Americans Finding Alternate Transportation

[pennypinch]

It has been reported by the Federal Highway Administration that Americans drove 9.6 billion miles fewer this past May compared to a year ago. People are finding alternate ways of travel since the soaring of fuel prices.

They say this will affect revenue allotted for highway maintenance. A decline in usage means a decline in tax dollars going to repair.

Commuters have turned to trains, buses and bikes. Some are now even working from home. Figures show public transportation has jumped by 88 million trips for the first three months of this year from last year.

It has been said that if you want to reduce your commuting costs by 20%, leave your vehicle home one day per week. Find an alternate form of transportation such as the bus. The saving will really add up.

I know I have been trying to stick around the house as much as possible. I think everytime I take a gander at my fuel gauge in my car it says feed me. I only run around when it is necessary and try to do all of my errands in one trip.

[moneysense]

Well, at least this way, the big companies will now be affected by less travel, and maybe if they get tired enough of it, they will join the fight to get fuel prices lowered.

Here in my part of Ohio, gas is down to $3.75 a gallon and a further drop in prices would sure help.

Its about time someone besides the general public has to eat some of the hardships that come with having to pay such high prices.

[dollardaze]

Did the authorities think that skyrocketing gas prices would not trickle down in less driving by Americans and therefore would not affect the dollar amounts they get to improve roads?

Well it seems that there is always road construction going on in my area, not that the roads seem to improve for any length of time. It seems that just a few short trips up and down the highway, and I find potholes which were just fixed a short time before. I don't think that fewer dollars will make much difference in the quality of our roads.

What needs to be looked into is a better substance for our roadways that won't require so many repairs........that would be the cost effective way to go.

I'm with you, I stay home as much as possible. Even with the gas prices coming down a bit, it is still expensive to just drive when it's not really necessary.

[moneysense]

So our driving less is causing less money to fix the roads? Thats laughable around my area, as we have some pretty bad roads to travel on.

There are places where the ground below the roadway is settling more than usual because of all the rain etc. that we had several years back when we had all the flooding. And there have been no road repairs other than filling some potholes, going on in our area at all.

I have noticed that even our Interstate in this area is really getting bad in places, but this isnt a new thing and cant be blamed on the recent rise in gas prices. It seems that lack of good roads in our area has been an ongoing thing for quite a few years.

Is this due to lack of funding? Is it due to the fact that most schools in our area have built brand new schools which have taken up quite a bit of our tax money? I dont think so. But yet, I have no idea why the roads in our area have been in the shape they are for such a long time.

Actually, it seems that election years around here will find the worst of the roads getting fixed, and that is so wrong. The roads should be fixed when and because they need it, not because some politician wants to get into a particular office.

It also seems that we have a lot less maintainance on ditches running along side our roads, and because of this, the water that is misdirected because of this lack of maintainance can also cause severe problems with the roads.

I think a lot of the bad road problem around here has to do with misdirection of tax money. Be it federal tax money, state tax money, county tax money or money available to the townships.