418/419

If you live in the Tucson metropolitan area you have no doubt seen the sighs urging you to VOTE YES ON 418/419.  The signs tell you that you can fix our roads without raising taxes.  

That's not really true.  I know this because I am the person who reads every page of every Sample Ballot and Publicity Pamphlet that comes my way, in this case all 132 pages (the English version; the 280 pages include the whole thing in Spanish, too..... don't get me started on English as our common language).

It is true that our taxes won't go up.  They will also not go down.  The same half cent sales tax (a totally regressive measure) instituted when the first RTA plan was passed in 2006 (the year we moved here) will remain in place if the voters vote yes on 419, the funding package.

We were thrilled that there was a regional plan back in 2006.  Single lane roads with unimproved shoulders suddenly became 4 paved lanes with cut outs for left turns and buses.  Some even had bike lanes, although only a few with curbs separating the cyclist from the motorist.  Tucson prides itself as being a biking community; protecting those on two wheels was obviously not that important to the planners.

Railroad crossings were made safer with overpasses and underpasses.  More of that is planned in the next 20 years, along with widening arterial roads to facilitate speeding through the city.  The 2006 major crosstown road reconstruction project (Grant Road) has been going on for a long long long long time and is still nowhere near complete.  Neither are several other projects from that election.  

There is some money reserved from the revenues collected to cover some of those costs, but some is not all.  The RTA pamphlet uses COVID and 2008 to explain this failure of revenues not keeping up with expenses.  I'll grant them that.  But there were cost overruns and miscalculations too.  

Tucson's pot hole infestation has spread alarmingly in the 20 years we've been here.  The plan allots 6.6% of the project's expenses to Pavement Rehabilitation.  Orange Grove Road, recently widened and repaved, is going to be widened again.  I drive across the area in question most days, at high traffic and low traffic times.  In 20 years I've never been in what I'd call a traffic jam.  

Sure, the road now has 4 lanes then 2 lanes then 3 lanes then 5 lanes but the cars flow smoothly and I rarely miss the lights because of traffic.  The same can be said for Ina Road and Prince Road, both of which are in line for moderniz(ing) existing roadway including bicycle, pedestrian, and associated intersection and drainage improvements.  Notice that there is no mention of resurfacing, or pot hole filling, or fixing the damn roads themselves for crying out loud.

We just spent $4000 replacing TBG's engine mounts and oil pan, victims of the potholes (and our excessive heat... but that, they said, was less of an issue).  Driving up to Dr K and Not-Kathy's house is an adventure in off-roading... only we're on the (supposedly) paved surface.  Where there used to be holes in the asphalt, now there are mounds.  It's a toss up which feels better when you're over them.

Counting on the RTA to make smart decisions is put to the test when considering what's been going on since 2006.  Grant Road is home to my hairdresser.  In order to return to my house, I need to make a left turn and drive west.  From the salon to the nearest available left turn is now a nearly 3 mile drive.... which brings us to air quality and environmental safety.

The Vote No Arguments in the pamphlet are peppered with bicycle, pedestrian, and transit advocates, all of whom wonder about the air we breath.  They wonder why transit related projects comprise only 27.1% of the expenditures.  Expanding the highly successful Streetcar to serve more of the city is nowhere to be found.  With Tucson's COVID era free bus service and the concomitant rise in unhoused and unruly passengers, riding the buses has become less safe for both passengers and drivers.  Yet only 1.9% ( $51,000) is allocated.

There are broader concerns about the structure of the RTA, the dissolution of the citizens' advisory committee, the disproportionate allocation of funds to the outer rim rather than Tucson itself.  The Yes arguments are from developers and realtors and builders and elected officials (although Mayor Romero's argument is signed by her, without her title).  The No arguments are from pedestrians and cyclists and health care advocates, Democrats and Republicans and Libertarians.

I read it all.  I've thought about it for a while.  My favorite argument is this one, which I will quote in its entirety.

I live in unincorporated Pima County.  Like most of us, I spend too much time in my car.  Everywhere I need to go is far away from me.  I had the same problem when I lived in the city.  New roadwork won't solve that problem

Pima County's best regional transportation plan, the updated version of our 2045 Regional Mobility and Accessibility Plan, looks at average daily travel times under "build" and "no-build" scenarios.  Under a "build" scenario, the average person saves 36 seconds of daily travel time.

The projects funded by Prop 419 will cost $2.67 billion.  There are about 430,000 households in Pima County.  That's $6,200 per family.  There are better ways to save 36 seconds a day.

I'm leaning towards a no vote.