Category: Traffic

Why Traffic Jams Are Worse In Pa. Than They Have To Be

The Berwind Property Group plan for a development bordering state routes 252 and 3 in Newtown Township, Pa. remains on the drawing board with the new hurdle that those concerned about congestion at the intersection now run the township.

The township settled with BPG two years ago to develop the 219 acre site that was once part of the campus of the Charles E. Ellis School For Girls but a lawsuit by rival developer Claude de Botton stopped the project cold.

BPG has filed a right-to-know request hoping to find incriminating emails showing that members of the present board of supervisors had communication they should not have had regarding de Botton and BPG’s project.

De Botton is developing  a  town center a few miles to west similar to that proposed by BPG.

I’ve met de Botton and I have a lot of respect for him as a man and as a developer, and I’m sure BPG is a responsible developer as well although their people skills can use some improving.

While one can never be certain as to what another’s primary motivation is, the anti-congestion faction that runs Newtown certainly has a legitimate issue. The roads of Newtown– more often than not referred to as Newtown Square which is the post office address for most residents of the township — become almost a parking lot during the rush hours. This affects a rather large part of the Philadelphia metropolitan area since Route 3, aka West Chester Pike, is a feeder road for the Blue Route and Route 252 is one for routes 1 and 30.

The tragedy here is the remarkable shortsightedness shown by officials at the municipal and state level to make traffic flow a priority over commercial matters while there was a lot of open space and before anybody put any development plans on the table. The same can be said about the development of Route 322 and Baltimore Pike in Concord.

It’s still  not to late in Newtown for the state to step and make traffic a priority. The stores have not been erected and the parking lots have not been paved.

BPG’s tract is northwest of the intersection but it doesn’t include the actual northwest corner. That belongs to de Botton. For a bit of irony if the powers-that-be demand a widening of the intersection or an underpass, he would be the one more affected.

Turnpike Chief Reportedly Charged By Feds

It’s being tweeted that former Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission Chairman Mitchell Rubin has just been charged by feds with obstruction of justice stemming from the Vince Fumo investigation.

The Commission was ordered by federal investigators to retain documents last November.

Update—Rubin, 57, of Philadelphia has been charged with obstructing the grand jury investigation of ex-State former State Sen. Vincent J. Fumo.

Rubin is accused of withholding information relating to a Senate contract that Fumo arranged to award to a company Rubin co-owned, according to Acting United States Attorney Virginia Gibson.

Turnpike Chief Reportedly Charged By Feds

Turnpike Chief Reportedly Charged By Feds

25% Fed Highway Money Not Used For Highways

25% Fed Highway Money Not Used For Highways — As we ponder how to fight global warming (ho ho ho),  become less dependent on foreign oil and get our economy back in gear consider that highway congestion costs us about $76 billion annually in wasted time and fuel, and the remember that our interstates are a bit behind in maintenance, according to Robert W. Poole, Jr., an M.I.T-trained engineer who directs transportation studies at Reason Foundation.

Washington taxes us 18.3 cents per gallon and there are those who would lead you to conclude that that is not enough since the maintenance shortfall is  between $60 and $90 billion per year and the federal Highway Trust Fund tasked to pay for the work is in the red, $8 billion so in 2008.

The Fund set up in 1956 was originally limited to caring for the interstates. It was eventually expanded to all roadways and, in 1982, began being used for urban transit. It now pays for things like sidewalks, bike trails and scenic routes. Basically, 25 percent of the highway money is used for things other than highways.

It may be that sidewalks, bike trails and urban transit are good things but they certainly should not be funded on a national level. While it is appropriate to ask a person in Florida to chip in for a road between New York and Erie (or a person in New York to ante up for one between Melbourne and Jacksonville), it is very wrong to force someone to buy sidewalks for somebody a thousand miles away.

If Americans were told that was what the Highway Trust Fund was going to do they would never have approved trusting their money with it.

25% Fed Highway Money Not Used For Highways

25% Fed Highway Money Not Used For Highways -- As we ponder how to fight global warming (ho ho ho),  become less dependent on foreign oil and get our

Benefield’s Excellent Plan For Not Tolling I-80

The Big-Spenders-With-Our-Ransacked-Money (BSWORMs) who now run Pennsylvania are still scheming for  toll booths on I-80.

Nathan Benefield of the Commonwealth Foundation has come up with a list of alternatives  for finding the desperately needed dollars that the BSWORMs say must come from new government-caused traffic snarls.

Benefield’s suggestions are:

  • Repeal prevailing wage laws which mandate wages for government projects 40 percent higher, on average, than the private sector pays for the same work; and would free up hundred of millions, if not billions, for highway construction and repair.

  • Stop redirecting highway and bridge money to other purposes. 
  • Enable public-private partnerships, especially for new construction like express lanes, high occupancy lanes, new highways, new bridges etc.
  • Eliminate the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission (PTC) –rolling the Turnpike Commission into PennDOT, would eliminate an unnecessary bureaucracy and offer substantial saving in transportation spending.

  • Privatize rest stops.




Excellent ideas all; and I would also point out that forbidding all government workers from striking — which would include SEPTA employees and public school teachers — would free up a lot of state money for highway projects since the state would not have to subsidize public schools and transportation to the degree it now does.

I would also point out that making the Pennsylvania Turnpike a freeway and replacing the revenue by hiking the gasoline tax (or by spending less) would be a net tax cut since we would no longer have to pay the people to snarl the traffic.

Rate Hike For Pa.’s Self-Inflicted Traffic Snarls

Pennsylvania’s self-inflicted traffic snarls become more expensive, Jan. 3, when the Turnpike Commission raises the rate by 3 percent.

The PTC raised the rate by 25 percent last January.

Toll booths are always devices funded by taxpayers to snarl traffic,waste gas and produce smog and are an extraordinarily inefficient meansof raising revenue.

Kudos to the Commonwealth Foundation for the tip.

Thornburgh Say End ‘Top Heavy’ Turnkpike Commission

Former Pa. Gov. Dick Thornburgh is the latest to call for ending the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission.

He notes that the ” top-heavy”  PTC, with more than 2,000 employees,  manages 537 miles of turnpike highways; compared to PennDOT which manages nearly40,000 highway miles along with tens of thousands more miles of localroads, railways and bridges.

“The Turnpike Commission is a haven for those who wish to gorgethemselves upon commonwealth tax dollars and load the payroll forpolitical purposes.”

Couldn’t say it any better, although It’s always nice to note that toll booths are always devices funded by taxpayers to snarl traffic, waste gas and produce smog and are an extraordinarily inefficient means of raising revenue.

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Pennsylvania 38th In Roads

Pennsylvania 38th In Roads — Pennsylvania ranks 38th in cost-efficient highways according to a study by the Reason Foundation.

That would be out of 50 states, President Obama.

Hey, at least we are still ahead of New Jersey and New York.

North Dakota was first.

Pennsylvania 38th In Roads

Auto Safety Inspections Worth Hassle?

Auto Safety Inspections Worth Hassle? — Once 31 states required regular safety inspections. Now just 19 (17 as of 2017) do including Pennsylvania.

The decline started in 1976 when Congress eliminated the Transportation Department’s 10-year-old ability to withhold funds from states that did not have inspection programs.

So did the states like Florida end up with Road Warrior-type highways of jerryrigged jalopies with bald tires and bad brakes terrorizing helpless citizens?

Apparently not.

Dan Sutter, an economics professor at the University of Texas-Pan American, co-authored a 2002 study that found inspections have little to no effect on decreasing accidents.

“It seems reasonable that vehicle safety inspections would be a good thing,” he said. “But the data just doesn’t support that.”

He attributes this to great increases in vehicle reliability.

Just something to think about the next time you are trying to set up a ride to work the day you schedule for your car inspection.

Auto Safety Inspections Worth Hassle?

Auto Safety Inspections Worth Hassle?

Retired Congressman Says Dump Pa. Turnpike Commission

John E. Peterson, who represented Pennsylvania’s 5th District in Congress from 1997 until his retirement in 2009, is saying dump the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission.

Before winning election to Congress, Peterson held the state Senate seat for the 25th District which  along the New York border in the center of the state.

“I served in the State Senate for 12 years and saw firsthand howthe Turnpike Commission is the Senate’s patronage pit.  It is a cauldron of corruption,” said Peterson.

Well said, Congressman. You can also point out to those concerned about energy conservation or greenhouse gas emissions that toll plaza traffic snarls don’t help things.

This morning, btw, five Republican state representatives filed a bill abolish the Turnpike Commission. HB 2134 would transfer the transfer its assets and functions to PennDOT.

And did you know that the Turnpike was designed so that the straightaways could be negotiated at 102 mph and the curves at 90?


Feds Order Turnpike Workers To Retain Documents.

Pennsylvania Turnpike employees have received an email ordering them to
retain a wide range of documents because of multiple corruption
investigations, according to TollRoadNews.Com. The email called a Revised Mandatory Preservation Order
gives an indication of the scope of the FBI and state’s attorney’s
probes.

Records must be frozen for 33 companies or persons doing business with the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission. Click on the link to see the list.