General Road and Highway Discussion

[p2ee]

I am thinking of the Illinois tollway, which is almost entirely self-funded, including their capital costs.   Here's an accounting of their 2017 year.  Page 44 has the high level accounting.  I just calculated a 90 km trip on that network would cost me about $3.75 USD.  I'd be looking at about 4 times as much cost on the 407.

A lot (possibly the majority) of the Illinois toll roads were constructed more than 50 years ago and will surely have been paid off by now so that will also skew the comparison.

Given the revenue 407 ETR is making, they should be close to pay off their initial 3.1 billion investment, if they haven't already as well.  But the tolls keep going up instead, because once the investment is paid off its time to make the real profit.

Mentioned above, I don't see how it's not relevant.  And yes it's only paid on the incremental value, so a $20k car would initially generate 2600 in taxes and then 1300 when it's sold at a market value of 10k.

If no one ever trades in an old car, then you are correct, yes.

Sure, it'd be interesting to know how often cars are traded in and what is their value as the percent of the value of the new car that is being bought (trade-ins certainly don't apply to used car sales though), but regardless of that it doesn't really change the argument.  The fact that HST on the gas and on car sales is not being considered makes the conclusion of the article quite suspect.  The cost of road maintenance is being exaggerated (by comparing it to 407 toll costs) and the tax paid by drivers is being understated.  At the same time, I am not sure the subsidy to transit users considers capital costs of transit.