This post is part of a series on transportation issues affecting Massachusetts. Look for more from Rafael Mares and Christine Chilingerian in the coming weeks. To stay up to date, visit this www.clf.org/blog/tag/MA4Trans/ or follow the hashtag #MA4TRANS on Twitter.

Massachusetts relies on several sources of funding for its transportation system. In addition to user fees—such as transit fares, registry fees, and tolls—and federal dollars for capital projects, a good portion of the system is funded through state gas and sales taxes. Both the gas tax and the sales tax, however, have been providing less revenue than originally expected or planned.

For one, the gas tax has not been increased since 1991. Due to inflation, the value of the gas tax is trickling away over time. In Massachusetts, we’ve lost 41% of the 1991 gas tax’s purchasing power as costs rise and cars become increasingly fuel-efficient. It is now worth only 12.4 cents in 1991 dollars. That’s a paltry amount, especially in light of the fact that it was originally worth 21 cents. Consider that, over the same time period, other staple consumer goods have increased in price, for example, the average cost of a pound of flour has more than doubled. It is clear that the gas tax hasn’t kept pace. Consider also that state gas taxes are higher in every other New England state, with the sole exception of New Hampshire, which is currently considering a gas tax increase whose rate would put Massachusetts in last place in our region. Nationwide, Massachusetts currently ranks 29 in the gas tax; Wyoming’s pending gas tax increase could make the Commonwealth drop to number 30 by July 1st.  That should not be a point of pride.

In 2000, the last time the legislature considered a major funding bill for transportation, the sales tax had just experienced a decade of 6.5% growth per year. A portion of the sales tax was dedicated to transportation at the time with an assumption that it would increase at least 3% per year. In reality, the sales tax, however, only increased an average of 1% per year, leaving the system significantly underfunded. While the legislature responded with some smaller fixes over the last few years, none were large enough to correct the problem.

If we want to solve some of the problems I identified in an earlier post, we need to raise new revenue for transportation. It doesn’t have to come from the gas tax or the sales tax, but it has to come from somewhere.

This post is part of a series on transportation issues affecting Massachusetts. Look for more from Rafael Mares and Christine Chilingerian in the coming weeks. To stay up to date, visit this www.clf.org/blog/tag/MA4Trans/ or follow the hashtag #MA4TRANS on Twitter.

Does it seem as though your car is hitting nasty potholes with ever-increasing frequency? That’s because it probably is.

Across the state, our local roads are decaying. Although Massachusetts law, under Chapter 90, reimburses municipalities for road repairs, they aren’t receiving enough. An estimated $562 million is the amount of annual funding required to maintain the streets in a “state of good repair”; cities and towns, however, must make do with only $200 million, or about 36% of the funds that are actually needed. As a result, our roads are suffering, and the safety of our drivers along with them.

Passed in 1973, Chapter 90 compensates cities and towns for expenditures made on maintenance of local roads. In the 40 years since Chapter 90 was passed, the costs of construction have gone up dramatically, essentially reducing the value of Chapter 90 funds and their ability to solve the very problems they were designed to solve. As a result, municipalities are forced to dig into local revenues as well as cut important services, such as salaries for teachers or police officers, in an effort to bridge the funding gap. Less affluent communities are left in the lurch when it comes to maintenance, and are forced to look on helplessly as local infrastructure degrades. This presents the ultimate Catch-22 of the situation: minor cracks in the pavement, when left untended due to budget constraints, soon require far more expensive rehabilitation than a quick patch for communities already unable to afford them.

Massachusetts’s bridges are in a similar state of disrepair. As of January 2013, there were 436 structurally deficient bridges out of a total 4500 owned by municipalities or the state. That means, for every 10 bridges you drive over in the state, at least one of them could be deficient. Ask yourself: does that make you feel safe?

To be fair, “structurally deficient” doesn’t necessarily mean that the bridge is unsound or about to collapse. Once a bridge has deteriorated to a certain degree, an immediate overhaul becomes necessary to avert restrictions on its use. For example, many deficient bridges are subject to weight restrictions, and of these, 38 have degraded to a degree forcing access to be closed off. Since 2008, MassDOT has implemented the Accelerated Bridge Program and has begun the long-overdue process of restoring neglected bridges. Over the last five years, the Program has completed 121 bridges, and expects to restore more than 200 by 2016. Once the Program ends, however, bridges will continue to atrophy and crumble. Without the Program, there would still be upwards of 543 structurally deficient bridges in the state – yet, even with the Program, there will be over 400 deficient bridges left untouched on the day the work ends. Due to the perpetual need for upkeep, Massachusetts really can’t afford to lose initiatives like the Accelerated Bridge Program.

The maintenance backlog precipitates from years of neglect due to underfunding. In order to reverse it, continued investment in programs like the Accelerated Bridge Program is critical. Without devoting resources to infrastructure today, the epidemic of potholes and crumbling bridges will continue its relentless advance.

So the next time you curse out your mayor when next you drive over a particularly treacherous pothole, think twice: that pothole is part of a larger problem. You can be sure people are feeling it in every corner, and every car, of the Bay state.

This post is part of a series on transportation issues affecting Massachusetts. Look for more from Rafael Mares and Christine Chilingerian in the coming weeks. To stay up to date, visit this www.clf.org/blog/tag/MA4Trans/ or follow the hashtag #MA4TRANS on Twitter.

If you have ever tried to get from one place to another in the Bay State, you could get the impression that everyone in Massachusetts must have a car. If you’ve ever tried to ride your bike across the Longfellow Bridge (as currently configured), or walk around Agawam, you know what I’m talking about.

You’d be surprised to find out, however, that one in every eight Massachusetts households does not have a car. Even more interesting is the fact that the percentage of Massachusetts residents of driving age without driver’s licenses has been increasing steadily from 8.67% in 2006 to 13.41% in 2010. Since few people who have a driver’s license tend to give it up, a growing number of young people are deciding not to drive. They’re taking to the streets, en masse, but on foot or on bike.

The number of miles traveled on public transit among sixteen to thirty-four-year olds in the United States increased by 40% between 2001 and 2009. That’s an important trend to be aware of when we decide how to spend our transportation dollars going forward. When we build transportation infrastructure today, it will be used by a generation or two to come. We need to keep their habits in mind when building today or we’ll lose them tomorrow.

Regardless of young people leaving cars behind, there are other important reasons to open up travel options for people. Consider that the average cost of owning a car in the United States is almost $9,000/year for a sedan—money that can be spent in better ways when there are other options to get around. Likewise, to reduce our energy consumption, we have to look to the transportation sector. Transportation consumes roughly 33% of all the energy in Massachusetts – the most of any end-use sector. Emissions from our vehicles accounts for 36% of our entire statewide greenhouse gas emissions – and it is the portion of our emissions that is rising the fastest. Since not all ways of getting around are created equal—e.g., buses during rush hour use much less energy and don’t contribute fewer emissions per passenger per mile than SUVs—we will have to develop our transportation system with the goals of reducing energy consumption and mitigating climate change in mind.

As a result, I think it is fair to conclude, it would make little sense to spend money on maintaining our current transportation system without developing it in a way that meets our future needs. Today’s construction builds tomorrow’s infrastructure. If we build like we always have, recent trends suggest that people may not use it. That would be a waste, for our economy, our health, our environment, and our communities.

We all expect our transportation system to work. But what happens when it doesn’t and we don’t fully understand the alternatives? Image: shoothead @ flickr

This post is the first in a series on transportation issues affecting Massachusetts. Look for more from Rafael Mares and Christine Chilingerian in the coming weeks. To stay up to date, visit this www.clf.org/blog/tag/MA4Trans/ or follow the hashtag #MA4TRANS on Twitter.

We all expect our transportation system to work. We get upset when we wait for the bus, drive through a pothole, sit in traffic, or are stuck on the T behind a broken down train. We expect our transportation system to be in place—for roads to be paved, for sidewalks to be built, for bike lanes to be marked, for train track and trains to be available, and for tunnels to be dug and lit. What’s more—we not only expect them to be there, but to also be in good service when we need them: for roads to be smooth and not congested, for buses and trains to be timely, for sidewalks to not be treacherous, and for tunnels to, well, not leak.

As Paul Levy, a distinguished Massachusetts public servant, however, has pointed out, the nature of our democratic system, and the slow deterioration that all infrastructure goes through do not mesh well. Almost two years ago, Mr. Levy wisely called for a cheering section for infrastructure. With legislators on Beacon Hill now finally actively trying to tackle the long-standing, severe underfunding of our transportation system, we believe it’s time to put on the cheerleading uniform, pull out the pom poms, and cheer loudly.

But how can we cheer, if we‘re not armed with important facts about the root of our transportation system’s problems? This blog series attempts to shed light on facts about the Commonwealth’s transportation system that can help us be informed supporters of new revenue for our transportation system, even if it takes a billion dollars a year over the next ten years to solve the problem.

I hope you’ll follow as we post this. They’ll make great reading while you’re waiting for the T.