Daily News Briefs, November 7, 2023

Editorial: Louisiana Needs Toll Revenue To Finance Major Bridge Projects

The editors of The Advocate comment on a Louisiana legislative committee’s recent disapproval of a toll-financed, public-private partnership to replace the obsolete I-10 Calcasieu River Bridge in Lake Charles. They attribute the deal’s collapse (and the possible forfeiture of a major federal grant) to the fact that area residents and the influential trucking industry rejected the idea of having to pay any amount of tolls as the state’s contribution to the project’s financing. Yet, according to the editors, “[t]he numbers say that if we don’t pay tolls, we won’t get bridges and not just the needed bridge over the Calcasieu — but another more expensive new bridge in the Baton Rouge area over the Mississippi River.” They see a larger problem with state transportation funding at the root of the bridge controversy, writing, “Louisiana is a something-for-nothing state, as demonstrated by the fact that its taxes for roads and bridges and other forms of transportation are low; the main gasoline tax hasn’t been raised at all in more than 30 years.” (TRN inserted a link in quoted text.)

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New York State Launches Campaign To Prevent And Deter Bridge Strikes

Governor Kathy Hochul (D) announced that an enforcement and public awareness campaign is taking place this week with the aim of preventing bridge strikes by over-height trucks, including rented box trucks and moving trucks operated by non-commercial drivers. According to Hochul’s news release, “Since the beginning of 2023, there have been 91 reported bridge strikes on the New York State Thruway’s 570-mile superhighway, compared to a total of 63 reported bridge strikes in all of 2022, a 44 percent increase from the prior year.” The effort involves the collaboration of the New York State Police, the Thruway Authority, NYSDOT and the governor’s Traffic Safety Committee, which comprise a new Bridge Hit Mitigation Task Force. An NYSDOT social media campaign, “Check Your Height, Know It’s Right,” emphasizes truck operators’ responsibility to know their vehicle’s height, and will remind drivers that current mapping technology does not customize routes according to a vehicle’s height. Increased police patrols in bridge-strike hot spots, and heightened coordination between law enforcement and commercial vehicle inspectors, also are planned. And to further get people’s attention, proposed regulations (see PDF pages 13-16) would add punitive points to the license of a driver who strikes a bridge or is caught speeding in a work zone.

CDLLife and Daily Voice (White Plains) also report on the campaign.

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FHWA's Office Of Operations Offers Some New Resources

FHWA’s Office of Operations last week announced the availability of two additional resources: updates to its Asset Management for Operations website, and a report on urban congestion trends. Regarding the former, the website now includes presentation slides on Connecting Transportation System Management and Operations (TSMO) and Asset Management, links to current Transportation Asset Management Plans (TAMPs) that include TSMO assets, and a sampling of links to TSMO plans that include asset management elements. The 2022 Urban Congestion Trends Report “includes congestion and reliability measure trends in the 52 largest urban areas in the United States, along (with) information on data tools and an operational strategy evaluation.”

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These are just some of the toll industry developments TRN is following.

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