It’s what everyone has already known, this brings it into the open -

Peters confirms diversion of highway, bridge money
U.S. Transportation Secretary Mary Peters this week confirmed what OOIDA has already reported – that a big chunk of fuel tax dollars end up paying for things other than roads and bridges.

In an interview on The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer on PBS, Peters said “I think Americans would be shocked to learn that only about 60 percent of the (fuel) tax they pay today actually goes to highway and bridge construction.”

Peters said in the last highway bill, about $24 billion went to special, “earmarked” projects, and for things such as museums, bike paths and the maintenance of lighthouses.
“Land Line Now” on XM Satellite Radio reported similar numbers last week, based on research by OOIDA staff member Rene Hill.

In her research, Hill used the year 2005 as an example, and showed that 35 percent of the fuel tax dollars collected that year ended up being spent on things other than general road and bridge work.

And what’s sad is the same thing is being done at the state level (see Don’s post). Truck owners know what we pay and if you multiply that by the number of trucks, there is no excuse except for mismanagement and special interests why our bridges and roads are falling apart. As usual, it takes a tragedy to bring the obvious into the spotlight.

Of course everyone’s first reaction is to keep trucks off of bridges.

I’ll be in the Minneapolis suburbs next week. I’m not thrilled about going, but there are plenty of ways around the bridge collapse, but traffic is horrendous without a piece of the interstate being shut down. Minneapolis has a four lane interstate, where most major cities have six or eight lanes going in and out of their downtown districts. It’s a traffic nightmare on a good day.

Speaking of taxes - 2290’s are due on the 31st of this month. That’s $550 per truck to the Federal Government above and beyond any fuel, income or road taxes.