Funny how gas is cheap after 8years bush

[1bad65]

Tax increases are always the same way as well. They never go away. The income tax in the US was sold to us as the way to pay for WWI. That ended in 1918, yet the tax was never repealed, it just keeps going up.

Look at toll roads. Here in Texas we got some a few years ago. Governor Perry, who I will never vote for again, said the tolls are there to pay for the cost of constructing the roads. Does anyone really believe that they won't be tolled forever? What about our state gasoline taxes that are supposed to pay for roads?

[bakxierboxer]

What about our state gasoline taxes that are supposed to pay for roads?

Jeepers!
That sounds "just like" the Federal "gas tax" at the pump.......
Then there are other taxes at various stages of the import and processing....

[GLW]

Actually, the jury is still out on Texas and toll roads that don't ever have their tolls go away...

Back in the late 1950's early 1960's, the Dallas Fort Worth Turnpike was just about the first toll road in the state. You could go to Austin and say "The Toll Road" and people knew you were talking the DFW area.

It was built with the expectation of the toll stands disappearing in a certain number of years. That year came and the tollbooths did NOT disappear..but the reason given was that there was maintenance on the road that was required. The maintenance was done and eventually the tollbooths came down. It is now I 30...and guess what, the maintenance was much better on it when it was a toll road.

The next was the North Dallas Tollway. It was also to eventually have the tollbooths removed. Haven't been on it in a while...but the tollbooths definitely stayed longer than they were supposed to due to required maintenance. It has since been extended beyond I 635 and still has a toll...

None of the toll roads in Houston were ever advertised as being planned to go free. They were to use the money for paying for the road and then its upkeep.

Austin was late in the game with toll roads. No telling about them...

But what I can say is that the roads that STAYED as toll roads actually are better kept than the others...go figure.

[MasterKiller]

In Oklahoma, the tolls were originally setup to be temporary until the highway projects were paid for. Funny thing is, the highways get refinanced every few years to pay for NON highway projects. The tolls are an easy source of revenue that basically equates to a driving tax.

[BoulderDawg]

I think tolls are good ideas. When I go to the airport I have several choices: take the toll road for 5/6 bucks then pay $10 for parking. Drive an addtional 10 miles and still pay $10 a day to park. Or take the bus for $22 round trip and pay nothing to park......I take the bus everytime.

The only problem I would have would be if there was no other practical way to get from point A to Point B....Then there should be no toll road. However if you want to pay 6 bones a trip to shave off a few miles then knock yourself out. The rich are the only ones that will pay that and they are plenty out here in Colorado.

[BoulderDawg]

By the way, we won't live to see it but within two hundred years the car as we know it we just be a memory.

[1bad65]

The tolls are an easy source of revenue that basically equates to a driving tax.

Agreed. The thing that upsets me is that the other taxes (namely gas and car inspection fees) are supposed to fund road construction and maintenance.

GLW, the ones in Austin are tolled by the state, not the City of Austin. The ones in Dallas and Houston are state highways as well, correct?

[David Jamieson]

By the way, we won't live to see it but within two hundred years the car as we know it we just be a memory.

2 hundred years?

dude, within 2 decades you will see more electric and HFC personal vehicles.
You'll see huge improvements in infrastructure that allows for high speed rail and there will also be changes in air travel to boot.

think about it. The USA and Canada and Mexico didn't even have highway systems until the 50's.

The cars that were being driven in the 70's are nothing like the cars that are driven now.

We may be old with the demise of the personal combustion engine, but it won't be 200 years from now.

combustion engines will get used but overall, everything will be public transport, electric or hydrogen fuel cell.

[SPJ]

Funny how gas ($2.00) is cheap after 8years of bush when this summer it was $5 a gallon.

Gee think him and his friends were screwing us with out the smile on are faces!

However, it is funny to witness all the fools who bought hybrid cars because they thought times wouldn't change,and gas prices would just get higher.

My budget for the gas for driving to work more than double in 2008.

had to cut back a lot of MA related purchases.

[sanjuro_ronin]

Yeah, I can't wait to drive these new latest models of environmentally friendly cars !!

[BoulderDawg]

2 hundred years?

dude, within 2 decades you will see more electric and HFC personal vehicles.
You'll see huge improvements in infrastructure that allows for high speed rail and there will also be changes in air travel to boot.

think about it. The USA and Canada and Mexico didn't even have highway systems until the 50's.

The cars that were being driven in the 70's are nothing like the cars that are driven now.

We may be old with the demise of the personal combustion engine, but it won't be 200 years from now.

combustion engines will get used but overall, everything will be public transport, electric or hydrogen fuel cell.

The reason I say 200 years is because most people are slow to change. We did not even have an interstate highway system until 50-60 years after the invention of the automobile. There are still many parts of the world that don't.

[GLW]

Originally, the toll roads in DFW were run by the turnpike authority. It was an entity of itself with really no parallel anywhere but the DFW area. That is one of the reasons that it actually paid for the road and then when it completed the maintenance and turned the toll road over to the Interstate highways, the toll booths came down.

The North Dallas tollway was under the same umbrella....but it kept pushing north well past 635 now...and pretty much made itself such that the toll would never end.

Houston has the Harris County Toll authority connected to Metro (buses)...but it feeds into the state now...and from what I have been told, your EZTag from one area SHOULD be recognized in the others in the state....

This implies state control at some level now...and also implies that they have now figured out that most people will not notice when the toll NEVER goes away...so they keep milking that cash cow.

This definitely WAS an idea of Governor GoodHair (Perry)...and his group of merry men.

In Harris County, they added a 1 cent Metro charge to the sales tax. If you bought an item outside the county, you paid 7 1/4 % sales tax. Inside the county, it was 8 1/4%...of course, if you weren't paying attention, many merchants were just using the 8 1/4% even if they were out of the county.

That penny was to pay for the buses and the upkeep on things like the toll road...

That is until the powers in Houston wanted to tap it for other things. Then the stae came in and laid claim to it being a highway fund and wanting their cut (most of it).

Highways and Texas...only thing screwier is the Permanent University Fund.

[golgo]

By the way, we won't live to see it but within two hundred years...

Speak for yourself! I plan on being here in 200 years.

[BoulderDawg]

Speak for yourself! I plan on being here in 200 years.

You might want to rethink that. Although medicine might get to the point where they could keep a body alive for that many years the problem is the aging of the brain. I've read a few articles that the absolute upper limits would be 120-130 years old(And that's pushing it) because after that the brain just goes.

[1bad65]

This definitely WAS an idea of Governor GoodHair (Perry)...and his group of merry men.

I'll be voting for Kay Bailey Hutchison in the upcoming Republican primary for Governor, that's for sure.