{"id":313257883,"date":"2014-12-05T16:04:43","date_gmt":"2014-12-05T16:04:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/?p=313257883"},"modified":"2014-12-05T16:04:43","modified_gmt":"2014-12-05T16:04:43","slug":"stop-obsessing-over-the-gas-tax-and-change-how-we-fund-transpo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/?p=313257883","title":{"rendered":"Stop Obsessing Over the Gas Tax and Change How We Fund Transpo"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>by Tanya Snyder, Streets Blog<br \/>\n&#8230;<br \/>\nThe Highway Trust Fund has more problems than just its 1950s-era name. Funded by the federal gas tax, the trust fund is becoming obsolete over time, as efficiency gains and declining miles-traveled sap its size. The Eno Center for Transportation says it\u2019s time to rethink the entire system.<br \/>\nIn a new report [PDF ], Eno compares the U.S. method of funding transportation to that of five peer countries. Ours is the only one that still pretends to rely on a \u201cuser-pay\u201d system. (Yes, pretends: The last six years of constant last-ditch infusions from the general fund, totaling $65 billion, have exposed that particular myth.)<br \/>\n&#8230;<br \/>\nEno argues that the Highway Trust Fund skews funding decisions by introducing petty conflicts &#8230; \u201cThese challenges have historically overshadowed substantive arguments over policy and hindered the tying of federal funds to national goals or performance measures,\u201d according to the report.<br \/>\n&#8230;<br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/usa.streetsblog.org\/2014\/12\/04\/eno-stop-obsessing-over-the-gas-taxaand-change-how-we-fund-transpo\/\">https:\/\/usa.streetsblog.org\/2014\/12\/04\/eno-stop-obsessing-over-the-gas-taxaand-change-how-we-fund-transpo\/<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>by Tanya Snyder, Streets Blog &#8230; The Highway Trust Fund has more problems than just its 1950s-era name. Funded by the federal gas tax, the trust fund is becoming obsolete over time, as efficiency gains and declining miles-traveled sap its size. The Eno Center for Transportation says it\u2019s time to rethink the entire system. In &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/?p=313257883\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Stop Obsessing Over the Gas Tax and Change How We Fund Transpo&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"1","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-313257883","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biking-elsewhere"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/313257883","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=313257883"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/313257883\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=313257883"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=313257883"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.baltimorespokes.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=313257883"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}