As a cyclist, I get a lot of reasons I shouldn't be on the road thrown at me from people with uneducated opinions, but this one - this misconception right here that driving pays for roads, is the only one that makes my blood boil. I think if more people understood what actually pays for the roads it would cut down on the sense of entitled driving so many seem to have in general.
Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?
71–80 of 172 posts
Re: Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?
#72First and foremost, we need to abolish the laws that caused this all to happen. Yes, that’s right – all of this was required to happen, by law. Many people think that sprawl is a free market phenomenon, and they are exactly wrong. Sprawl is caused by the following policies – I call these Sprawl Laws; you can find them for yourself in your local city code (for the most succinct explanation, see this paper[1]): * Zonin…
It's not as clear cut as you say. Houston is minimal for its minimal/nonexistant zoning rules such as you say and it's also a massive sprawl.
What Houston lacks in zoning laws, it makes up for with many, if not most, neighborhoods being "deed restricted" communities. For residents, this is effectively the same as zoning. From the city website (http://www.houstontx.gov/legal/deed.html):
"Restrictions mean limitations that:
-Affect the use to which real property may be put;
-Fix the distance that a structure must be set back from property lines, street lines, or lot lines;
-Affect the size of a lot or the size, type and number of structures that may be built on the lot;
-Regulate orientation of a structure; or
-Regulate certain fences requiring a building permit."
Re: Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?
#73Re: Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?
#74There's this assumption that are $15-$18 per square foot. I'm no expert here, but I think that number might be roughly double what cities actually pay, based on this document from the State of Michigan : https://www.michigan.gov/documents/Vol2-40UIP16SubDevCosts-Y... It's a decade old, but I'm seeing only $8/square foot cost, not $15+. Using the rest of the authors map + numbers, the majority of properties are now ac…
How are you arriving at $8? The footnote on page 2 puts it maybe close to that at minimum just for the construction (the article is including 30 years of maintenance).
I'm not including water mains, electricity, and gas mains. (Since they aren't really part of the street -- they generate their own revenue through usage charges + other taxes).
Here's another person also arriving at roughly $8/sqft in California :
Re: Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?
#75Re: Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?
#76Driverless cars solve this problem pretty soon The end result is going to be about ~80% fewer cars in existence.
Why? Drivers or not, cars still need roads to reach locations.
But you can have streets which are far narrower as driverless cars can coordinate on how to make it work well.
Re: Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?
#77I've always wondered why we pave our streets to begin with. Yes, I know that dirt and gravel kick up alot of dust, but the expense of the street itself seems a bit extreme as well. I can't think of how many times I've seen a new street go in, and just a few weeks later they cut it up and dig up a water line to replace it. There has to be a better material besides concrete or asphalt that would provide similar benefit…
I've lived on dirt roads. At this point you only really find them in very rural areas because of their disadvantages.
1) Dirt roads can become almost impassable in bad weather. Everything turns to mud so it's very easy to get stuck or damage your car
2) Dirt roads require a fair amount of maintenance under moderate use. Roads can wash out, have too many rocks, can become lopsided or have gauges in them from car traffic.
3) Its way to damage your car. If you go too fast you can easily blow your oil pan. Dust of course gets into everywhere including the engine.
4) Low speeds. Your max speed is around 20-40 mph in good weather depending on the curves. Bad weather you can easily be going 5 mph. When getting to the town center takes an hour takes an hour, it becomes beneficial to leave roads just because of the increased store traffic.
5) Your vehicle gets incredibly dirty. Those wash me memes are clean in comparison
Re: Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?
#78First and foremost, we need to abolish the laws that caused this all to happen. Yes, that’s right – all of this was required to happen, by law. Many people think that sprawl is a free market phenomenon, and they are exactly wrong. Sprawl is caused by the following policies – I call these Sprawl Laws; you can find them for yourself in your local city code (for the most succinct explanation, see this paper[1]): * Zonin…
It's interesting that some of the most charming neighborhoods in the country (e.g. Chelsea in New York, DuPont in D.C.) were built before all that crap. You'd never build a "modern city" like Philadelphia, with its narrow one-way streets, lack of parking, and commercial and retail mish-mashed together. But most of the rest of the country feels dead in comparison.
Some places are building this. Assembly Row in Somerville is a prime example. Usually it's called transit oriented planning.
Re: Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?
#79As a cyclist, I get a lot of reasons I shouldn't be on the road thrown at me from people with uneducated opinions, but this one - this misconception right here that driving pays for roads, is the only one that makes my blood boil. I think if more people understood what actually pays for the roads it would cut down on the sense of entitled driving so many seem to have in general.
The UK has a campaign dedicated to this: http://ipayroadtax.com/
Admittedly it's more due to the UK's peculiar form of taxation (in a netshell: occupiers of houses pay "council tax" rather than owners paying "property tax"). But the website is a little dated, I hear they re-instated a ring-fenced sales tax on cars that will go towards road development.
Re: Are Your Taxes Paying for the Cost of Your Street?
#80There's this assumption that are $15-$18 per square foot. I'm no expert here, but I think that number might be roughly double what cities actually pay, based on this document from the State of Michigan : https://www.michigan.gov/documents/Vol2-40UIP16SubDevCosts-Y... It's a decade old, but I'm seeing only $8/square foot cost, not $15+. Using the rest of the authors map + numbers, the majority of properties are now ac…
CPI from 2003 to 2016 would bring that $8 up to $10.35, FWIW. And then, as you mentioned, road quality may come in to play. As would labor costs and other factors.
And that doesn't incorporate the government administration cost, which the author's number includes (by taking the actual city budget).