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32 CONNECTICUT GREEN GUIDE • SUMMER 2015 www.CTGreenGuide.com Opinion EDITORIAL Please, No Tolls C onnecticut's transportation planning and infrastructure certainly needs a refresh. We won't go as far to say the state's transportation system is a mess, but if Connectict continues its long tra- dition of kicking the can down the road, it certainly will be a mess. To this end, we applaud Gov. Dannel P. Malloy's 30-year, $100 billion plan to overhaul the state's transportation systems. However, as Malloy's special commission to come up with a funding source for this slightly overambitious plan starts to develop concrete ideas, we would like to make one plea: No tolls. We get it: cars are becoming more efficient, and the decrease in gasoline tax collections nationwide is the scourge of all transporta- tion planning everywhere. A new funding source is needed to pay for costly maintenance and improve- ments. Connecticut is relatively tapped out with its funding sourc- es: local partnerships would create higher property taxes; more gas taxes would be counterintuitive, especially in a state with the high- est gasoline prices in New England; businesses already are facing tax increases just to balance the this year's state budget. Tolls seem like an obvious solu- tion, or at least part of the solution package. (News Columnist Lyle Wray talks more about funding op- tions on page 14.) Yet, forcing motorists and busi- ness fleets to pay tolls feels more like the bill coming due for years of Con- necticut robbing its transportation funding to pay for non-transportation services, underfunding its transporta- tion improvement plans, and talking about overhauling transportation planning with no real action. Take the gross receipts tax, for example, which is a main rea- son prices at Connecticut fueling stations are typically 20-30 cents higher than those immediately across the border. This started off as a tax to help fueling stations pay to clean up spills, but the legislature kept stealing the money away to pay for its pet projects, so now none of that money goes toward transportation projects. This year's legislative passage of a transportation lock box to prevent this kind of thievery in the future is a somewhat reassuring notion, but in a state with a long history of raiding its special funds for general spending, that lock box measure only means so much. While tolls are user fees, much of Malloy's transportation plans call for improvements that have nothing to do with roads, such as improvements to rail, airports, and seaports. At that point, motor- ists are paying for something that doesn't benefit them directly. Tolls are annoying. They usually cost just enough to hurt commuters' wallets but aren't high enough to force commuters to find an alterna- tive route. Tolls add further costs to company fleets that already have to suffer the state's high fuel costs. Tolls are an impediment to people wanting to travel to places like Hart- ford and New Haven to work, go out to eat, stay in a hotel, or shop. Tolls are a bad idea. In May, Connecticut had the fourth highest per gallon prices for diesel in the nation and the ninth highest for regular. Tolls would add to these costs. PHOTO | HBJ FILE