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Scott Walker and his anti-train attitude

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[quote user="blue streak 1"] <blockquote> <div><img src="/TRCCS/Themes/trc/images/icon-quote.gif" /> expresslane400:</div> <div></div> That's because truckers make up the difference with all the taxes they pay. I know because I pay those taxes. <div style="clear:both;"></div>   </blockquote> [You certainly pay a lot of truck use taxes.......BUT......You do not pay your share to keep up the roads. As you are fairly new to this forum it has been established that trucks may pay only 10 - 30% of the wear they cause to roads. Therefore trucks are subsidized much more than Passenger RRs ever have been.  Their susbidity comes from car drivers and general tax revenue.  I will cite a couple examples. If you have driven in downstate NY you are aware there are roads that commercial vehicles are not allowed. Some include buses as well. These roads were built for the most part in the 1950-1960s and have yet to ever have any major repairs due to wear and tear. Many have never even been repaved. Wear and tear of a road happens exponentially in relation to the load per tire. What exponent you ask? 4th power!! Say your 18 wheeler weighing 80,000# has 4444 #  per tire verses my 4000# car (most weigh less) of 1000# per tire. To apply this .. if my car is a 1000# vehicle tire has wear factor  "X" then your 18 wheeler will have a "X  to 4.444 th power" = approx 20,000+  times worse. Our poster RWM can give you a more accurate figure as my memory fails me and I may not have these figures correct. <div style="clear:both;"></div> [/quote] I would like a reference to the studies that show trucks cause the amount of road damage claimed or don't pay their fair share of the cost of building and maintaining the nation's highways.   Clearly, heavier vehicles cause more wear and tear on roadways than lighter vehicles.  The key question is whether the truckers pay a fair share of the cost of repairing the incremental damage that they cause.  The American Trucking Assoication, as you might imagine, claims that they do.   I would like to know the methodologies that were used in the studies.  Model assumptions would be critical to the outcomes.  For example, if the studies assume that all 18 wheelers are carrying 80,000 pounds of goods, that would be incorrect.  Many trucks carry far less weight than their rated capacity, i.e. Frito-Lay trucks loaded with potato chips, FedEx trucks loaded with packages.  Many trucks haul low density, high volume, high value goods, which means that they fill up the trailer with heaps of light materials. Studies can be deceptive.  The researchers frequently use simulation models that rely on assumptions that may or may not apply in the real world.  They usually make heavy use of statistical sampling, projecting the results to the population as a whole.  The results of a statistical sample cannot be projected to the population as a single number.  It has to be a range, determine by the sampling construct constraints.  As soon as someone tells me that trucks cause X amount of damage to the highways, I know it is probably wrong.  A single number would only be correct by chance.  Supporters of commuter rail claim that it is far more fuel efficient that cars.  They base their studies on common operating assumptions, load factors, etc.  I question some of the assumptions.  For example, the average load factor on the Trinity Railway Express (TRE) is approximately 33 per cent, although it is near 80 per cent during the morning and evening rush hours.  How is that factored into the studies?  Also, the TRE trains layover at their end points for approximately 25 minutes, pumping heaps of pollution into the environment.  How does that compare with the modeler's assumptions?  It is these kinds of questions that a researcher needs to address, whether it is a commuter rail operation or the damage trucks do to the highways.  Several years ago Dallas Area Rapid Transit (DART) gave me route information for every one of their routes, included the TRE.  When I asked the Vice President of Operations how much each route contributed to a reduction in pollution in the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex, he admitted that he could not tell me.     Whoops, I forgot.  What does the damage trucks do or don't do have to do with commuter rail systems?
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