Category: Transportation
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Virginia’s Deceptive Gas Tax Continues to Confuse, Rises Again
By Steve Haner, Virginia’s gasoline taxes rise again on July 1, a continuing legacy of former Governor Ralph Northam’s most taxing term. He signed the 2020 bill calling for annual gas tax adjustments for inflation, so the combined taxes will rise from 41.6 cents per gallon to 42.4 cents per gallon. It was a bipartisan…
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CDL Carnage Continues
by Kerry Dougherty On Friday morning, at 2:35, a charter bus on I-95 south in Stafford county failed to slowdown for a work zone and plowed into an SUV. That SUV rammed an Acura sedan, carrying a family of four. Four other cars were also hit by the bus, before the larger vehicle flipped over,…
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A Lesson from Amsterdam
A transportation infrastructure built around the primacy of bicycles works OK for the Dutch, but Virginians would never accept it. by James A. Bacon Amsterdammers love their bicycles. They ride their two-wheelers in the sun, in the drizzle and in the rain. They bedeck them in flowers and deck them out with baskets. Like the…
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Light Rail: The Bad Idea That Will Not Die
by Kerry Dougherty Good grief. I thought we drove a stake through the heart of the foolish notion of extending light rail to Virginia Beach back in 2016. Apparently not. Del. Alex Askew, Democrat of Virginia Beach, is asking Richmond to commission a two-year study to determine the feasibiity of extending Norfolk’s failed light rail…
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Money Down a Rathole
VRE and Norfolk ‘Tide’ are big wastes of tax dollars. by Ken Reid “The Tide,” the cute name given to the 7.4 mile-Norfolk light rail now entering its 15th year of service, was dubbed in an August expose the “Worst LRT in America.” According to Hampton Roads Transit’s 2026 budget, the annual cost of operating the Tide…
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The Empty Bus to Nowhere
Why Virginia’s rural transit subsidies need a reality check by J.D. Wong If you live in one of Virginia’s picturesque rural counties, you may have seen a familiar, yet puzzling sight: a large, brightly branded public bus rolling down a country road or regional highway, carrying nothing but a driver and a volume of air.…
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Caution: Speed Humps Ahead
by David Saunders Problem: There’s a rise in pedestrian accidents. Solution: Install speed humps that force drivers to slow down. Sounds like an excellent plan. What could possibly go wrong? If you drive in and around the City of Richmond, you’ll notice that the new administration has been placing speed humps (what used to be…
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An Issue-free Campaign for Governor Ignores Traffic Congestion
by Ken Reid I attended Gov. Youngkin’s address to the Northern Virginia Transportation Alliance Friday Oct. 24 in Fairfax. There, for the first time that I can recall, he addressed the horrendous traffic on the American legion Bridge (ALB-495) and the fact Virginia’s extension of express toll lanes to the Potomac River will be open…
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Off the Interstate: A Public Figure Honored
by Dick Hall-Sizemore Whenever I travel to anywhere west of the Blue Ridge that is south of Staunton, I take U.S. Rt. 60. Such trips usually include a stop at a restaurant at Cumberland Courthouse that serves some of the best fried oysters in the Commonwealth and at a decent price, along with lemon meringue pie. If…
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Abolish Red-Light Cameras
Improve safety with longer yellow lights. by J. Kennerly Davis Traffic ticket revenue maximization and safety have been competing motivations for public officials since the dawn of the automobile age. This has certainly been the case with the enforcement of red-light laws. The first electrified traffic signal was activated in Cleveland, Ohio in 1914. For…
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NOVA-Only Vehicle Emissions Tests are Ripe for Repeal
By Derrick Max and Gabrielle Brohard For more than four decades, Northern Virginia drivers have dutifully lined up every two years to have their vehicles inspected for emissions (separate from the equally onerous safety inspections required throughout Virginia). The mandate, which only applies to localities in Northern Virginia, was enacted in 1982 under the 1970…
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Punish Perverse Beltway Counties by Cutting Transportation Funding
Northern Virginia counties that let students use the opposite sex’s bathrooms and locker rooms can pay to pave their own streets. We won’t. by Jacob Grandstaff President Donald Trump’s administration should pull all Department of Transportation funding from counties and cities whose school boards continue to push far-left gender ideology. A good place to start…
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What’s Next? Parking-Ticket Forgiveness?
by James A. Bacon State Senate Democrats announced yesterday a deal to pay off $36 million in toll debts accumulated by thousands of drivers using the Downtown and Midtown tunnels connecting Norfolk and Portsmouth. “I’m proud to announce because of our 2025 Appropriations Bill, the Virginia Department of Transportation and Elizabeth River Crossings have successfully…
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Monopoly Beer and Electric Vehicles
By Brett A. Vassey, Spoiler alert! This is not an article about a new board game, but about a game in which the Virginia General Assembly writes the rules and picks the winners. House Bill 2087 was introduced by Delegate Irene Shin, D-Fairfax. It cleared the Senate Commerce and Labor Committee on a narrow 7-6…
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Commonwealth on Fence for Transportation Funding
The U.S. Dept. of Transportation has issued an order that “updates and resets the principles and standards underpinning U.S.Department of Transportation policies, programs, and activities.” The order provides that all “DOT grants, loans, contracts, and DOT-supported or -assisted State contracts shall proioritize projects and goals that (among other issues) “give preference to communities with marriage…