Is the Gas and sales tax a disinsentive for local goverments to support fraight and passenger rail?

[Anonymous]

I met with a County commisioner for Montgomery county NY last week about a proposal to reactivtate a rail spur to a new Wall Mart Warehouse that sees about 500 trucks a day.....His objection was "IF we build a rail spur what will happen to all the gas tax and sales tax revenue that we collect at our local truck stop here?" This is a good question...Same for commuter rail what will happen to all those people who take the train to work and not be buying gasoline and paying local taxes? Seems that we are hopelessy addicted to oil..
and it may be too late to get into rehab.[}:)]

[Anonymous]

Gov't. and corporate greed runs everything! (Or, is that "ruins" everything?)

[Junctionfan]

I would think that the government would be pleased because of the amount of money they would save on road maintainance. 500 trucks a day does alot of damage to the roads over a long period of time.

[mudchicken]

Might want to ask why freight railroads pay tax on diesel fuel that is used to support truckers and also ask him if the truckers even pay for 50% of the damage caused to local infrastructure. Your county commisioner has a pretty myoptic view of the world IMHO.[V][V][V]

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by trainfinder22

I met with a County commisioner for Montgomery county NY last week about a proposal to reactivtate a rail spur to a new Wall Mart Warehouse that sees about 500 trucks a day.....His objection was "IF we build a rail spur what will happen to all the gas tax and sales tax revenue that we collect at our local truck stop here?" This is a good question...Same for commuter rail what will happen to all those people who take the train to work and not be buying gasoline and paying local taxes? Seems that we are hopelessy addicted to oil..
and it may be too late to get into rehab.[}:)]

The County Commissioner is an idiot. Anyone versed in transportation knows that the vast majority of goods distributed by Wal Mart are not likely to move by rail to a local siding. Some may move by intermodal container to an intermodal terminal. Others that are heavy bulk items such as fertilizer, rock salt or similar might move by rail to such a siding. But, the vast majority will remain in trucks and thus the effect on fuel sales and sales tax collections will be non-existent.

LC

[Anonymous]

Raise the gas price from 5 to 10 dollars a gallon, that will realy **** off a lot of consumers but look at in the long run........well save alot of oil. As for the taxes............

[jchnhtfd]

QUOTE: Originally posted by mudchicken

Might want to ask why freight railroads pay tax on diesel fuel that is used to support truckers and also ask him if the truckers even pay for 50% of the damage caused to local infrastructure. Your county commisioner has a pretty myoptic view of the world IMHO.[V][V][V]

And while you're bugging the guy, find out (if you can) why the freight railroad also pays a whacking great local property tax on its track and equipment, part of which supports the local highway system[xx(]!

[Anonymous]

Yes I cant seem to get a lot of support for property tax abatements for Railroads...VT and Montana dont tax railroads...Plus What about the State Turnpike commisions and the the tolls that they collect that would be lost if the the freight went to rail...As for Walmart Distribution Centers I am saying that since they buy in bulk they could buy by the train load and send it out by truck or Piggyback,,,They miight have enough traffic to justify there own Piggyback ramp.

[mudchicken]

QUOTE: Originally posted by Hobo1971

Yes I cant seem to get a lot of support for property tax abatements for Railroads...VT and Montana dont tax railroads...Plus What about the State Turnpike commisions and the the tolls that they collect that would be lost if the the freight went to rail...As for Walmart Distribution Centers I am saying that since they buy in bulk they could buy by the train load and send it out by truck or Piggyback,,,They miight have enough traffic to justify there own Piggyback ramp.

Faulty logic all the way around...
(1) VT & MT indeed DO collect property tax from the railroads. A lot of counties would be in dire trouble w/o the disbursement checks. (In Montana it is Tax Code Title 12).... Both states seem keen on taxing leased improvements on railroad land bigtime...can't speak to state add-ons to Federal Hwy Use Tax on fuel in those two states...
(2) States would be dollars ahead if trucks were kept off the road. They might last a while longer if the folks who don't pay their own way were to stay off the road. The remaining motorist taxpayers could then put some of that money into badly needed improvements on secondary roads which are in terrible shape as it stands now. (And as pointed out above, the truck traffic is never going to quite go away the way you seem to think) Historically, trucking has NEVER paid its own way and has always relied on others to pay for infrastructure. (and it used to be even worse)
(3) Highly unlikely Wal-Mart/J B Hunt could justify a piggyback ramp for just one distribution center....

Sorry, just does not fly as stated[2c]...Please check your "facts"...

[mudchicken]

QUOTE: Originally posted by trainfinder22

I met with a County commisioner for Montgomery county NY last week about a proposal to reactivtate a rail spur to a new Wall Mart Warehouse that sees about 500 trucks a day.....His objection was "IF we build a rail spur what will happen to all the gas tax and sales tax revenue that we collect at our local truck stop here?" This is a good question...Same for commuter rail what will happen to all those people who take the train to work and not be buying gasoline and paying local taxes? Seems that we are hopelessy addicted to oil..
and it may be too late to get into rehab.[}:)]

Come to think about it, it wasn't that long ago that CSX howled about NY state "gouging" the railroads and taxing twice to 27 times the national average, making it that much harder for railroads to justify improvements in that state.

http://www.ppinys.org/reports/2002/railtax.pdf
http://www.occf-ny.org/railroad.htm
http://www.tourolaw.edu/2ndCircuit/September02/01-7966.html

[Junctionfan]

Where does Wal-Mart's imports come from? How many railcars would you say would replace the trucks? I am curious only for contimplative purposes if their transportational needs could be solved with roadrailer service via terminal. If for example most of the stuff comes from the west coast and various other states that run pig trains to Chicago, the trailers could be assembled off of the pig trains into a roadrailer train enroute to the nearest roadrailer facility in New York state.

[edblysard]

The shipping out by rail won't work..
Each of the trucks you see leaving WalMart, or most retail distribution centers, are not carrying one single product...

What they are carrying are the daily orders for the stores, shrink wrapped pallets each destined for a single store along the delivery route.

One truck may have as many a 15 stores daily order inside, so store A in Dallas would get a shrink wrapped pallet containing a 1000 light bulbs, DVD players, clothes, laundy soap, garden supplies,20 medium ladies pantsuits, 25 large ones, six cases of trash bags, store B gets one pallet of lawnmowers, and another pallet of mixed clothing, you get the point.

The truck, of course, stops at several different stores on it's route, dropping off each stores individule order.

Inbound to the distribution center wont work either.
The cost of trans- loading say, 2000 ladies pantsuits from the container to a boxcar, then the effort to unload the boxcar at the center is prohibitive.

WalMart, and most newer retail distribution centers, were designed from the get go to be serviced by trucks.

Even the main distribution center, the one that feeds the state or regional distribution centers, were designed to use containers on chassis, (trucks) its faster and cheaper.

Ed