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Are
tolls the answer? First, let us get all the issues on
the table
by Ed Risse
For Virginia Business
November 2003
"Fixing
Interstate 81" in the October in the Virginia
Business is a well-presented story but only
addresses a fragment of the picture. In an examination
of the ways to "fix" Interstate 81, adding
asphalt is at most only one quarter of the story. Mobility
in the urban corridor composed of five subregions between
Bristol and Winchester is far too important to be just
a roadway expansion story.
Here
are additional points that any coverage of mobility
and access in the corridor should address:
Every
decision about reducing congestion on I-81 must consider
the alternatives to the unsustainable, dead-end scenario
of more and more trucks and asphalt. The first option,
of course, is to shift freight "from roads to rail."
Rail is far more efficient and should include roll-on-roll-off
and piggyback service to every community in the corridor's
multiple subregions. There are a number of stakeholders
who champion roads-to-rail on grounds of energy consumption,
noise, safety and environmental impact.
To
be competitive from a business perspective, Virginia
must give the same subsidy per-ton mile to rail as it
does to roadways and let competition determine the balance.
Speaking of competition, shifting transport demand from
roads to rail is exactly what the commonwealth's major
competitors for high-value, inter-regional goods and
services are doing.
Freight
is not the only thing that should go via rail-or in
shared vehicles. Critical agglomerations of passenger
trips under 10 miles and those going between 30 and
500 miles should have shared-vehicle and/or rail alternatives.
While
we are on the topic of moving people and lowering congestion
in the corridor, the transport system should come to
the rescue of citizens who now must "resort to
a vehicle" to gain access because there is no comprehensive
pedestrian system. Yes, that is right: A pedestrian
network will reduce vehicle travel, including vehicle
travel on I-81.
There
are many good reasons to develop non-vehicle systems
beyond health and energy consumption. Viable subregional
tourism in the corridor cannot be based on driving a
private vehicle from attraction to attraction, venue
to venue or facility to facility. Such a strategy violates
the laws of physics and economics. When private vehicles
are relied on, just when the volume of tourism approaches
the break-even point, the system crashes. Take a close
look at Lancaster County, Pa., for a stunning example
of this reality.
Successful
tourism is based on visitors walking, biking, riding
or floating for a day, weekend, week or more in places
that offer a range of housing, services, recreation
and amenity. Look at successful Urbanside or Countryside
tourism anywhere in the First World. As luck would have
it, many of the Urbansides in the Bristol-Winchester
urban corridor are home to colleges and universities
which are great places to anchor pedestrian systems.
Roadways, railways and pedestrian systems are still
only half the story about reducing congestion on the
I-81 and in the Bristol to Winchester corridor.
No story about transport and mobility is complete that
does not address the other side of the coin: the human
settlement pattern (aka, pattern and density of land
use) that generates the demand for travel in the first
place.
There
may be a need for more asphalt on I-81 and other roadways,
but more asphalt alone will only make matters worse.
This is a matter of physics, not policy, politics or
lobby group posturing.
The Bristol to Winchester corridor must evolve into
functional subregions made up of Balanced Communities.
"Balance" here means a balance of jobs/housing/services/recreation/amenity
in every village and community in every subregion. Opening
the story with an example of someone using I-81 to get
to work illuminates the core of the problem.
The
urban corridor from Bristol to Winchester is composed
of five +/- subregions. Most are subregions of the Appalachian
Urban Support Region. For this reason, the balance required
within the subregions and within the communities and
villages (aka, towns) is a relative balance. However,
this synergistic distribution of activities must be
far closer to a comprehensive balance of jobs/housing/services/recreation/
amenity than now exists.
When the idea for an "Interstate" system was
first hatched following World War I (yes, WW I not WW
II), it was called the "Interregional" system.
We should still think of it that way because it is not
possible to build an interregional system that is also
a major intra-urban system. Belief that such a system
is possible is a variant of the Private Vehicle Mobility
Myth that is:
Citizens
can live wherever they can afford a house, work wherever
they can find a job, and seek services and recreation
where they want. Further, having made these choices,
it is possible for government to provide a mobility
system so citizens can go wherever they want, whenever
they want to travel and arrive in a timely manner.
The
rolling disaster that is I-81 demonstrates the futility
of believing this myth or the parallel one about entrepreneurs
being able to open a business wherever they choose and
expect the government... You get the idea.
The
cover of the October issue asks the question: "Are
Tolls the Answer?" They are part of one aspect
of the answer. Tolls are a way to start to level the
playing field. Not just tolls but variable, smart tolls.
Tolls should not just pay for more asphalt; they should
help create a balanced transport system to serve a balanced
distribution of land uses.
There
are other issues that are important but no review of
"fixing" I-81 should omit the important topics
covered here. They may be new to some but that is because
of the abject failure of the Commonwealth of Virginia
to create a real transportation agency that focuses
on mobility and access. A real transport strategy will
only emerge when citizens demand this fundamental change.
The reason that many governance practitioners are pleased
with the status quo is that many of their supporters
at the top of the economic and political food chain
are making a lot of money from business-as-usual. The
ones who suffer are those residents who have to use
I-81 and the other congested roadways in the state.
Ed
Risse, AICP, is the principal of SYNERGY/Planning Inc.,
in Fauquier County.
Return
to Virginia Business - November 2003
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