By: David Seago
Tacoma News Tribune
April 28, 2008
Original Tacoma News Tribune blog post
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Matt Rosenberg, who writes a knowledgable transportation blog for the Cascadia Center, offers a cleverly succinct analogy for congestion pricing:
Suppose electricity was free, even at hours of peak usage. Think your power supply would be reliable, then? Exactly. Now apply the same common-sense approach to highway capacity.
The Cascadia Center, a unit of the Seattle-based Discovery Institute, promotes alternative solutions to transportation and development problems. The Center is a big fan of congestion pricing, which will get its first real-world test in Washington beginning Saturday.
That's when the state DOT opens its first HOT lane on nine miles of SR 167 from Auburn to Renton. Tolls will range from 50 cents to $9, depending on the time of day. If the four-year experiment goes well, the state may expand it to to other highways in the region, including interstates 90 and 405.
Rosenberg offers other updates on tolling issues in today's post. Did you know there's a scholarly journal calling Tolling? I think there's one on Rosenberg's bedside table.
