http://www.philly.com/philly/news/20120512_N_J__to_contribute_to_proposed_Amtrak_tunnel.html
Christie says they will contribute to Gateway tunnels project; but he is long on words and short on funds /? Guess he got a lot of flack from ARC cancellation ??
When Republican governors Christie, Walker (Wisconsin), Scott (Florida) and Kasich (Ohio) refused money to build HSR in what in electoral “swing” states (up for grab, unlike say California or Texas) it was perceived as a deliberate, concerted effort to hurt Obama in the 2012 election by denying him credit for job creation. Turnabout is fair play, you can expect those four to get no more cooperation than absolutely necessary from the federal government (e.g. transportation infrastructure spending) that might make them look good.
I am arguing that the advocacy community in Wisconsin contributed to the loss of the Milwaukee-Madison train line by viewing everything through the lens of partisan politics. The view, openly expressed at advocacy meetings, was that the people you speak of represented such an extreme tangent in U.S. politics that there was no way they would be elected in November, 2010, and there was no contingency plan for what would happen if that were the case.
You may reason that if the voters in Wisconsin put Mr. Walker into office, and Mr. Walker was vocal in his opposition to the train, there was really nothing the advocacy community could have done about it. On the other hand, the local bricks-and-morter advocacy group was so much in the mode of “free expression of their views” and was obliviou
[quote user=“Paul Milenkovic”]
DwightBranch:
blue streak 1:
http://www.philly.com/philly/news/20120512_N_J__to_contribute_to_proposed_Amtrak_tunnel.html
Christie says they will contribute to Gateway tunnels project; but he is long on words and short on funds /? Guess he got a lot of flack from ARC cancellation ??
When Republican governors Christie, Walker (Wisconsin), Scott (Florida) and Kasich (Ohio) refused money to build HSR in what in electoral “swing” states (up for grab, unlike say California or Texas) it was perceived as a deliberate, concerted effort to hurt Obama in the 2012 election by denying him credit for job creation. Turnabout is fair play, you can expect those four to get no more cooperation than absolutely necessary from the federal government (e.g. transportation infrastructure spending) that might make them look good.
I am arguing that the advocacy community in Wisconsin contributed to the loss of the Milwaukee-Madison train line by viewing everything through the lens of partisan politics. The view, openly expressed at advocacy meetings, was that the people you speak of represented such an extreme tangent in U.S. politics that there was no way they would be elected in November, 2010, and there was no contingency plan for what would happen if that were the case.
You may reason that if the voters in Wisconsin put Mr. Walker into office, and Mr. Walker was vocal in his opposition to the train, there was really nothing the adv
Scorched earth politics has a tendency to burn the posterior of those ignited the scorching fire.
ARC was a bad idea - stub end, NJT only terminal deep under the ground. Low capacity and low utility , particularly for the price tag. It was born as an NJT-only project when it should have been a joint project with Amtrak and MetroNorth (LIRR) right from the start. Who ever let it get as far as it did should have earned the derision of rail advocates. Christie killed to keep from throwing more money down the rat hole of a bad project. Better late than never.
An “all comers”, through tunnel is a good idea. He is for it and is willing to fund a “fair share”. Determining that will be fun. “Fair” seems to have become political code for “somebody else should pay”.
One of the more difficult management decisions is knowing when to cut the losses. Christie seems to be a pragmatic guy, not one to get too tied up in politics.
In a similar vein, I wouldn’t be too upset if the Cal HSR proposal gets drooped or gets thoroughly redone. While it would be nice to get to the Bay Area in less than three hours by train, I can think of a lot better ways for the money to be spent to improve rail passenger service in Calif.
That is what he would have us believe, but sorry, no sale. From one of the articles I linked to above:
"So why did Governor Christie willfully deceive and beggar the citizens of his state? As Streetsblog reported at the time, it was all about New Jersey’s empty, debt-ridden transportation trust fund. New Jersey’s gas tax, the third-lowest in the country, hasn’t been raised for 23 years. The infrastructure funding woes that can be found across the country, therefore, are even more acute there. When Christie killed the ARC tunnel, the highway trust fund was expected to go bankrupt within a year.
The sustainable fix would have been increasing the gas tax, at least to the level of New Jersey’s neighbors, but Christie went for the fiscally irresponsible and politically explosive option of stealing from transit riders instead. By taking almost $3 billion from what the Regional Plan Association’s Ingrid Michaelson at the time called “the cookie jar of money that previous governors have set aside for ARC,” Christie bought himself two or three years of road-building and national attention from conservatives (including an impassioned movement to recruit him to run for president).
“In hindsight, it’s apparent that he had a highly important political objective,” said Martin Robins, a former director of the ARC project now at Rutgers, to the Times: “to cannibalize the project so he could find an alternate way of keeping the transportation trust fund program moving, and he went ahea
For me, it was a deficient project in any case, because it would have ruled out through Connecticut - New Jersey commuter service, something I think will be important in the future.
[quote user=“DwightBranch”]
oltmannd:
Christie killed to keep from throwing more money down the rat hole of a bad project. Better late than never.
That is what he would have us believe, but sorry, no sale. From one of the articles I linked to above:
"So why did Governor Christie willfully deceive and beggar the citizens of his state? As Streetsblog reported at the time, it was all about New Jersey’s empty, debt-ridden transportation trust fund. New Jersey’s gas tax, the third-lowest in the country, hasn’t been raised for 23 years. The infrastructure funding woes that can be found across the country, therefore, are even more acute there. When Christie killed the ARC tunnel, the highway trust fund was expected to go bankrupt within a year.
The sustainable fix would have been increasing the gas tax, at least to the level of New Jersey’s neighbors, but Christie went for the fiscally irresponsible and politically explosive option of stealing from transit riders instead. By taking almost $3 billion from what the Regional Plan Association’s Ingrid Michaelson at the time called “the cookie jar of money that previous governors have set aside for ARC,” Christie bought himself two or three years of road-building and national attention from conservatives (including an impassioned movement to recruit him to run for president).
“In hindsight, it’s apparent that he had a highly important political objective,” said Martin Robins, a former director of the ARC p
If anti-train types want to continue to claim that highways pay for themselves through fuel taxes then they need to make sure that highways pay for themselves through fuel taxes. Or drivers can navigate potholes, I don’t care. If the governor of a state wants a share of funds set aside for transit the funds should be spent on transit.
Doesn’t a good chunk of the NJT funding come from fuel tax set-aside? A good chunk of the Fed funding for transit comes from the fuel tax.
Killing a bad rail project is always a good idea - no matter where the ear-marked money goes…
What I’m trying to get across is that all the political intrigue and anti-rail evilness that is being heaped on Christie might not be deserved.
Out bias going into these things is “rail = good” and “road = evil”. But, that is our bias. When others disagree, they are not always “out to get us” or “rail haters.”
Lets just suppose an apolitical, fair-minded, even-handed, loves everyone, independent person took a look at ARC and said, “Wow. This isn’t a very good project. Would be wise to pull the plug on it.”
Is it possible that such a judgment could exist or, because we don’t like it, we have to read into all manner of bias, intrigue and other BS?
When facts don’t fit how we feel about something, the facts take a back seat to our emotions. That’s just a fact of life.
If you are claiming that Christie is a partisan (offering arguments not made in earnest but in support of his political party, the republicans) I agree, for reasons I have documented above. If you are claiming that I am a partisan you are wrong, I support neither the right of center nor the far right of center branch of the Republicrats. Further, you would seem to be arguing against earnestness, and for sophistry and hidden agendas, i.e. it doesn’t matter what reason Christie gave, the ends justify the means. Finally, despite your claim that it was a bad project there can be no doubt that additional tunnels need to be constructed between under the Hudson River between New York and New Jersey to supplement the 102 year-old North River Tunnels (
[quote user=“DwightBranch”]
oltmannd:
What I’m trying to get across is that all the political intrigue and anti-rail evilness that is being heaped on Christie might not be deserved.
Out bias going into these things is “rail = good” and “road = evil”. But, that is our bias. When others disagree, they are not always “out to get us” or “rail haters.”
Lets just suppose an apolitical, fair-minded, even-handed, loves everyone, independent person took a look at ARC and said, “Wow. This isn’t a very good project. Would be wise to pull the plug on it.”
Is it possible that such a judgment could exist or, because we don’t like it, we have to read into all manner of bias, intrigue and other BS?
When facts don’t fit how we feel about something, the facts take a back seat to our emotions. That’s just a fact of life.
If you are claiming that Christie is a partisan (offering arguments not made in earnest but in support of his political party, the republicans) I agree, for reasons I have documented above. If you are claiming that I am a partisan you are wrong, I support neither the right of center nor the far right of center branch of the Republicrats. Further, you would seem to be arguing against earnestness, and for sophistry and hidden agendas, i.e. it doesn’t matter what reason Christie gave, the ends justify the means. Finally, despite your claim that it was a bad project there can be
Politicians are double dealing & twin tongued snake oil salesmen charged with making policy decisions - decisions they are ill equipped to make.
Christie is a politician - nothing more and nothing less.
…and sometimes the right thing happens, anyway! [:)]
[quote user=“DwightBranch”]
As a former political science professor I can tell you that politicians care about one thing above all else-- getting re-elected-- and given the fact that federal money stimulates their economy and helps them to do so, it is very unusual for a governor to turn any free money down. Further, Christie, Scott, Kasich and Walker have all been shown to be deliberately misleading and incorrect in the reasoning they used for turning down the money. These two facts can only lead to the conclusion that these four Republicans, in concert with the national party, turned down the money to hurt Obama’s chances in 2012, not out of any concern for the welfare of their constituents. Mitch McConnell, the leader of the Republicans in the US Senate, has admitted that the Republicans’ strategy all along has been to block Obama so that he would lose re-election. Now, when you adopt such a strategy, you can expect a response. Christie is now trying to be associated with the new project, but you can expect him to be kept a million miles away by New York and the Obama Administration, the plan will have very little input from New Jersey, and Christie will be seen standing around with his finger in his a*
I agree with this and the other post that was critical of the NJT stub ended part of the terminal project. The precedent of this is Philadelphia, where the stub-ended PRR Suburban Terminal and the Reading Terminal were joined with a “thru” connection. I have been in the replacement to the 11 track Reading Terminal which is now an efficient 4 track thru station. The trains continue off the Reading lines to paired PRR lines back out into the suburbs. It both eliminates turning trains, and enables cross suburb trips. The same could be done with pairing NJT and Metro-North New Haven line trips. NJT and Metro-North already have combined operations on the Port Jervis diesel route.
“So, bottom line, you are saying he should have raised the gas tax to continue to pay for a bad rail project? Doing what he did sound very pragmatic to me. NJ may pay the third lowest gas tax, but the property tax make New Jersey one of the highest taxed states in the nation. You wanted the gas tax raised in the midst of the deepest recession since 1893?”
It is not just property taxes. It is the whole ball of wax.
As of January 2012 New Jersey’s gasoline tax was 14.5 cents per gallon. It is 48th amongst the 51 fuel taxing districts (includes District of Columbia) in the United States according to Tax Foundation data.
Although New Jersey is 48th in motor fuel tax rates, it is second in toll revenue collections. For example, in 2005, which is the latest data that I could find, New Jersey collected $125.77 per capita in toll revenues vs. $60.42 in fuel taxes. Only Delaware beat it on toll revenues. At the other end of the spectrum, as an example, Connecticut collected five cents in toll revenues per capita vs. $136.42 in fuel tax revenues. If one only compares fuel tax rates, it appears that Connecticut collects a substantially higher amount of money from motorists than New Jersey, but when the toll revenues are added to the equation, the picture changes significantly.
Fuel tax revenues are a function of the fuel tax rate times vehicle miles traveled divided by average or median miles per gallon. Accordingly, although the tax rate may not have changed since 1988, which is the date of the last increase according to the NJ Transportation Trust Fund Authority, fuel tax revenues have increased dramatically. Undoubtedly, most of the increase is attributable to an increase in vehicle miles traveled in the Garden State, since there has not been until recently a dramatic improvement in vehicle miles per gallon.
In 2011 New Jersey realized $483 million in fuel tax reven