Las Vegas Sun

March 28, 2024

Q+A: Tom Skancke:

If you plan to drive, plan to dig deep, local transportation expert says

Skancke

Sam Morris

Las Vegas consultant Tom Skancke, a member of the National Surface Transportation Policy and Revenue Study Commission, says motorists can expect to pay more — and in new ways — for the nation’s highways.

Sun Archives

Long before the deadly collapse of a highway bridge in Minneapolis in August, Congress realized that the federal government had to do a better job of improving the nation’s surface transportation network.

In 2005 it created the 12-member bipartisan National Surface Transportation Policy and Revenue Study Commission. Longtime Las Vegas transportation consultant Tom Skancke was among its members.

The commission last month issued its recommendations, calling on government and private sources to spend at least $225 billion annually over the next 50 years to upgrade the nation’s highway, transit and rail systems. Currently, about $86 billion in federal, state, local and private funding is spent annually on transportation programs.

Among the commission’s most controversial suggestions was one to increase the federal gasoline tax — now 18.4 cents a gallon — by 25 cents to 40 cents a gallon over the next five years.

It also called on government to complete major road projects within five years of conception, less than half the time it normally takes now. And it advocated replacing 108 transportation programs with 10, focusing on areas such as congestion relief, saving lives and research and development.

Skancke, president and chief executive of The Skancke Co., was appointed to the commission by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada. In an interview with the Sun, Skancke discussed the recommendations and their potential effect on Nevada. Some answers have been edited for space considerations.

Given the fact that gas costs about $3 a gallon, how realistic is it to expect Congress to raise the federal gasoline tax by 25 cents to 40 cents a gallon over five years?

Congress understands the needs of the system, that we have not invested to the degree that we should have for the past three decades. Keep in mind the fuel tax has not been raised since 1982 for infrastructure. The proposed increase is 5 cents per gallon a year for the average taxpayer, less than a coffee a day. It’s a question of whether, do you want the best transportation infrastructure system in the world, or do you want to be No. 3 to India and China? I guess that’s the question Congress and the American people need to answer.

For this country to increase its investment in surface transportation systems, what potential funding sources are available other than the fuel tax?

There’s public-private partnerships. There is tolling. There is vehicle miles traveled. There’s congestion pricing. There is an increase in the diesel fuel tax. It’s important that ... Nevada, our Legislature and our governor take a leadership position in passing tolling provisions and public-private partnerships and congestion pricing. Looking out 50 years, the fuel tax is probably not the most stable tax to use going out past 2025.

So we recommended vehicle miles traveled, where you pay for the miles that you drive. There is a mechanism where you verify your odometer when you register your car and go do your smog check. You can pay it monthly. You can pay it quarterly. You can pay it annually. Those would be the choices the legislatures and Congress would have. If at the end of that 12 months you’ve lied at some juncture through that process, you are severely penalized for not telling the truth throughout the year because they’ll be able to verify, through monthly or quarterly reports, what you’re driving.

How could the commission’s recommendation to accelerate the time between conception and delivery of major transportation projects affect Southern Nevada?

Any transportation project right now along the (Interstate 15) corridor is a 14-year process. We made a recommendation of getting them done in five years, all transportation projects. If we’re taking 14 years to build a road, that’s just being environmentally irresponsible. You have congestion. You have cars parked. If you want to talk about greenhouse gas emissions and you want to talk about air quality, it’s a proven fact, and there’s hours and hours of testimony that a parked car running idle creates more emissions than a car moving.

How might Southern Nevada benefit by having the federal government replace more than 100 current transportation programs with 10 new ones?

Currently the way you do this is you play connect the dots. It’s a very difficult process for any department of transportation to figure out which project fits into which category. Under our proposal, there’s not going to be 108 programs to choose from. What the departments of transportation do and what the Regional Transportation Commission does is compete for all these pots. If you streamline the process, you make it easier for them to deliver the projects. If you have 10 programs to choose from, I think it’s pretty clear where your project fits in a 10-program dynamic as opposed to 108.

In calling for reduced congestion in large metropolitan areas of at least 1 million people, how might that recommendation be applied to the Las Vegas Valley?

Congestion pricing and tolling through the I-15 and U.S. 95 corridors. With congestion pricing, at peak times you’re going to pay a higher amount. So during the day the toll may be $1.50 but at peak times it could be as high as it needs to be to move people through the corridor. It’s going to be very difficult to expand the corridors any more than what they are now. I-15 will likely be to 12 lanes if we can get it done.

The commission suggested that it is ambitious but possible to cut surface transportation fatalities in half by 2025. Do you have any specific ideas on how to achieve that?

Most of our fatalities are on rural highways where there is not substantial striping or lighting at intersections. There is not enough shoulder space. The speed limits are not enforced in rural parts of our country. People in rural parts of our nation tend not to wear safety belts.

So we made a recommendation that we need to take a serious look at our speed limits. Each state should have a safety belt law. They’re proven to save lives.

We need stronger licensing requirements that take into account age and experience. Both young drivers and more mature drivers tend to be the cause of accidents. We need to take a serious look at this text-messaging thing. People typing notes in cars is out of control and people are dying from people typing notes. People have to pay attention to their driving, not putting on makeup or eating in their cars.

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