I was pleased with your support of highway tolls. It should be made clear, however, that the main reason for tolls is to bring market practices back to transportation; the users of freeways should cover all freeway costs and be aware of those costs by purchasing access when they need it, not by burying such costs in a variety of taxes, some far removed from the freeway. The present transportation regime subsidizes freeways and their related urban sprawl, foreign energy consumption and environmental degradation (witness the dust bowl conditions of the I-15 fill source in the south Davis area).
Moreover, under this regime, private sector mass transit and innovation don't have a chance. Under a market system, a modern day entrepreneur might build us a monorail system or some other innovation. Recall that the United States had magnificent private sector commuter rail systems (which paid taxes, not consumed them) clear into the 1950s, before being destroyed by road subsidies. If we don't change, we will have paved over urban destruction (10 additional lanes plus feeders to connect Davis County?), government subsidized mass transit that doesn't work (why should UTA be customer-oriented when the tax collector is their marketing department?), more air pollution and ever-increasing reliance on foreign energy.In the case of transportation, the market solution is the environmentally sound solution. If all this sounds crazy, appreciate that the pending privatization of the FAA is based on similar market-based concerns.
Lew F. Jeppson
North Salt Lake