We spend too much time in traffic and too much money on roads for businesses and suburbanites.  We need a more unified approach.

Texas taxpayers shouldn’t be subsidizing Amazon, Walmart, and other huge shipping companies by constructing and maintaining their shipping infrastructure for them.  People who use the roads the most and put the most wear-and-tear on them should pay a bit extra.  But anyone paying that little bit extra should be entitled to easy, straightforward billing and customer service.

By approaching transportation as a system for moving  people and goods, we can build a modern, multi-modal framework that…actually works.

  • Treat Highways a Bit More Like Railroads.  If a business ships product over railroads, it has to pay a bit for construction and upkeep of the rails.  Not so with freight that moves over state highways—taxpayers foot the bill for that.  A four-cent-a-mile fee on trucks is fair, reasonable, and overdue–and could even end up contributing to other social programs.
  • Treat Railroads a Bit More Like Highways.  Railroads, on the other hand, are largely private affairs.  They can take private land, and then deny the public the direct benefit of the rails.  In the Austin/San Antonio/Houston/DFW triangle, passengers and express freight should be coaxed off of highways and onto trains.
  • Smarter Toll Roads.   If we’re going to have private-sector roads, then put private-sector innovations to work on them. Here’s an idea: unified statewide billing and customer service systems that actually work, plus incentives for freight trucks to go around city centers rather than through them.
  • State Support for Light Rail.  I get it—in this state, we love our fast cars and big trucks.  Hell, I love fast cars and big trucks.  But I don’t like urban gridlock, and I doubt most city-dwelling Texans do either.  As Dallas and Houston have shown, light rail in city centers just works.  The state should help individual cities overcome the hurdles to implementing these systems.
  • Incentives for Working Remotely.  Keeping commuters off the road one or two days a week would go a long way towards reducing traffic, carbon emissions, and wear and tear on the roads. We need property tax credits for homeowners who regularly work from home, and credits for businesses who encourage their employees to do so.
  • Let Local Government Create Congestion Zones.  It’s not fair or sustainable for rich suburban commuters to get to drive over city roads and bridges that they don’t pay for in order to get to work and play in the city (looking at you, Westlake and Redbud Trail).  If suburban governments don’t want to shoulder the burden for urban traffic and infrastructure, then their residents should, on a per-use basis.