VinnyVincent

I understand that, but it's well known that the Hardy toll road loses money and is SUBSIDIZED(there's that nasty word people hate when talk of increasing taxes comes) by funds from BW8. If toll roads are so successful, as you claim, why not charge 30 cents at the booth on BW8 to cover filling of pot holes and here's an idea- how about a VOTE on whether or not we need additional funds to build roads in some areas? Why I am I stuck paying for someones bad business decision when I ride BW8 but not the Hardy? They fixed the road after hurricane harvey? LOL that's what they're SUPPOSED to do! of course they fixed it. They were losing more money per day in tolls than the repairs cost them no doubt. Gotta keep that money pouring into he county commissioners pockets, right? I bet if the roads were public roads and they got damaged, we could have gotten federal assistance for repairs...

But isn't the argument for toll roads "You aren't going to increase my taxes to pay for roads I don't use!"? Well, by paying to ride on a road that's been paid off already, you are paying for other roads that you probably don't use. Most people who use BW8 on a regular basis aren't using the hardy on a regular basis. It's the exact same thing as a tax, but the cost is higher because they are #1 for profit and #2 their executives are overly paid. There's also a lot of what essentially amounts to bribery/back scratching going on.(I'm thinking county commissioners here) What's more, they secure funding from investors to build new roads. Why do they need BW8? Foreign Investors are beating down the door to buy more of our public land, so they can charge us to use it...shouldn't be too hard to get all the money that way. The only reason I see to keep BW8 tolls open is greed. 249 used to be a decent free highway. Now the poor people who have always lives there are reduced to some cheesy little feeder road that got squeezed in as a technicality. That toll road made traffic in that area worse, not better, because no one uses it.

I'd be happy with that bit of progress. At least shut down the one thats been paid for 12 times over. Without doing that, they're using toll money simply to fund more toll roads. It's like a tax with the added weight of a private company to support.

Yup and they get to throw huge parties off the books with peoples money who did pay to use the road... http://corridornews.blogspot.com/2007/06/huge-parties-by-hctra-and-its-vendors.html

I understand that 290 was more work to clear and get ready. What I am saying is that even AFTER it was all cleared and "ready"...the process to simply level out the road has taken them longer than the 288 crew to level and pave the road. A lot longer. You drive by the 288 construction zone and it's actively being worked on with a decent staff of workers. In contrast 290 seems to have empty equipment sitting there for weeks at a time and overall the whole operation just seems totally unprofessional and amatuerish compared to the 288 job.

I guess that's not an issue 1.4 million a day is the kind of money these guys paying the bills will be making... http://www.chron.com/news/houston-texas/houston/article/Toll-road-authority-doubles-as-bank-for-county-4083949.php

No I don't really see where you are going. See unlike some of the "experts" commenting on these threads; I actually live/commute not just in Houston, but on 290 and 288 daily. Even AFTER they had 290 ripped up and started paving... it's taken them longer to simply flatten out the surface than it has for the 288 crew to pave the entire road.

Oh and taking a train is just stupid. By the time you find a way to the station and wait for the train to show up, you could've sat in traffic and not paid to use the road(although that is rapidly becoming less of an option with the proliferation of tolls)

Yes it's going up super fast near 610. I didn't know they could build roads like that. Wonder why they couldn't get the same crew on 290...

Arrested for traffic offenses? Man you pro toll guys sure are starting to sound like you want houston to turn into a police state

https://www.change.org/p/texans-for-toll-free-highways-heavily-reform-toll-roads-by-legislation-or-litigation-sign-the-petition Perhaps this is inaccurate? I haven't looked into anything about SB 1110... It sure is a shame that some people in certain areas aren't even able to simply live in a city without having to take that city to court for trying to rip them off...

no no no, I'm talking investment property, not where I live. I live off 290 and 1960 near cypress/jersey village. I was considering investing in a second property in sunny side...ironically enough so I could kill time waiting on traffic to die down before I drive home each evening...but went with Grimes Co. instead(no building codes enforced)

I just noticed this. You had to go to court to determine what your house is worth? Sounds like they really hit you guys hard in the inner city lol

Critical Mass certainly didn't start out with police escorts. On the contrary they were often harassed by police before they grew to such large numbers. What I'm suggesting is no different than the critical mass event. It's a regularly scheduled meet where like minded individuals meet to show the morons in Austin that we are tired of this crap. Every new road is a toll road and it's BS. They don't understand/listen to anyones complaint so apparently citizens need to take action. What would you suggest would be an effective way to get the message across to them? Your second paragraph is a phenomenon known as awareness. Back when houston was designed bikes were not factored in. College station probably doesn't want a bunch of obnoxious cyclists clogging their streets every month, so when they started to get more developed they included bikes in the mix. Awareness is exactly what we would be raising by participating in this protest.

I'm just repeating what some of the pro-toll people in this thread have said and also some of the anti-toll sites I've read seem to be of that opinion. Also by their own admittance 25% is going to education.

I actually looked at property over in sunny side near where I work...somewhere to build like a small second house where I could relax for a few hours after work and wit on traffic to die down. I finally concluded that I'd probably rather sit in my car than risk my life spending time in that area. Plus the property tax's were crazy and if you wanted to say, add a culvert for a driveway, by the time you got done paying off the county to do that it was almost ten grand. That's before even pulling any permits...so yeah I ended up getting property in Grimes county instead. I'm sure they'll turn 1788 into a toll road before too long and I'll be stuck paying 10 dollars to visit my rural property.

That's the route I take every day. 290@1960 - 288 and 610. it takes 1-2 hours in traffic and 32 minutes without. If I want to take BW8 it's 10 dollars round trip AKA well over 3000 a year to commute that route to work...

Trust me you got a lot more because of critical mass. The PR thing, that's your opinion. Ever hear of bike houston and the houston bike plan? Both of those are connected to the critical mass event. The event has been very successful nationwide, in spite of what you and your cyclist friends think. I think if I model this toll road protest after them, it can also be successful.

Which means next to nothing when you consider the fact that they aren't using the money on roads to begin with, like they are supposed to...

That's old. I wonder how much we're getting ripped off on our property tax that is now being used for roads... EDIT: Also you already know that whole thing is somewhat false. They have a chart showing you how the gas tax is spent. They have 75% of the funds going to roads and 25% going to schools on that chart. We already know that's false. You said yourself the money was being spent on other things didn't you?

Doesn't matter. What matter is that it's supposed to be going to roads and it's not. So instead they have increased our property taxes to help supplement the gas tax they are abusing. Tolls have gone up as well... Still all new roads are toll roads. Ridiculous.

The point is the gas tax is supposed to be paying for new freeways and that money is being diverted to less important BS...so instead of fixing that they raise property taxes AND tolls have gone up. SO we are being triple taxed and apparently a lot of this is going to simply "maintain" the roads. Yeah right. If they were dumping that kind of cash into road maintenance, we should be driving on silky smooth roads with a surface less than 10 years old on each of them. Instead I have to change my shocks out every 75K because they are so worn out...

BTW what are the property taxes like on those houses? Outrageous I'd imagine. FYI they are now diverting tax money from the appraisal district into road construction too...so you guys enjoy paying your inflated property taxes that everyone has been noticing the past few years. They just passed that which is why they have been going up so much.

Dude there's crack houses across the street. No reasonable person is going to move their family into that house.

Here's the view of the houses across the street... That's your options for living toll free in houston, unless you have a million dollars to live in river oaks.