One of the bright spots in the various bills seeking to replace the 1998 TEA-21 federal funding law has been a general liberalization of thinking about road tolls. For years, a goal of Federal highway legislation has been to push states to eliminate tolls, and there has been a long-standing prohibition against investing federal transportation funds in state-managed toll highways.

The dawning realization that the United States has given short shrift to its infrastructure over the past several decades has changed that attitude in a relatively short span of time. Experiments with tolls, both for congestion relief and for transportation revenue were encouraged on a limited basis in the 1991 ISTEA law and in TEA-21.

Draft legislation to succeed TEA-21 has accelerated the trend. The eventual "TEA-3" bill could give states close to blanket authority to levy tolls on highway systems that receive federal aid, and to use the resulting revenue for a wide variety of needs. An amendment proposed in the U.S. last Thursday, as Representatives worked to finish their overall transportation funding bill, sought to counter the trend. Rep. Mark Kennedy of Minnesota offered an amendment that would have restricted authority for new tolls on Interstate highways to new capacity, such as "high occupancy toll" lanes and may have actually eliminated many agencies’ ability to move toll revenue to non-highway uses, such as the use of bridge and tunnel tolls to support mass transit in our region.

The amendment was soundly defeated (265-155), thanks largely to a wide coalition of interests that favors a broadening of state powers to raise transportation revenue. Opponents ranged from the American Road and Transportation Builders Association to metropolitan transportation reform groups around the country.

"We agree with the President that these decisions need to be made on a state and local level," said American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO) Executive Director John Horsley. AASHTO is the "trade association" of state transportation departments. President Bush’s transportation proposal would significantly increase states’ authority to levy tolls on the Interstate highway system.

"The Kennedy amendment would reverse a growing trend in which states are experimenting with tolls to cut congestion and air pollution," said Michael Replogle, Transportation Director for Environmental Defense. "We can minimize new pavement by doing more to price and manage the pavement we’ve already got." he said.

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