Posted by
stopvotingfordemocrats on Saturday, September 06, 2008 11:52:15 AM
The local paper reported today that Caltran and the Alameda County Congestion Management Authority have started construction of a $153 million carpool lane on eastbound I-580 between Pleasanton and Livermore CA. The purpose of this expenditure is to relieve gridlock on one of the most crowded freeways in the Bay Area.
What a fantastic idea! Spend all that money so that maybe 1 out of 4 drivers can use the new lane. Is this an effective use of tax dollars?
Several weeks ago, the Contra Costa Transportation Authority, which acts as CMA for Contra Costa County CA, announced a startling discovery: the freeways in CCC are congested! They noted that one way to reduce congestion was to allow more traffic in the carpool lanes.
So now we have an admission by the experts that our freeways are underutilized. The simplest and most obvious solution is to eliminate the carpool lanes. Cost: almost nothing. Announce on Monday that from here on out anybody can use the diamond lanes.
But no, the glorious leaders at CCTA proposed a multi-billion-dollar project to add more carpool lanes along with a complex system of scanners to collect taxes...ahem...tolls from drivers, using FasTrak cards.
What are the odds that the CCTA is run by a bunch of Democrats?