Category: Transportation
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These Two Electric Chargers Ran Out of Gas, So to Speak
I’m just back from a trip to Virginia Beach on a media tour of Dominion Energy’s two experimental offshore wind turbines. I’ll have more to say about them shortly. As for the subject of this post… Driving home, I stopped at the Interstate 64 rest stop between West Point and Richmond. Very conveniently for drivers…
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Free Bus Fares for Everyone Because… Equity
by James A. Bacon Once upon a time, Virginia built roads and bridges according to the quaint old principle of “pay as you go,” meaning that the state didn’t spend money it didn’t have. That idea went hand in glove with another quaint concept that the people who used public transportation infrastructure should be the…
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TCI Debate Rages in Comments on Proposed Rule
by Steve Haner The political wannabes in both parties and the state’s media are continuing to ignore it, but the argument over the proposed motor fuel carbon tax called the Transportation and Climate Initiative rages in comments on the proposal flowing into its advocates. The Thomas Jefferson Institute has also launched a short video (above),…
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TCI Model Rule Ready for Study, Comment
by Steve Haner First published this morning by the Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy. (Happy birthday, Mr. President.) Read the governing document for the Transportation and Climate Initiative and it becomes clear there is more going on than just an effort to reduce motor fuel use with a combination of taxes and shrinking caps. That…
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Dominion EV School Bus Crash #3 Ends Session
by Steve Haner Dominion Energy Virginia’s effort to force its ratepayers to finance a fleet of electric school buses has finally crashed, defeated by the House of Delegates for a third time in the final roll call of the 2021 General Assembly Saturday night.
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Work at Home and the Transportation Revolution
by James A. Bacon It may be time for a major re-think of transportation policy. Alan Pisarski, a Northern Virginia transportation consultant, argues that the states should refrain for now from expanding the transportation system and dedicate funds to properly maintaining the transportation assets they have. New technologies and business models, some accelerated by the…
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Updates: PPP, PIPP, Dominion’s School Buses
by Steve Haner Tax on Paycheck Protection Program Grants The General Assembly session deadlines require final decisions on various revenue bills before the final budget bill is adopted, in theory keeping the two issues separate. What is good tax policy should not be driven by the need or greed of the appropriators.
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Should Virginia Rebuff the HUF?
by Bill Tracy There’s a new Virginia tax called a HUF — for Highway Use Fee. Who knew? Not me — until I had to pay it. If you renew your Virginia vehicle registration, and your car exceeds a 25 miles-per-gallon EPA rating, you will be politely advised that you are underpaying pump taxes, and…
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Dominion Electric Bus Scheme Back, With More
by Steve Haner First published this morning by Thomas Jefferson Institute for Public Policy. The ultimate goal of the Transportation and Climate Initiative with its tax and rationing scheme is to eliminate fossil fuels for transportation and get us into electric vehicles. That is something advocates have admitted and critics have pointed out. While Virginia…
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Is It Time to Say Goodbye to Virginia Coal Exports??
By Peter Galuszka Oilprice.com, a petroleum trade newsletter, has a story that could spell more bad news for the faltering Virginia coal industry. For many years, the most valuable product from Virginia’s coal fields was coking or metallurgical coal that is exported to other countries for use in steel making. China has been a crucial…
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CO2 Taxes, Gas Rationing Poll Badly With Voters
By Steve Haner The Transportation and Climate Initiative plan to tax and ration motor fuels suffered a major setback just before Christmas, when eight of the eleven states considering it decided not to move forward in 2021. Less than two weeks earlier, advocates had released polling that claimed to show overwhelming popularity for the idea.
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$50 Million to Extend Amtrak Service to Christiansburg?
by James A. Bacon In his proposed budget unveiled yesterday, Governor Ralph Northam provides $50 million to extend Amtrak passenger rail service from Roanoke to the New River Valley. The money would go to “right-of-way and easement acquisitions and anything that would help reduce bottlenecks to make way for a passenger train in the New…
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Bacon Bits: Stream-of-Consciousness Edition
New sparkplug for Colonial Williamsburg. Carly Fiorina, former CEO of Hewlett-Packard, unsuccessful candidate for president and Virginia resident since 2011, has joined the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation Board of Trustees as chairwoman. It is gratifying to see Fiorina, a truly dynamic individual, apply her talents to a Virginia enterprise. Colonial Williamsburg has suffered a long-term decline…
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The Virginia Green Car Buyer’s Blues
by Bill Tracy Let me tell you a sad yarn about buying green cars in Virginia. Due to a dead hybrid battery after 14 years and 192,000 miles, we recently traded in our classic 2006 Toyota Prius for a new Toyota RAV4 Hybrid LE, the cheapest green RAV4. Had we lived in a different Blue…