MoDOT has been planning for some time to use an innovative public-private partnership program to repair 802 of the worst bridges in the state. It took a couple of legislative acts in order to get the program authorized, and now it appears the weak economy is threatening the entire project. David Catanese of KY3 in Springfield is always interested in transportation issues, and he has an informative report here on the Program is facing. In short, it sounds as if the contractor and MoDOT are having trouble reaching an agreement on the price because of rising interest rates and commodity prices.

The recent Reason Foundation report that ranked Missouri’s transportation system 13th in the nation still ranks us low (40th) for the quality of our bridges. Needless to say, it is imperative that the Safe & Sound program get moving to address this problem. I hope it happens via partnership with the private sector. It is going to have to get done somehow, though, and if that means using the transitional design-bid-build system paid for by bonds, then unfortunately, it may have to be done that way. (Assuming MoDOT has any bonding authority left.)

This situation really isn’t anybody’s fault. It’s well-known that commodity prices have increased, and credit market problems have been documented a time or two. So here’s hoping that the project gets going soon, to benefit all of us. I know MoDOT is doing all it can to move public-private partnerships forward, but I guess right now we just have to wait and hope it works.

MoDOT is trumpeting — and deservedly so — the new state highway rankings released by the Reason Foundation in their annual report on such. Missouri has improved to 13th in the country in overall highway quality, up from 28th as recently as 2004. Missourinet has the story here (link via Combest). Missouri should rightly be proud of the improvements throughout the state led by MoDOT.

The Show-Me Institute is proud of the work we have done with Reason on the subject of transportation. Yesterday, I was part of a panel at the Missouri Public Transit Association’s annual conference, talking about alternative ways of funding public transit. Tolling, competitive contracting, private investment, and public-private partnerships are the wave of the future in meeting our transportation needs for highways, bridges, and transit. Slowly but surely, I think people are beginning to embrace that change.

In an editorial (link via Combest), the Post-Dispatch argues that MoDOT is exposing Missouri drivers to too much risk by allowing contractors to inspect their own work on the reconstruction of highway 40.

The reason is obvious: Contractors have a financial incentive to approve their own work. Do-overs raise costs, and contractors face penalties if a project isn’t completed by deadline. Inspectors working for the contractors know this. Honest though they may be, they also know the financial interests of their employers.

This isn’t a complete picture of the financial interests of the contractors. If contractors cut corners to meet the deadline and put drivers at risk, they also put their business at risk. How many people would hire a contractor who built a bridge that fell into a river? According to the previous Post-Dispatch article covering MoDOT’s change in inspection policy, Jim Ernzen, an Arizona State University professor and director of the Del E. Webb School of Construction, compared inspections from previous projects to inspections from the highway 40 reconstruction:

“We found very little variance,” he said. “These guys realize no matter how fast they get the project done, if they don’t do it correctly, they don’t get the next job.”

Bingo. If a company is really worried about its long-term financial interests, it won’t do a shoddy job. In the end, the contractors really do have the proper incentives.

It would be wonderful if everyone took into account the full social consequences of their actions before making a decision to act. Almost every action you take has some effect on someone other than yourself. And you probably don’t completely take that into account. Consider, for example, your decision to take Eager to Hanley to cross over highway 40. This imposes costs on everyone who must line up behind you in traffic. And, as the Post-Dispatch notes, the traffic is terrible … and confusing:

On most days, getting from Eager to Hanley is a guessing game for drivers unfamiliar with the intersection. Figuring out which lane leads where causes some drivers to cut over at the last minute, triggering road rage.

Hanley Road is one of the most traveled streets in the county, with more than 50,000 vehicles using the stretch near Highway 40 daily, according to the county.

An ideal solution would force drivers to take into account the costs they impose on each other when they drive through congested areas, while also providing an incentive for firms to provide alternatives or improvements to the route. Tolls are about as close to that ideal as you can get. If drivers were forced to pay a small fee to cross the highway at Eager and Hanley when it is congested, many of them would find alternate routes or perhaps try to cross when there is less congestion. This would relieve the congestion and provide a quicker route for those who were willing to pay for it.

The tolls would also send a clear signal to anyone who provides transportation services, both governments and firms: If you can provide an alternate route or means of crossing the highway, or improve the intersection, you can make a tidy profit.

It looks like it’s a bit too late for tolls at Hanley and 40, though:

St. Louis County and Missouri transportation officials announced Monday an agreement to add the intersection to the $535 million Highway 40 (Interstate 64) rebuild. The intersection that leads to dozens of stores and restaurants will be rebuilt as a “jug handle” intersection, eliminating left turns to and from Eager.

Perhaps next time, transportation officials will keep our work in mind when deciding how to fund their next project.

The Hannibal Courier-Post has run an editorial touting toll roads and public-private partnerships as possible solutions to the current transportation funding crisis. Here at the Show-Me Institute, we couldn’t agree more.

Over at Prime Buzz, Brad Cooper laments the lack of funding for MODOT:

Like Kansas, Missouri is significantly short of meeting all it’s transportation needs. Both states combined have about $60 billion in needs over the next 20 years.

At a recent transportation summit in Mexico, Mo., where MoDOT released a booklet (warning: PDF) detailing the challenges facing Missouri’s transportation system. Included was a list of projects that MoDOT deemed essential.

After detailing some of these projects for the KC Metro area, Cooper remarked:

Just how we fund any of these project no one knows for sure. But expect voters to be asked sometime in the next couple years for some kind of tax increase to fund roads.

Over here at the Show-Me Institute, we always have a few suggestions. David Stokes presented a policy study at the Mexico transportation summit detailing many of them. One is tolling. If the infrastructure improvements are really all that necessary, then people would be willing to pay fees for them when they actually use them, rather than only up front in the form of taxes.

In conjunction with this, public-private partnerships can help as well. Governments aren’t good at much more than actual governing, so instead of having the government take on the financial risk building a new toll bridge, for example, let the private sector do it. If the bridge is likely to be profitable in the long term, firms would be willing to pay for the right to build and operate government-owned infrastructure. This provides another source of revenue that can be used for projects that aren’t as easy to contract out to the private sector.

The best thing is, no new taxes are needed to fund projects this way. With tolling, the only people who have to pay for the projects are the people who use them. I can’t imagine anything that would be more fair.

The economic health of state government is good — maybe even too good. The Kansas City Star has a story about the state’s substantial budget surplus. Gov. Blunt and the General Assembly deserve a lot of credit for this. They don’t deserve credit for creating a good economy; the people of Missouri do that (although passing and signing tort reform helped greatly). But the governor and the legislature do deserve credit for holding the line on spending, to allow economic growth to overtake spending increases and grow both the state’s economy and the state budget surplus.

The size of the surplus is huge. The state begins its year with a balance of $833 million over and above the legally required reserve of $557 million. I’m no math genuis, but that equals $1.39 billion, with a “b.” The state should do two things with this surplus, and holding it back for a rainy day is only for the $557 million. The $833 million should be used for infrastructure and cutting taxes. One legislator sees that clearly:

Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Gary Nodler said it makes sense to spend some of the surplus on one-time projects, such as building construction and maintenance and computer equipment and software.

There are also some comments in the article from cradle-to-grave socialists who give the standard talking points about not spending enough on health care and education, and that this whole surplus was built up on the backs of the poor. These are the type of people who consider dependency on the government by large segments of the population to be a good thing, rather than a bad thing.

With the $833 million, I would also recommend helping MoDOT meet the state’s transportation needs in allowable capacities (I am fully aware of the legal funding differences there). I would also cut taxes. It would be wonderful to see the state reduce its income tax from 6 percent to 5 percent, to see the effect it would have. The net effect would not be a 17-percent reduction in income tax revenues, although that would be fine with me. More money in Missouri taxpayer pocketbooks would also lead to more sales tax collections, aside from helping improve the climate for economic growth. I won’t go so far as to predict an immediate increase in tax revenues if Missouri did the above, but it would be good for taxpayers and the economy, in both the long and short terms.

An alternative idea would be to increase the extremely low amount of earnings for which income taxes kick in, the increase the level at which the highest rate (6 percent) kicks in. That would benefit everyone, but particularly the poor who would see less of their income get taxed. Of course, we could also just get rid of Missouri’s income tax entirely.

KY3 News has a story (link via Combest) discussing MoDOT’s expected budget shortfall, because of the rapid increase in gas prices. The piece includes some commentary from Missouri’s three gubernatorial candidates, all three of whom agree that raising the gas tax is off the table and that other solutions must be found. While the articles does not explicitly state the candidates’ ideas, it does mention one solution offered by Rep. Kenny Hulshof:

Hulshof called the public private partnership idea (also known as some type of toll road) intriguing. “Imagine a parallel truck lane along Interstate 44 with just truck traffic that’s built with private funds,” Hulshof asked attendees during his hour session with the Chamber.

Here at the Show-Me Institute, we couldn’t be happier. David Stokes, an expert of sorts on public-private partnerships, has been advocating this type of solution for a long time, and recently gave a presentation in Mexico, Mo., discussing alternative ways to fund and fix the state’s roads. His policy study highlights the benefits of this type of partnership, and outlines the ways in which it can alleviate MoDOT’s budget problems. Although Hulshof stopped short of advocating public-private partnerships, it is good to hear that the idea is at least garnering some discussion.

In November, St. Louis County voters likely will decide whether to enact a half-cent sales tax increase for the expansion and upkeep of Metro. Passage of this increase will also result in a one-fourth-cent tax hike in St. Louis city, which was approved several years ago, but never actually implemented in the city because county voters rejected the same proposal. Now, with Metro wanting to expand and increase
its budget, it’s again under consideration.

Those who support the increase cite its relatively low cost, while those who oppose it label it as unfair. Other revenue-generating possibilities are also being discussed, such as a transit ticket price increase and a crackdown on free riders — both of which may be viable options. For the purpose of this post, I will only focus on the proposed tax increase and its expected revenue.

As a disclaimer, I am not a frequent MetroLink rider, only using it when attending various events downtown. I grew up in a rural area where there was no public transportation, so I am not accustomed to using MetroLink as a primary mode of transportation. With that said, my own experience has no bearing on my conclusions about the tax increase.

The proposed increase, assuming that the demand for goods is completely inelastic, would generate around $87 million annually in additional funding for the expansion and operation of Metro. The majority of this funding, around $78 million, will come from St. Louis County because of its larger half-cent increase, and because of its much larger tax base. St. Louis city would generate around $9 million from its one-fourth-cent increase. While it is true that demand is most likely not completely inelastic, these numbers give us a general idea of how much revenue could be generated.

As I said earlier, I’m not a frequent MetroLink rider and I don’t know whether a tax increase is the best way to fund an expansion. Some people are advocating a use tax (taking the form of increased ticket prices), while some of my coworkers have suggested a sales tax specifically for business areas that benefit from mass transit. One point of contention about increasing ticket prices is that those who use mass transit the most have no other means of transportation. They depend on transit for their everyday travel and have no other alternatives. Also, higher ticket prices may decrease the number of riders, negating the need for an expansion in the first place. However, a sales tax increase has its own faults — not everyone who shops in targeted areas uses mass transit, so why should they have to pay for something they don’t use? This is a valid point, worthy of consideration.

Mass transit is a useful tool that can further enhance a city’s development. There is little doubt that public transportation is a key component to boosting growth, but the best means of funding that transportation is open to debate.

The Kirksville Daily Express reports that there are two main reasons why Missouri’s gubernatorial candidates are reluctant to make any transportation proposals:

First, any plan will require money.

This is dead wrong. If we assume that MoDOT has to build and maintain the roads, sure, any plan requires money. But why should we assume that? Another option would be to sell off some of Missouri’s roads to private developers who would be more responsive to market demand. Note that this would generate revenue rather than cost the state money. Although there are state constitutional issues that would need to be resolved before this could happen, it would generate some competition in the road market — which, if I recall correctly, has served the computer industry rather well in recent times.

Second, as even the Missouri Department of Transportation notes, there is no consensus on which transportation projects have both the greatest need and public desire — much less how to pay for them.

More of the perils of operating without a market system. Someone should read their Hayek. Nobody knows what the public wants because everyone in the road market — both state and local governments — can fail to meet consumer demand and get away with it. There is no incentive to find out what consumers want, so no one has the relevant information. Real live markets, on the other hand, have handy mechanisms for solving this problem — what Hayek called the knowledge problem. Prices convey all of this information in one neat aggregate number … in the absence of government intervention, anyway.

Perhaps reform is needed to get some of the government out of the transportation system so that prices are set free.

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports:

So far, rebuilding Highway 40 has involved ripping out roadway and demolishing and rebuilding bridges.

This morning, the paving begins.

[...]

Paving should continue through October. Although reconstruction of the first phase is on target to finish by Dec. 31, a wet spring kept paving from starting sooner.

It’s nice to hear that the reconstruction of highway 40 is on schedule despite early setbacks because of the weather. However, I don’t think that the addition of a new lane in either direction will solve the congestion problem. Policymakers have framed the problem in a fundamentally flawed way: They see the congestion as an engineering problem only requiring a good design with enough money thrown into execution for a solution.

This is all wrong. Congestion is an economic problem at its very core. It surely is possible to completely solve the congestion problem with enough tax dollars and a decent design, but the question that must be asked is, is it worth it? The problem with Missouri’s current system of funding transportation projects — road construction in particular — is that there is no metric to determine whether a new road or an extra lane is actually worth the costs of construction and maintenance. Ideally, consumers would pay a premium for driving on highly congested roads and receive a discount for driving on relatively uncongested roads. This would help determine whether a new road is worthwhile and cut down congestion at the same time.

A very practical method of approaching this ideal is to use tolls as the primary method of financing road construction and maintenance. With a toll road, the metric for determining whether road construction is worthwhile is simple — if the road turns a profit, it is worthwhile. In addition, reducing congestion (or, more accurately, setting the optimal level of congestion) is simply a matter of adjusting tolls to maximize each respective road’s profit. No public sector necessary, here.

See also David Stokes on toll roads.

Ballooning gas prices have encouraged more people to utilize St. Louis’ public transportation options, according to a story published in the Post-Dispatch. The dollar figures discussed in the article got me to thinking about how much public transit costs the average taxpayer in the St. Louis metropolitan area.

Last month saw the highest utilization of public transit in decades, at 5.5 million passenger trips during the course of the month, or an average of 177,500 passenger trips a day. We can safely assume that the number of unique passengers is no more than half that number, because most people would be using the bus or train for a round trip of at least two boardings. So, on average and at the absolute height of ridership, roughly 90,000 (about 3 percent) of the St. Louis metropolitan area’s 2.8 million residents are using public transit on any given day.

Metro required $230 million to operate its buses and trains this year. Twenty percent of that amount (about $46 million) was collected from ticket sales. The remaining $184 million came from area taxpayers, no more than 3 percent of whom were likely to use public transportation on any regular basis. That means that every man, woman, and child in the area faced an average of $65 in additional taxes to subsidize the operation of Metro’s buses and trains — services that 97 percent of those taxpayers are rarely (if ever) using.

Additionally, St. Louis County is asking its taxpayers to approve a ballot measure this November that would raise the local sales tax rate to generate an extra $80 million annually for bus transit and Metrorail. Assuming that most county residents do their shopping in the county, each of the county’s 1,000,000 residents will be shouldering an average of an additional $80 per year to subsidize public transit.

To be perfectly clear where I stand, I take Metrorail between my house and the office about twice in any given week. I would likely chip in an extra two or three dollars per trip in exchange for reducing my and my neighbors’ tax burdens by $60 or so, and knowing that we would only have to pay for the service when we chose to use it. I do understand, however, that many people are perfectly willing to pony up tax dollars for a service they think will be of use to those who can’t afford their own vehicles. I was just kind of stunned by the realization of just how much each St. Louis–area resident must currently be forced to pay in order to keep these services going, and I felt like it was important for someone to offer some perspective on how much public transit is costing the average taxpayer.

Attorney General (and gubanatorial candidate) Jay Nixon was asked at a recent forum about his transportation plans. KY3’s Political Notebook has the clips and coverage. The best thing I heard was when the he stated that toll roads and truck-only lanes are "on the table." I was less pleased to read this (it’s not in the clip, so I’m trusting KY3’s account, here):

Signals that public-private partnerships to manage Missouri roads give him "deep concerns," because of the potential for foreign ownership . . . Still, Jay Nixon leaves "everything on the table."

Having co-written an entire study of this subject, let me repeat that there is no "ownership" in a public-private partnership. The private partner leases an existing asset, or obtains the right to build and operate a future asset, but does not own it. The people of Missouri, through state government, would always own any infrastructure built or operated under PPPs.

As for the "foreign" part, I can’t fathom why this bothers so many people so much in these cases. It’s just a frickin’ road. (As an aside, I can understand why potential foreign ownership of Anheuser-Busch bothers people.) There are plenty of American campanies that can bid on these projects, and the leading international companies that do this type of transportation PPP are based in Australia and Spain. If we were to decide that we needed to really finish what we started in 1898 and return to war against Spain, like Rome v. Carthage, it’s not as if a Spanish company that built and operated a Missouri bridge could take the bridge and move it back to the Iberian Peninsula. This is foreign investment in America, that could potentially provide new transportation infrastructure only at a cost to people who choose to use the asset, and unlike the AB/InBev situation, no current jobs would be at stake. Why this upsets so many people is beyond me. …

Randal O’Toole had an op-ed published in the Post-Dispatch yesterday, about light rail and the environment. It is a very interesting read. As some of you may recall, Randal wrote a major Kansas City light rail study for the Show-Me Institute earlier this year (although he created this particular op-ed in his capacity with the Cato Institute). As both St. Louis and Kansas City move forward with major votes on mass transit, it is important to hear voices like Mr. O’Toole’s.

More O’Toole from this weekend on NPR, here. Thanks to my brother Mike for the link.

Detailed commentary will follow, but I wanted to get Mayor Funkhouser’s new regional Kansas City transit plan up on our blog. Here is the Kansas City Star’s story. Here is some typical boosterism. Here is some blunt critisicm. Here is the Show-Me Institute’s contribution to the discussion. I do like how the mayor’s plan includes some less expensive and efficient parts, like bus–rapid tranit, express buses, and even commuter rail, assuming there is enough demand for the commuter rail. But $600 million for 11 miles of light rail sounds low, considering it cost St. Louis that same amount to do just seven miles from 2004 to 2006 — although that included two miles with significant tunnelling. As I said, much more analysis of this to come.

The City of Festus has decided to sell the only airport in Jefferson County. The Suburban Journals story serves as a terrific entryway for me to recommend several studies by the Reason Foundation about privatized airports. There is absolutely no reason why governments alone should manage and operate airports.

I should be clear that this particular airport is not being sold specifically so a private company can operate it as a for-profit business. That could happen, but they also might sell it to neighboring companies who would stop using the land for an airport entirely. I certainly hope the private operators who buy it will keep it in use as an airport, but that is my heart talking. My head says Festus should do whatever is best for the citizens of Festus, which is exactly what they are doing. Anyway, airport privatization is an interesting issue, and one that the city of St. Louis might have to consider for Lambert in the long run as a potential move.

MoDOT is predicting that road projects in Missouri, except for the New I-64/40, will be delayed because (according to the Post-Dispatch, via Combest):

Ed Hassinger, the Missouri Department of Transportation’s district engineer for St. Louis, said a triple whammy of higher bond payments, a looming deficit in the federal highway Trust Fund and dropping state fuel tax revenue would reduce the number of dollars available to build roads and bridges.

I sure wish a Missouri-based, free-market think tank had written a study about ways to fund and operate needed road, bridge, and transit projects using innovative solutions (public-private partnerships) and user-based fees (tolls) to fund transportation in Missouri. That might come in handy right now. …

Tony’s Kansas City blog, which is far superior to our own in its choice of pictures, weighs in on light rail for Kansas City. I recommend the post, and will of course take the opportunity to remind you of SMI’s own study on the subject.

I am going to take the recent news about light rail in Kansas City as an opportunity to further plug Randal O’Toole’s work on this subject for SMI. In recent days, the lawsuit against the City Council for overturning the voter light-rail initiative was tossed out by the courts. Now, the Star is reporting on the pressure that the mayor and others are facing as they decide how to move forward, pun intended.

Randal O’Toole thinks Kansas City should move forward the responsible way, with expanded bus–rapid transit and the use of competitive contracting in the provision of transit services. I agree, and hope Kansas City oficials give his ideas strong consideration.

While I don’t support increasing the gas tax, and would favor more implementation of user-paying instruments like tolls, this is just a horrible, terrible, no-good, very bad idea. We have infrastructure needs that must be addressed, as discussed in depth by yours truly (and Reason) in this study.

The good, the bad, the depressingly ugly, a fistful of dollars, just a few dollars more, and once upon a time in Missouri.   

P.S. — Thanks to Combest for the links, MOPNS for the videos, and all the newspapers for the articles!

P.P.S. — Just to be clear, the "bad" refers to biodiesel mandates, not KY3, the latter of which I’m a big fan of.

It was probably a little premature and St. Louis-centric for me to call the Franklin County Charter victory the highlight of yesterday’s elections in Missouri with so much being voted on in Kansas City. Great as it was, they had some big issues on the table in KC, so let’s dive right into the Star’s coverage:

Votes approved the extension of the 3/8-cent sales tax to support the bus system — and, more importantly, codified that the tax go to the bus system rather than being diverted to light rail, as has been attempted. The Show-Me Institute has written extensively on this issue. Kansas City has a good bus system, and KCATA is moving toward expanded use of bus–rapid transit, which has worked well where it has been tried. Expanding the use of BRT was one of the central points of Randal O’Toole’s study for us. The passage of the tax extension, and its limitation to buses, will go a long way to making sure KCATA provides transit for the people who need it in a cost-effective manner.

Voters also approved a $1,000 per license fee on payday loan establishments to "reimburse" the city for the cost of regulating the businesses. This is just absurd, and will only increase the costs and interest rates of small loans for people who depend on these establishments for credit. Justin has covered this issue for the Show-Me Institute with great skill, so I will refer you to his comments.

Finally, in a move that will get libertarian blood boiling, voters approved a ban on smoking in public places, including bars and restaurants, in Kansas City. I shall leave it to my colleagues (who I am pretty sure spend far less time in bars than I do) to tell you why this is so horrible. I, myself, have several work trips to Kansas City planned in the coming months and I look forward to spending even more money in bars during those trips now that I won’t have to be bothered by the disgusting smoke. But, heh, I never said I was a libertarian. …

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch editorial board is certainly capable of surprises, and this morning’s editorial about Amtrak is one such instance. I don’t have much to add; mostly, I just wanted to highlight it here because, you know, we get a lot more traffic than some old dead-tree newspaper. As they put it:

As to the rest of it, that should be Amtrak’s problem, not the taxpayers’. Taxpayers already are paying 80 percent of the cost of hauling an Amtrak passenger across the state. That’s enough. Outside of the crowded eastern corridor, passenger trains no longer make economic sense.

Facts are facts, unfortunate as they may be to someone who loves trains, like I do. It would be fabulous to somehow fix the problems and allow Amtrak to be on time with its trains, but I don’t see why taxpayers, rather than riders, should fund those fixes. It’s hard enough to argue in favor of keeping the subsidy at the current level, as the romantic in me supports, but increasing it would be wholly irresponsible.

The Joplin Globe published this editorial today about the potential for truck-only lanes and public-private partnerships for Missouri. (Thanks to Combest for the link.) I, along with intern Nick, aka the Nintern, visited the Globe last week and had a great dicussion with them about our study. We appreciate the thoughful editorial and recommend it highly.

I highly recommend this editorial in the Springfield News-Leader about public-private partnerships and toll roads — ideas we discussed with the newspaper’s editorial board last week. It is an excellent editorial, and we thank Tony Messenger for the opportunity to meet with him and his colleagues. Once again, here is the link to our study on the subject. And thanks to Combest for catching the piece and linking to it!

The release of our most recent study, about transportation in MIssouri, was accompanied by a very successful media tour through southwest Missouri. Please check out this interview on KY3 NBC. We also did an interview with KSPR ABC in Springfield, but can’t find a link to it on the station’s website. 

We also did some great radio shows, and we’d like to thank Mark Kinsley and Kara Marxer at AM 1310 KZRG in Joplin for having me on his show along with Len Gilroy from Reason, and Dan Vaughn of KWTO 560 AM in Springfield for hosting us as well. We had an enjoyable, full-hour discussion with Mark and Kara on KZRG. To the many callers we had on KWTO with great questions: Thank you for your calls. To the couple of callers who accused us, more or less, of being part of a conspiracy to destroy our borders and create a North American Union: You are insane.

Finally, we were able to meet with some newspaper editors about the study, including Tony Messenger of the Springfield News-Leader, and we aprpeciated all of their time.

A new study, jointly produced by the Show-Me Institute and the Reason Foundation, examines the relatively new funding paradigm of public-private partnerships and how such arrangements may benefit Missouri’s public transportation infrastructure. The study provides an overview of the types of public-private partnerships that can be utilized for transportation projects, including their benefits and best practices, and responses to common concerns. It also explores how public-private partnerships can be used not only to upgrade, modernize, and expand Missouri’s road and bridge network, but also to improve the delivery of transit services.

As cars have become more efficient, the fuel taxes used to fund the state’s highways have leveled off — but the transportation needs of the state have not. Other states have looked to the private sector to provide transportation infrastructure, as a means of augmenting gas taxes. This new study, titled "Missouri’s Changing Transportation Paradigm," takes a detailed look at the transportation issues that Missouri will face in the future, and surveys the ways in which public-private partnerships have been used as a tool to help solve similar problems elsewhere.

The study’s authors — David Stokes, a policy analyst at the Show-Me Institute, Leonard Gilroy, the director of government reform at the Reason Foundation, and Samuel Staley, Ph.D., the director of urban growth and land use policy at the Reason Foundation — outline the many benefits of public-private partnerships. When undertaken properly, these benefits may include: delivery of tomorrow’s infrastructure today, cost savings, greater access to capital, greater efficiency, performance of quality improvements, changing the incentive structure, enhancing risk management, spurring innovation, and increased flexibility.

The full study is a bit of a lengthy read, as such studies go, so of course we’ve produced a four-page policy briefing that condenses the study’s arguments and analysis into a more easily digestible format.

The city of Arnold (which has graced this forum before for alternate reasons) is now the first municipality in Missouri to face a federal lawsuit regarding the legality of the red-light cameras that it has installed at certain busy intersections. The lawsuit, according to an article in the Post-Dispatch, questions the constitutionality of the cameras based on the presumption of guilt that they impose on the owners of automobiles that are photographed:

The ordinance forces you to come forward and "basically declare your
innocence," says Washington University law school professor Peter Joy, who reviewed the suit at the request of the Post-Dispatch.

"In essence, it sort of compels you to finger your wife or child or someone else you loaned the car to," he said.

Additionally, the plaintiff in the suit has alleged that the city of Arnold has gone as far as committing mail fraud by attempting to extort money from innocent citizens victimized by the cameras.

With red-light cameras spreading as a method of traffic control (the attorney for the plaintiff indicated that he may be interested in expanding the lawsuit to include more of the 20 communities in Missouri and Illinois that use red-light cameras) it will be interesting to track the progress of this case on a federal level. In line with some opinions expressed here before, the plaintiffs are to be commended for attempting to highlight an injustice that Missouri municipalities were presumably planning on expanding until someone called them on it, but it will be interesting to see if their line of reasoning stands up inside the Eagleton.

Either way, it gives me some ammunition with which to complain the next time I get angry at the "No Right on Red" sign at Delmar and Skinker.

Sunday’s Post-Dispatch featured an article reporting that Metro, with the aid of its newly contracted security firm The Wackenhut Corp., will be increasing security on St. Louis’ MetroLink light-rail system. The expanded security force will not just be manpower-based, though, because Wackenhut plans to arm 80 percent of its security personnel in order to better protect the recent influx of riders the Highway 40 shutdown has brought to the 37-station system.

Although MetroLink has had a better security record than other similar transit systems around the country, trains do pass through areas where crime has been a problem, and a number of incidents have been reported since the line expanded in 2006. Metro’s response to the security concerns of citizens could be seen as a reaction to the crime concerns that were first mentioned by Randal O’Toole (and then  were later grossly overexamined by members of the news media).

Without a doubt, a larger and better-armed security force will make riders feel safer, but will this feeling of security be worth $13.1 million in taxpayer money?

On a lighter note, the New York Times has a fun piece up on the unexpectedly correct use of the semicolon in recent subway advertisements. The grammarian in me couldn’t help but share and silently wish that I had a mastery of that most elusive part of punctuation.

In an effort to help lower emissions and reduce the congestion associated with the Highway 40 shutdown, both downtown St. Louis and Washington University recently signed on to a new car-sharing program by Clayton’s own Enterprise Rent-a-Car. The program, dubbed WeCar, allows subscribers (for a small hourly fee) to briefly rent hybrid Enterprise vehicles to use for errands throughout the downtown area.

Although I was skeptical of this program at first (most likely because of the fact that I’ve never seen two of the Wash U. vehicles leave their spaces in front of Mallinckrodt Center), further thought has led me to believe that the prevailing joy of this Post-Dispatch piece might not be misguided after all.

WeCar represents the efforts of a private company using its resources to correct a social and economic problem. Enterprise, noting that the Highway 40 shutdown would create monumental traffic congestion in the St. Louis area, is offering a fair and convenient service to St. Louis residents that will make their lives easier. In turn, the company itself earns revenue from the rental fees for the vehicles.

The best part about this, though, is that it is a market correction to a civic problem. A car sharing service may not lower congestion all that much, but it certainly costs taxpayers less than the costs associated with expansion of, say, St. Louis’ Metrolink light-rail system.

I know sometimes David Stokes and I don’t agree on things in this forum, but this whole privatization thing might not be that bad of an idea after all.