On the same day House Republicans in St. Paul debuted a TV ad blaming pain at the gas pump on the DFL, the nonpartisan Urban Land Institute (ULI) released a sobering assessment of the infrastructure needs of the Twin Cities and 23 other metro areas in the United States.
The concurrent events illustrate the stark differences between politics and policy. "Minnesota Democrats: You pay, they pump," goes the TV tag line, alluding to the 2 cents per gallon just added in the first stage of what by 2012 will be an 8.5 cent gas tax increase. The tax revenue will provide much of the funding for the $6.6 billion transportation package that overrode Gov. Tim Pawlenty's veto.
Meanwhile last week, away from the partisan politics at the State Capitol, the Land Institute's annual analysis of the nation's infrastructure presented a picture that was far from pretty. America is "coasting on prosperity" and faces an infrastructure "crisis'' in 10 years if nothing is done, the study warns. More specifically, there's at least a $170 billion annual funding gap, and the resulting traffic congestion costs U.S. motorists $78 billion a year in wasted fuel and lost time.
This isn't news to many Twin Cities motorists. Some stretches of interstates already masquerade as parking lots during rush hours. The wasted time cuts into professional productivity and takes away from personal and family time. Annual congestion costs for the Twin Cities -- the value of travel time delays (more than 59.7 million hours) and excess fuel consumption (41.8 million gallons) -- are more than $1.1 billion annually, according to the most recent data available from the authoritative Texas Transportation Institute. And that annual price tag doesn't take into account 2008 gas price spikes, which only increase the negative economic impact of bumper-to-bumper traffic.
The bitterly debated Minnesota transportation bill will help alleviate -- but not eliminate -- local traffic congestion through investment in roads and mass transit. No one wants to pay more at the pump, but the ULI study proves that the state's investment is overdue.
The study also shows that congestion will only grow worse in the years ahead. ULI estimates that over the next quarter-century, Twin Cities vehicle miles traveled will supersede population growth by 41 percent, the sixth-worst imbalance of the markets analyzed and even worse than notorious traffic towns such as Los Angeles.
Of course, politics will always come into play when tax dollars are at stake, and infrastructure needs should continue to be discussed in Minnesota and across the country this election year. But as Minnesotans watch the gas tax ads, they should consider the costs of doing nothing. When it comes to infrastructure, doing nothing isn't free.
