNDAMENTAL CHANGE IN SETTLEMENT PATTERNS THEN THE GRIDLOCK JUST MOVES SOUTH. THE GREATER PROBLEM IS THAT THE NEW CAPACITY DRIVES MORE BAD DECISIONS THAT ADSORB THE NEW CAPACITY LEAVING THE WHOLE SYSTEM MORE CONGESTED.

    “Maybe we can do something about our Virginia settlement patterns so we not using I-95 as a local commuter route, but until we do, we have both a daily traffic nightmare and a potential national security problem if the Capitol area had to be evacuated during rush hour.”

    NOW YOU ARE TALKING, CHANGE THE SETTLEMENT PATTERNS!

    “We also have some obligation to the interstate system to move people through VA rapidly.”

    VDOT DESIGNED THE INTERSTATE SYSTEM IN VA IN SUCH A WAY THAT IT WAS BOUND TO FAIL. THIS FAILURE WAS PREDICTED 30 YEARS BEFORE CONSTRUCTION STARTED [SEE OUR CURRENT COLUMN AT BACONS REBELLION]

    “I don’t understand why a limited access bypass around I-95 from Fredericksburg to Maryland is not the most promising way to relieve traffic congestion without adding to sprawl”

    WE REALIZE YOU DO NOT UNDERSTAND. THAT IS WHY WE ARE ALL TRYING TO HELP. TAKE ANOTHER LOOK AT OUR FIRST NOTE IN THIS POSTING OR STUDY “THE PHYSICS OF GRIDLOCK.”

    “and why you attack Jerry Kilgore for being in favor of it.”

    BECAUSE KILGORE HAS NO IDEA WHAT HE IS TAKING ABOUT OR THAT THE “SOLUTION” THE ROAD GANG PROPOSES WILL NOT ONLY FAIL TO SOLVE THE PROBLEM, IT WILL MAKE SUBREGIONAL CONGESTION WORSE.

    ASK KILGORE OR NVTA OR ANYONE ELSE YOU WANT TO BELIEVE IN TO SHOW YOU ONE PLACE IN THE UNITED STATES WHERE BUILDING MORE ROADWAY [OR RIALWAYS] WITHOUT FUNDAMENTAL CHANGE IN HUMAN SETTELMENT PATTERNS LOWERED THE LEVELS OF REGIONAL CONGESTION.

    TEXAS A&M DATA SHOW EVERY LARGE NEW URBAN REGION GETTING WORSE YEAR AFTER YEAR.

    “If we can’t get to your favored Fundamental Change anytime soon, maybe this is as good as it gets.”

    ONCE CITIZENS UNDERSTAND THE NEED FOR FUNDAMENTAL CHANGE THE TIME TO GET TO FUNCTIONAL MOBILITY AND ACCESS WILL BE MUCH SHORTER, IN FACT INFINITLY SHORTER, THAT BUILDING ROADS OR RAILS. THIS IS BECAUSE MORE FACILTIES WITHOUT FUNDAMENTAL CHANGE ONLY MAKES CONGESTION WORSE.

    I HOPE THIS HELPS.

    EMR

  13. Phil Rodokanakis Avatar
    Phil Rodokanakis

    Jim: You said ” I’d hate to pay higher taxes to bail out their screw-ups.”

    There is no need for raising your taxes. Just return back to us a little more that then 24 cents we get back for every dollar we sent to Richmond and then we can take care of fixing our own transportation mess. Of course, if you return more to us in NOVA, then some programs will have to be cut. I don’t think that’s too unfair given that our Richmond Commissars have been defrauding NOVA for years now…

  14. Phil Rodokanakis Avatar
    Phil Rodokanakis

    EM said: “First you plan the human settement pattern, then you crate a transport system that provides mobility. Actually, you plan them together.”

    Didn’t the try that approach in the former Soviet Union?

  15. E M Risse Avatar
    E M Risse

    Phil:

    You are so old school, doctrinaire!!

    To provide a straight answer: Not just in USSR but in every functional urban agglomeration over the past 10,000 years. Try the Greek colonies, the Roman planned povincial capitals, etc.

    I am not an expert of on the USSR. (You will recall Fairfax County sent a team to Moscow to help them “suburbanize.”)

    I do know that settlement patterns similar to the ones in the USSR that we lived in while visiting the Czech Rep as well as ones those in other Eastern Eupropean, Balkan and former the Yugo emerging nation-states are rebounding as democracies do in part to the ease of retrofitting the Soviet Era settlement patterns.

    In contrast note the problems with retrofitting “subrubia.” See today’s TWP story on Long Island. (You may have missed it because it has a picute of Mrs. Clinton :>)

    If we are to move beyond the current dysfunction, we all need to set aside the myths that got us here.

    I suppose you were trying to pin the idea of Soviet Central Planning on us. Have you seen anything from us that does not support market driven evolution of settlement patterns?

    EMR

  16. Paul Avatar
    Paul

    EM:
    I’m wondering (and bear with me while I throw something out there that I might not subscribe to)- is there any downside to just patching up the problem, decade after decade? Build another bypass, take traffic around the city for 15 years. Then, when it gets unbearable again, build another one. Or build a diamond connector. Ease traffic for a few more years, then build another one.

    Sure, that kills our green space – but aren’t we inevitably going to do that anyway on the eastern seaboard? Our birthrates aren’t going down…immigration laws aren’t tightening any time soon either. So, in an area with 1.5% unemployment, people will continue to multiply and move in.

    Isn’t transportation policy best described as: “finding the best solution amongst a whole crop of crappy solutions in order to put the problem off for another 15 years until we’re forced to choose again”?

    I guess I’m just a bit hopeless. Even with mixed land use combined with fundamental change in people’s perceptions of where they need to live (which I doubt will ever come), you still just have millions of people crammed into a small space. Seems like we just need to grin, bear it, expand the capacity of the existing metro system, and build some more roads.

    …And let Kansas enjoy their open space until it becomes suburb of DC.

    …Or wait for teleportation. Once the crack scientists at UVA figure that out, we’ll be set.

  17. E M Risse Avatar
    E M Risse

    Paul:

    I am glad you do not believe that is a “solution” because it is not.

    The response has to do with the scale of functional arrangements of human activies. That is why mass geographic illiteracy is such a terrible problem.

    We plan to deal with that two columns from now when considering “Land conservation.”

    Your survival tactic is, however, exactly what politicians believe is in their best option. Thus the statement by Kilgore that got this all started.

    EMR

  18. Anonymous Avatar
    Anonymous

    I have to blog in against Ed Risse once again. We cannot successfully plan what you call fuctional human settlement patterns and have them happen without force. I say that because Will Vehrs is right – what we have is already there – because it is what people want. Ed Risse will say that it is only because of massive subsidies and advertizing, but Davy Crockett said that the time to move was when you could see your neighbors smoke well before advertizing or subsidies other than free land. Relative to the city, country land is still free, and the same issues drive us today as then.

    Even if EMR could magically change everybody’s perceptions and have them democratically vote for the totalitarian regime he seems to favor, it would take several hundred years to find out that he is wrong.

    But that is not going to happen. Loudoun and Oregon are current examples of what will happen if you try to take tens of billions of prospective dollars out of people’s pockets just so you can have green space you don’t have to pay for, while at the same time generating massive capital gains for those of us who own property in the city and doing it by subsidizing failing mass tranit.

    Shared vehicles will only work when no other option is available, and that will happen when our standard of living is much lower than it is now. OK, I agree, we are spending our childrens inheritance, the best we can do is spend it wisely, considering what we have to work with. One of the things we don’t have to work with is an agreed master plan for the human race.

    That is because we can’t agree on who is to say what the needs are, let alone how they are to be met. No one is mart enough to do that, and the best approximation we have come up with so far is to average what each person thinks their need are, given the constraints on hand – a giant Delphi process, if you will.

    In this process every player, whether it is EMR or Kilgore has his own interest, and he is free to create associations of interests. Those associations might be called businesses, unions, lobbys, special interest groups, religions, political parties, or whatever. There is no advantage in denigrating someone else’s interests, and it is a logical fallacy.

    For thousands of years the reasons for building roads has been to create congestion, the end result of which is commerce, yet suddenly we seem to have forgotten that. Congestion is good, up to a point. When that point happens and the economic value of congestion declines relative to other opportunities, then it is time to spread out.

    Those people who choose to spread out most advantageously will find themselves in the middle of the next outlying city and will profit the most.

    EMR seems to think that profit is a bad thing, but actually it is the reward for making good decisions. He would subsume profit for the public good, he actually proposed expropriating the profits from the advertizing and entertainment industries to support public schools, as if we were some undereducated bananna republic. The public benefit turns out to be the sum of all the little individual profits.

    Profit does not mean stealing from someone else, the nature of a deal is that both parties think they have profited, and probably, both parties have profited.

    Preventing sprawl, as we now practice it, means getting what we want without paying for it. Jim Bacon went so far as to say it was free, no cost. That is as silly as saying we can fund schools by exporpriating the advertising industry – to them it is a cost. Since we all probably own stock inthe advertising industry, it is a cost to all of us.

    Any such attempt will necessarily result in a suboptimal solution. That is why tom g is right when he says anyone with a piece of land should be able to develop it within reason. By the same token, those who wish to preserve land are free to go buy and preserve it. The fact that this happens so seldom shows that it is not cost effective, and when it is cost effective we will preserve it in the face of any obstacle, just as we have done with Central Park.

    Price and profit are how we plan human settlement patterns. That is why thousands have settled on the East Coast, so far, it is unprofitable to move, or we have not yet identified where the more profitable place to move is.

    We can be pretty sure that the most profitable place to move is not the place that already has the highest price, regardless of what EMR says.

    The way to determine whether a third crossing is justified is to compare the costs against the profits and against every other possible use of the funds compared with their profits. We are not smart enough to do that, so we resort to crude approximations or special interest groups to guide us.

    Jim Bacon says the only way to get the money is to raise taxes, but raising taxes beyond a reasonable amount, reduces commerce and therefore tax revenues. Preventing a landowner from developing (within reason) is a tax that reduces commerce and tax revenue, that we could have used to buy open space if that was a priority.

    Price and profit are not only how we plan human settlement patterns, it is how we plan conservation. That means that we cannot penalize one who owns urban open space that is ripe for infill. We are not smart enough to know what the value is to the owner, and by forcing him to develop sooner than he wants, we may be reducing commerce and tax revenue that we could have used to buy open space if that was a priority.

    I’m in favor of raising taxes if we can show with reasonable certainty that it is to our economic benefit. That is a very high standard, because, in general, we are not smart enough to know.

    We can fairly well say that private enterprise will not invest in projects that do not show a near term profit. Only Government can afford to do that, and one investment government makes that pretty generally increases revenue is roads. It is true, we now have new technolgies that make roads less necessary: that means we can sprawl even more if we want, and evidently we do.

    Particularly with roads, a large scope solution may not be the answer. The maximum throughput for raods is around 25 mph and three car lengths apart. By that measure large highways are counterproductive, except for the traffic that need to travel long distances at high speeds.

    Two copies of Route 50 with traffic calming may carry more cars per hour than one four lane Route Fifty, and they would offer mor opportunities for commerce.

    Big infrastructure has big benefits, but it also has big risks, and when it fails,it is likely to fail spectacularly. That is why the World Trade Center was a target for so many years.

    Connecticut once was faced with a problem in Rhode Island. Rhode islan couldn’t decide where to locate the connection for a norther spur off of Route 95. Eventually Conneticut built a four lane highway right up to the Rhode Island border where it stopped in a field.

    It stayed that way, unused, for years until Rhode Island had to do something, then they picked up where Connecticut left off.

    Virginia could make Maryland’s choice if they wish to invest the money. Build the road and cantilever half a bridge across the river.

    Big infrastructure always involve some risk. I thought bulding a twelve lane Wilson Bridge was utterly stupid. They would have been better off and cheaper and less disruptive with six two lane bridges. Half of them would have landed in Anacostia, which could use some development.

    My suggestion on the outer beltway is to make an inner Blue Ridge Parkway, and run it right over the top of Bull Run Mountain, with no interchanges except for 95, 66, and 7. It is kind of similar to an idea proposed by my friend Mal Jones. He says we should line the highways with our cemetaries so we can’t widen them.

    If the rest of OD doesn’t stop stealing and diverting NOVA highway fu
    nds theyare going to shoot themselves in the conomic foot, or else NOVA will fail economically and reinvent itself in Charlottesville. Is that really waht you want?

    EMR is right, what we have is not there forever, but human settlement patterns are one of our most durable constructions: they live on even after the cities fail.
    It will take dozens of generations to do what he suggests, and it will have to be done incrementally and not with Fundamental Change.

    He is right again about gridlock, we spend billions specifically to create congestion. The fact that we get gridlock just means we are more successlful than we planned, but planning has never had a very good record.

    Attacking Kilgore as an idiot does not make EMR’s arguments any more correct, or any more useful even if they are.

    In a democratic society where people are free to pursue happiness, how do you propose changing settlement patterns, if that is not what they want? Eventually, when things get bad enough, people might change their attitudes, but given the amount of empty space we have to work with, that might take another six or seven hundred years, during which time more people will be watching ponge Bob Square Pant’s than reading what EMR or I have to say.

    How can we make things bad enough to cause that to happen? Well, we will just declare a Clear Edge, beyond which nothing can happen and we choke off all economic activity other than farming and forestry. That ought to work. But the problem with that is that everyone in the city will try to escape to the country for the weekend, a phenomena we already see. Increasing density will result in a U-shaped travel pattern and we will have to build a network of roads to get people out of the city.

    It will have multiple lane highways close in, fanning out to smaller and smaller feeder roads in the country. Sound familiar?

    I recently made a trip from Iowa to DC on the highly dysfunctional interstate highwy system. Iowa, where agriculture still has at least some value is actively getting out of agriculture. Every town I saw had a pattern of human settlement similar to here: circles of townhouses creeping into the countryside because that is all people can afford.

    Unlike VA the Iowa rest arteas are spectacularly beautiful, with pedestrian friendly walking paths, and barbecues and spotlessly clean toilet facilites. The farther East and more civilized you get. the worse the facilies are.

    EMR is selctive about the Texas transportation study. It also says that those few locations that have spent substantial funds have congestion that is increasing more slowly. Again, it comes down to what is cost effective. Downtown Houston is 75% streets, and it still does not have enough becuae the Population/commerce density is stacked up in the sky in high rises.

    Clearly, there is such a thing as too much roads, but that hasn’t happened yet in the countryside.

    Pointing to your own argument that the interstates are a failure hardly counts as proof. Millions of people whose livelihood depends on them might differ. Even if we agree that highways are a failure, show me one place where changes in human settlement patterns have made a difference in regional transportation.

    Ray Hyde
    Delaplane, VA

    Virginia couls simply

    It turns out that sprawl is how we reduce the price of cities.

    Any attempt, whatsoever, to

  19. Anonymous Avatar
    Anonymous

    Sorry for the partial excluded thoughts hangig out otn the bottom of my previous post. Here is one more.

    EMR is fond of talking about natural systems. Consider the human or any other circulatory sytem with arteries and veins and capillaries. Now choke off the capillaries and the whoe organism suffers.

    Ray Hyde
    Delaplane, VA

  20. Anonymous Avatar
    Anonymous

    Ooh, I really like that analogy – If you clog the arteries, the organism suffers too.

    Ray Hyde
    Delaplane, VA

  21. Will Vehrs Avatar
    Will Vehrs

    Ray, speaking on behalf of this blog, I just want to thank you for your always thought-provoking comments. So many times you keep the discussion going–and keep EM and the rest of us on our toes regarding transportation, sprawl, and human settlement patterns.

  22. Anonymous Avatar
    Anonymous

    Thank you. Spring is happening and soon the farm will eat every second of spare time and energy, in fact it already is, so I will probably be less visible here.

    I see the tax and spend problem as being pretty simple, at it’s bassics. Like any business, you neer have enough money to make it grow as fast as you would like, unless you have a busiess that you are satisfied with.

    You can either borrow money or raise prices, either strategy has some risk involved. If you borrow too much you jeopardize the business, like Donald Trump. If you raise prices you run the risk of decreasing business to the point that you make less money: Think of Tiffany’s compared to Wal-Mart. Congestion is the non-market equivalent of raising prices, those that can’t stand the price move to Farmville, or someplace and accept a different, but not necessarily worse standard of living. It is not for me to say.

    Congestion preceded automobiles. Think of the souks in Fez or Marrakech. When they got crowded, they got bigger. If you wanted to open a new stand in the souk you could either pay a high price to buy out an existing stand or take a lesser location on the fringe. It has less valeue as EMR would say, but also less risk.

    I don’t see our situation today as much different, but our solution is more complex and expensive. The benefits are greater too in some respects, in others they are the same. If you want a drink of water in the souk you go to a water carrier who will dispense a drink from a goatskin bag. We have the Polar water delivery guy.

    Probably we agree that we all want what is best. What causes problems is that we have so many stakeholders there is no way to reach a concensus on what that is, and not even an agreed upon set of Metrics.

    We have some metrics, unemployment and new job starts, homelessness and new housing starts, housing affordability, crime rates, saving and charity contributions etc. We don’t have a way to combine all of them into a government success number that we can agree on.

    We already have check offs on our taxes for various issues. Why not make the entire form a check-off?
    After you figure your taxes, fill in a form that indicates in a general way how you think they should be spent. EMR can allocate 100% to preserving open space or environmental issues if he likes.
    Others might dedicate 100% to education or public safety – there are a lot of people consumed by single issues.

    Averaged over 250 million people we could reach a concensus of what we want to spend money on, and that concensus would shift over time. Most people would probably develop a division of their taxes not too different from what we have now, and those that think we need Fundamental Change would have their say.

    Lawmakers and government bureaucrats could be restricted to fiddling at the margin – say 10 to 15% of variation on any one category. As it stands now, they probably don’t have that much leeway because there are so many vested interests. The result is that politicians necessarily talk out of both side of their mouth or become shills for powerful interests. This plan would mean that powerful interests would have to appeal to the people instead of the legislators, and the advertizing industry, instead of being a waste, would become an agent for Fundamental Change.

    This reform would cost almost nothing and it is eminently democratic even if it is weighted towards the rich, but you have to be willing to make the assumption that people are not clueless, which might be a stretch. The rich have mor money than the rest of us individually, but in the aggregate the diffence is not so great. Anyway it might be possible to counterweight the forms by population somehow. House legislators would be resticted to considetation of the forms weight on population and the senate would be restricted to considertion of the forms weight on money, for example.

    I’ve used the analogy of fish and locusts before. Although the individuals are competing for the same resources, they have developed a keen sense of collision avoidance combined with an understanding of the public benefit of acting in a group. Here again, the members at the edges of the group are at greater risk.

    Maybe we should be as stupid as fish, it would be more natural.

    Ray Hyde
    Delaplane VA

  23. NoVAStatehood Avatar
    NoVAStatehood

    Whoa there, partner…
    smile when you say that.

    “It is short-sighed indeed for downstaters to take no interest in the health of Northern Virginia. NoVa, after all, pays a wildly disproportionate share of state taxes. It’s in the interests of us downstaters not to kill the goose that lays the golden egg.

    That said, as a downstater, I have to say that NoVa’s transportation mess is largely of its own making. I’d hate to pay higher taxes to bail out their screw-ups. I can well understand the sentiment in NoVa land in favor of tolls — at least the revenue raised there stays there.”

    It sounds like you want to
    have your cake and eat it,
    too.

    There are 4 regions in
    the Old Dominion:
    1) Richmond Metro, which has
    25% of the population,
    contributes 25% of the
    revenue, and receives 25%
    of the expenditures
    2) Hampton Roads, which has
    25% of the population,
    contributes 25% of the
    revenue, and receives 25%
    of the expenditures
    3) Northern Virginia, which
    in the immortal words of
    a downstate legislator was
    dubbed “NoVALand”, which
    has 25% of the population,
    contributes over 40% of the
    revenue, and receives back
    only 16% of the expenditures, and
    4) The rest of the
    Commonwealth, which has 25%
    of the population, contributes
    only 10% of the revenue,
    and receives 34% of the
    expenditures.

    NoVA doesn’t just contribute
    a lot of the taxes — we
    carry the rest of the state
    while Richmond and Hampton
    skate by without making a
    net contribution.

    This is nothing new, either.

    Each year, it is an imbalance
    of over $5 billion, which
    means an Enron every year.

    So…next time you start
    thinking that folks from
    the Northern counties are
    out of line for insisting
    that the Commonwealth
    cough up some cash, remember
    this: we weren’t the folks
    who shorted NoVA by $5 billion
    every year…and it is not
    a sustainable model.

    Remember that the territory
    which is now Kentucky was
    at one point Fincastle
    County, Virginia. Remember
    that the territory which is
    now West Virginia was once
    Hampshire County, Virginia.

    Keep up the the same attitude,
    and get the same result again.

    If you won’t return the
    revenue to us, at least end
    the Dillon Rule, so we can
    regulate development here
    and make it pay for the
    costs it incurs.

    Or change nothing and make
    it 4 instead of 3 states
    which once were Virginia.

    Because the time is coming
    when we will present the
    Commonwealth with the bills
    for the infrastructure
    which it has skipped over
    building…$5 billion x 10
    years = $50 billion.
    (Remember VDOT’s own numbers
    which say that $10 billion
    statewide is just the tip
    of the iceberg).
    Are you downstaters ready
    to pay up???? Or is
    the Commonwealth really
    only a one-way street, where
    cash from NoVA flows south,
    but nothing comes north?

    Doesn’t the Constitution of
    the Commonwealth guarantee
    to all citizens an equal
    government?

    If that is the case…why
    is it only Northern VA which
    has to carry the rest of the
    state? Not enough big banks,
    large law firms, big
    aluminum companies, and
    other companies in greater
    Richmond to allow it to
    contribute more than it
    receives? Not enough tourist
    dollars in Hampton Roads to
    allow it to make a net
    contribution to the
    Commonwealth? Why is it only
    NoVA who can make such a
    contribution?

    Fix it or nuke it….or,
    perhaps more exactly,
    fix it if it can be fixed
    before it implodes.
    Otherwise, please stand
    clear. We are not geese,
    we are people whose needs
    are NOT being met by
    the Commonwealth.

    If you truly feel it is
    our problem, and are not
    willing or able to help fix
    things, please allow us to
    fix them on our own.

  24. Jim Bacon Avatar
    Jim Bacon

    Novastatehood, The problem you describe is a real one — there IS a large imbalance between what NoVa contributes in taxes and what it receives in taxes. What you highlighted, and I didn’t realize (are those real figures, or were you making them up for purposes of illustration) was the extent to which non-metro Virginia is being subsidized. Rather than blame downstaters for the inequity, however, I would invite you to dig a little deeper in your understanding of what is going on.

    Why is such a large transfer of wealth take place? Is it an imbalance in the amount of discretionary pork doled out to different jurisdictions of the state? I don’t believe so. NoVa legislators can logroll with the best of them. A close analysis will show that the inequity results from funding formulas for highways, education, Medicaid, social services and, perhaps, other programs, that spend money on auto-pilot. The question, then is why are these funding formulas so unfair to Northern Virginia?

    In the case of transportation, the formula seems unequal because road spending goes to two things: funding local roads, and funding roads that connect metro regions with one another. Be definition, those connecting roads are located in non-metro areas. Part of NoVa’s road subsidy (not necessarily all) is paying for the privilege of connecting to Charlottesville, the Valley, Richmond and points south (Raleigh, Florida, etc.) Do you really object to that?

    As for the education funding formulas, there is an income redistributionist element. Wealthy localities help pay for the poor, rural localities that can’t afford decent schools on their own. NoVa is being short-changed not because of some geographic prejudice but because it happens to be the wealthiest part of the state. Your problem is not with “downstate” per se, but with the idea that wealthy regions should be taxed to help poor regions.

    The same might be said of Medicaid and social services. Medicaid goes to poor people, who disproportionately live in rural and inner-city areas. NoVa is suburban. It claims no rural parts, and it has no old, urban core because the urban core is Washington, D.C. Again, what you’re taking issue with is the fact that wealthy citizens are taxed to pay help poor citizens.

    Now, let’s get down to the real nub: NoVa is not a well-rounded region: It is a suburb. NoVa residents take no responsibility for helping support the urban core (Washington, D.C.) which brought NoVa into being. And, evidently, they feel put upon to help the rural areas that surround them. As a suburb, NoVa is skimming the demographic cream, income-wise. Here in Richmond, suburban Henrico and Chesterfield counties, I’m certain, also get short-changed as well. The difference is that the Richmond suburbs accept the fact that they’re part of the same region as Richmond, with all of its inner city ills, and outlying, rural counties.

    If you have a problem with the way your “region” is being short-changed from the redistribution of taxes, change the funding formulas to favor wealthier taxpayers and wealthier regions. Ironically, Northern Virginians are among the most liberal, income redistributionist-oriented voters in the Commonwealth. So, I would suggest, a good part of your problem isn’t “Richmond” — it’s the representatives you send to Richmond.

  25. Anonymous Avatar
    Anonymous

    Nice Response, Jim.

    That does make things a little more complicated, than it appears.

    Isn’t the reason the distribution formulas are set up that way is because there are more legislators in the rest of the state than in NOVA?

    It’s kind of a chicken and egg problem. Downstate depends on money from wealthy NOVA, wealthy NOVA needs roads to generate money,
    NOVA road money goes downstate and doesn’t come back. Therefore downstate has roads and NOVA doesn’t. Eventually NOVA chokes on its own congestion and businesses, people, money and sprawl move to C’ville or downstate. But now NOVA is no longer rich and downstate has to pay their own bills.

    Sounds like a plan.

    Ray Hyde
    Delaplane

  26. Anonymous Avatar
    Anonymous

    Novastatehood, when you go on your little tirades about the rest of the state, remember that without those “downstaters” you blame for all NOVAs woes, that without them, you’d likely be living in a region that would no longer be right to work and would tax and regulate itself into Maryland status. Certainly that wouldn’t be in the best interest of anyone in NOVA or the rest of the Commonwealth.

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