Good idea on transportation funding

We have used this space to chide the governor and lawmakers for lack of progress in enacting a capital improvement plan to fix up roads and schools and improve mass transit.

We can't think of a single reason why such a plan should remain stalled in Springfield.

Except one. That is, if whatever would be approved would be more about wasteful projects earmarked to get votes than projects to make our travel that much easier.

After all, the last time the state launched an infrastructure improvement program -- Illinois FIRST, in 1999 -- it was larded up with pork barrel projects that had nothing to do with building and repairing roads and schools and improving mass transit.

And let's face it. For the $12 billion that was spent on Illinois FIRST over five years, how much easier has your drive become? Last year, a study by the Texas Transportation Institute showed that the average Chicago-area driver spent 46 hours idling in stalled traffic in 2005 -- 11 hours more than in 2001.

And some of the worst snarls on the highways have yet to be untangled. For example, the $140 million spent on the so-called Hillside Strangler on the Eisenhower Expressway only succeeded in pushing the traffic jam from this bottleneck farther up the road.

That's why we support the Metropolitan Planning Council's proposal to change the way funds are allocated for capital improvements. The premise of the council is that the state should select transportation improvement projects on transparent, objective criteria that would give highest priority to work that would indeed ease congestion (including freight train traffic), improve safety on the roads and offer more public transit options. The criteria would also reward smart planning and give metropolitan areas like ours -- where much of the traffic and transit is located -- more transportation dollars and expanded decision-making power on how best to use them.

In other words, fund first those projects -- regardless of where they would be in the state -- that make the most sense in terms of improving overall travel.

Certainly this is easier proposed than done. Lawmakers and the governor don't want to surrender vote-getting deal-making in allocating capital improvement funds. But the council has pointed out that other states, such as Ohio and Michigan, are progressively moving toward using carefully constructed criteria instead of political earmarking in deciding which transportation expansion projects should be funded.

We don't agree with all of the council's recommendations. For one, we are skeptical of its support of congestion pricing, which levies higher toll charges on motorists during rush hours. And we can't support expanded public-private partnerships in improving transportation that would lead to even more toll roads in the suburbs -- these to be privately run.

But the council's common-sense suggestion that tax dollars or user fees should be used to fund only projects that actually improve travel, not just an elected official's political standing, makes perfect sense to us. And we're certain the suburbs -- with their heavy use of mass transit and congested roads -- would deservedly come out ahead under such a funding scenario.