How To Fix Georgia's Transportation Woes: A Constitutional Amendment

Earlier this legislative session, the Republicans controlling the Georgia legislature unveiled their solution to Georgia’s transportation woes. Their proposal would phase out the existing sales taxes (state and local) on gas and replace them with an increased excise tax. Local governments would need to levy their own gas taxes to replace this lost revenue. Meanwhile, users of alternative-fuel vehicles would pay an annual $200 fee that would fund transit projects specifically. The plan also includes a $100 million bond issue for transit. Due to concerns about local governments losing out on their own gas-tax money, this proposal has been amended.

Good on them for proposing a solution to a growing problem. An Urban Institute study cited in a recent WABE 90.1 article stated Metro Atlanta’s population is slated to grow by 1.3 million people by 2030 at minimum — and possibly by as much as four million. If you think traffic is bad now, just wait. If something isn’t done, it’s going to get a whole lot worse.

One way to deal with this is expanding MARTA rail--buses can get caught in traffic--to keep as many people off the roads as possible. Plans on MARTA’s website include the Clifton Corridor light rail to the Emory area, underserved by MARTA and, according to my CDC friends, Bermuda Triangle at rush hour. Another possibility is extending rail eastward to the Mall at Stonecrest, relieving traffic on I-20E. As far as outside the Perimeter is concerned, MARTA has proposed extending the existing heavy rail line from North Springs into Alpharetta to take traffic off Ga. 400. Clayton County’s recent incorporation into MARTA would allow for rail all the way to Lovejoy, where I lived when I was a reporter for The Griffin Daily News. It’d be a lot easier for Clayton County residents lacking cars to get to work or school in Atlanta if they could get on the train south of the airport, believe me.

Problem is, these projects cost money — the Clifton Corridor light-rail $1.12 billion, the Alpharetta heavy-rail project $1.6 billion. The Stonecrest MARTA expansion would be the most expensive of them all at just over $2 billion. And given how projects often go over-budget, I could imagine things getting more expensive before they’re done.

MARTA is the largest urban mass transit system in the country not receiving operational funds from its state. It does not receive very much in capital funds either. If the state is going to use the 50/50 rule on how MARTA spends its own money, it should contribute more. No representation without taxation, after all. Not only would state monies allow MARTA to operate its existing assets more effectively, but in sufficient quantities would facilitate improvements to keep Atlanta’s growing population from choking its freeways into uselessness.

Of course, where would all this money come from? The plan would raise $1 billion for needed improvements, but as I said earlier, it would also revamp the gas tax in ways that would cost local communities. It would also discourage the use of alternative-fuel vehicles with a ridiculous tax.

Rather than just complain, however, I would like to offer another suggestion. Increase the gas tax — which won’t be noticed too much given the recent price crash — and amend the state constitution to allow it to fund transit alongside roads and bridges. In 2011, the tax provided $675 million to the Georgia Department of Transportation. Though four years of less driving and more fuel efficiency have no doubt reduced that figure, gas-tax revenues could still allow significant improvements to MARTA. If this money can secure additional funding from the federal government (since it would help CDC employees) or stakeholders like Emory University or back bonds, even better. This alternative would not cost local communities or penalize the adoption of alternative fuels.

Given Atlanta’s rising population and how MARTA, in the words of a transit skeptic near and dear to me, “doesn’t go anywhere,” keeping our city from choking on traffic will require thinking big. The $100 million stopgap will help, but a long-term expansion of the system to meet the coming demand — and the money to pay for it — need a more ambitious solution.

Since constitutional amendments must originate in the General Assembly, the ball is in the legislature’s court. Although constitutional amendments can only be voted on in even-numbered years, the TSPLOST failed in the legislature the first time it was proposed. If we want to get started on building a transportation system to accommodate Atlanta’s coming millions, we’ll need to get started now.

Some Thoughts on MARTA, Infrastructure, and Keynesian Economics

I was perusing some articles from magazines published by a company I've been working for since midsummer and that got me thinking about transportation, Atlanta's mass-transit system MARTA, and related topics. Here goes...

MARTA has historically not functioned very well for a number of reasons, including a lack of support from the state, state meddling in how it spends its money, opposition to expanding it from its core territories (for various reasons--although a lot of opposition is driven by excessive fear of crime and even outright racism, there're better reasons like not wanting to pay extra taxes and the fact the train doesn't go to places like Turner Field), etc. However, under new management, it has undergone a major turnaround. The possibility of extending MARTA buses and even rail (although they really should stop being so vague about doing this "in the future") to Clayton County is on the table, while 2012's failed TSPLOST (which would have passed if it had been limited to a more truncated area instead of including counties like Cherokee) included proposals to extend MARTA rail to Emory and even up Ga. 400 into North Fulton or up I-75 into Cobb. As the Governing article notes, there's a lot more support for expanding MARTA due to people moving in-town, high gas prices, etc.

And now for the Keynesianism. This article here describes how in many places, growth and employment are low but so are borrowing costs. That would be a good time for infrastructure investment, since it would employ people and get them spending money ("priming the pump" if you will) and low interest rates mean that it's safer for a government to borrow money to fund the project. And given the dilapidated state of much of U.S. infrastructure (here's a specific example of where things can go very wrong), we wouldn't be talking about stupid make-work projects like paying people to dig holes and paying others to fill them, but stuff that is in legitimate government purview. Here's some evidence that this can kick in the "money multiplier" effect.

As far as Atlanta is concerned, Georgia recently had the highest unemployment rate in the nation, although things have gotten better now. MARTA has a bunch of projects under consideration already. I'm not a transit expert, but I can see some areas where expanding MARTA rail in-town and out-of-town would merit further investigation and, if built, would provide lots of construction/infrastructure-type jobs.

*Although the stereotype of MARTA opponents is white people from the northern suburbs, there was opposition to the TSPLOST based on how it wouldn't have extended heavy rail to Stonecrest Mall. Residents don't want to wait decades to get rail out the I-20 East corridor. This would be pretty pricey based on that article--according to these specifics here, it'd be 12 miles of heavy rail, some transit centers (presumably for buses), and a bunch of other stuff, at a cost of $2 billion. That's billion with a B. Still, if it would clear out the traffic in the area, it would reduce air pollution and improve quality of life for area residents on top of the obvious "reduce traffic" parts.

*The Clifton Corridor project would extend MARTA to Emory University and the Centers for Disease Control facility in Atlanta. This is the main reason I advocated in favor of the TSPLOST, since I've visited friends out there and the place is a traffic black hole at certain periods of the day. Someone I knew online opposed TSPLOST funding for the project by saying that Emory and the CDC should contribute and that's not a bad argument. I'm not sure about using light rail vs. heavy rail--a lot of the times light rail isn't separated from car traffic and if the trains get snarled among cars like a streetcar would, people won't use them.

*A direct rail connection to Atlantic Station would help remedy the "doesn't go anywhere" problem inside the Perimeter. I've seen movies like Ender's Game with friends from Alpharetta and it was easier to drive than take the train because then we'd have to use a shuttle bus to actually get to Atlantic Station. This would be even more convenient for people already in-town, since they wouldn't need to make the long trip down from North Springs into Atlanta proper. Thing is, with all the development already there, it would be more expensive to build a rail connection (even a cheaper light rail one) and according to the MARTA site, it's not that far of a walk.

*Assuming Clayton votes for MARTA this November, go to page 2-11 to see where rail stops can go. I used to live in the Lovejoy/Jonesboro area (back when I was a reporter for The Griffin Daily News) and I would have loved this for DragonCon and even for church (I go to a church in-town near a MARTA stop). Although rail wouldn't go as far south as Lovejoy (at first), it would have been much better to get on the train at the Jonesboro Justice Center than drive all the way up to Lakewood/Ft. McPherson.

*Extending MARTA rail to Turner Field (which would allow the buses used for the Braves shuttle to be deployed elsewhere) was on the initial TSPLOST project list, but was ultimately removed. The lack of transit options was one reason the Braves gave for leaving Atlanta, although the fact they're moving to Cobb (where the transit situation is even worse) makes them look dumb at best and dishonest at worst. Still, given the possible uses Turner Field could be put to--Mayor Kasim Reed wants a middle-class housing development and Georgia State University wants to transform it into a combination of sports, retail, and student housing--extending MARTA rail to the site anyway would be a good idea.

*As far as extending MARTA outside the Perimeter is concerned, back when I was a reporter in North Fulton I heard all about various proposals to extend MARTA into Alpharetta. That particular line would begin in the Perimeter area and extend all the way to Windward Parkway, with stops in Roswell along the way. That has faced some opposition from people who think it would "urbanize" Alpharetta (in context they're talking about dense development, not using "urban" as a synonym for "black"), but others have pointed out that there's a whole lot of office space in the area. If you work in the same office all day, you won't need a car like more mobile workers (such as journalists like me), so if a lot of office workers commute to Alpharetta from elsewhere, rail service might be a boon for them.

*If we go through with bringing the Braves Stadium to the Cumberland area (gag me with a spoon), it's going to create a traffic nightmare in the area. Extending MARTA up I-75 will connect the system to in-town fans and fans from the south who could take MARTA through Atlanta to Cobb, but one reason the Braves moved is because, based on ticket sales, they figured most of the fan base lived in the northern suburbs. However nice building a MARTA line connecting Cumberland to the rest of Atlanta would be in and of itself, it won't help "northern arc" people get there any faster and, as the following article points out, the politically-easiest route would also be quite expensive. Here's a transportation proposal that should make things easier and would create jobs to boot.

*This is an odd proposal that I'm not aware anybody has even studied, but some kind cross-Perimeter line connecting Doraville (Gold Line) to Dunwoody (Red Line) would be interesting. The distance is relatively short and it would allow much easier transit between the Red and Gold lines if somebody wants to go from the Northside to Lenox or Brookhaven rather than having to go all the way to Lindbergh Center and then change trains. If someone is heading up from downtown to the Northside and wants to detour to Lenox for whatever reason, they could keep going on the Gold Line and get back on the Red at Doraville.

Productivity Update, Including Possible Future Anthology

Current projects:

*Battle for the Wastelands

*First story featuring Andrew Patel, tentatively titled "Ubermensch."

*Second story featuring Andrew Patel, tentatively titled "Needs Must."

Awhile back, I sent out a suggestion to members of my writing group that we put together an anthology of short fiction we could sell for our own profit or to make money for a charity.  After a lengthy chain of e-mails and Facebook discussions, we decided to create an anthology of superhero stories.  Yesterday at my writing group, we set a deadline for Nov. 1 for the first drafts to be submitted, with Nov. 15 as the secondary deadline.  The theme is "Southern Superheroes."  The stories thus far (mine and another writer who doesn't have a blog or non-personal Facebook page I can link to) are set in Atlanta and Mobile.

Originally we were going to use Amazon publishing to sell this, since Matt Schafer had attempted to sell a short story entitled "Heroic Times" some years ago and was told superhero stories were impossible to sell.  However, at Saturday's meeting, both James Tuck and Alex Hughes, who have book deals right now, said that this is no longer the case.  We decided to get the anthology as good as we could make it and seek out a "real" publisher for it.

My contribution will be two villain-protagonist stories starring Andrew Patel, a half-Indian biomedical engineer who lives by the creed of the German philosopher Nietzsche.  He seeks to transcend humanity using technological means and funds this by alternatively working for and preying on members of Atlanta's criminal class.  "Ubermensch" is completed; "Needs Must" is perhaps a fifth done.

"Ubermensch" is on draft four now.  I am in the process of incorporating suggestions from this writing group, such as working in more Nietzschean philosophy and emphasizing Patel's struggle with his own envy in his battle with the hero Silverbolt--Nietzsche wrote extensively about how (according to him) the weak envy the strong and seek to tear them down rather than improve themselves.  I should be able to finish this fairly quickly--the most extreme suggestion would involve adding some additional content at the beginning of a scene.

Today has been a very productive day as far as "Needs Must" is concerned.  Last night, I plugged in the title and contact information (per Standard Manuscript Format) and marked off the different sections.  Today I wrote 1,600-odd words, just under half during my aggravating experiment with taking MARTA to do some chores at my church (I ended up missing the chores and there were delays in the northbound train so it took awhile to get home too) and the rest this afternoon.

Due to the November deadline, chances are I'll be focusing on my two stories and additional anthology work rather than Battle for the Wastelands.  However, I have been able to write some material from the points of view of the tyrant Grendel and the rebel chief Alonzo Merrill that takes place later in the story.  Unfortunately, the next unfinished chapter doesn't have a whole lot to it yet, so I won't be taking Battle to the writing group anytime soon.

Two More MARTA Columns

As the saga of the Metro Atlanta TSPLOST comes down to the wire, I figured it would appropriate to post the other columns I wrote as editor of The Johns Creek Herald.

http://www.northfulton.com/Articles-c-2011-07-12-188183.114126-sub-Local-MARTA-expansion-should-be-supported.html

http://www.northfulton.com/Articles-c-2011-07-26-188416.114126-sub-Compromise-key-to-successful-transportation-tax.html

Since I wrote these columns, things have changed.  Here's the project list as of a few days ago, the one the executive committee wasn't able to cut down to the proper size.

http://www.atlantaregionalroundtable.com/docs/Project_List_for_08-11-11_EC_Meeting.pdf

Now for some commentary, which might appear in a later column:

I'm rather leery of some of the transit projects not being fully funded.  Although the roundtable folk seem to think they'll be able to get matching funds from elsewhere (read: the federal government), given the financial problems in Washington these days, I don't think that money is coming.  It would be better to fully fund every project, even if that means reducing the total number of projects, rather than relying on outside help that may never come.

Especially foolish is providing only two-thirds of the Clifton Corridor cost.  The top end cost of extending MARTA to Emory University and the CDC, which would be a most worthy project, is $1.5 billion.  What good is half a rail line?  If they do it on the cheap, I fear they might simply create a rapid bus line instead of a heavy rail line.  Assuming they build a new road or lane rather than adding buses to the already-congested areas around Emory, buses would still need to be fueled, each bus would need drivers, and although I haven't used MARTA buses, based on what others have said I think they're slower than the trains and their service isn't as good.

And then there's the I-20 East extension in which they budgeted only one-third of the cost.  That's even worse, since there's no alternative to the trains in the area I can think of.

Although I know due to the context Jesus is talking about the cost of discipleship, I'm still reminded of the unfinished tower in Luke 14:28-30:

For which of you, desiring to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost, whether he has enough to complete it?  Otherwise, when he has laid a foundation, and is not able to finish, all who see it begin to mock him, saying, `This man began to build, and was not able to finish.'

Luckily the list the executive committee puts together Monday (hopefully) isn't the end of the story.  When the list goes before the full roundtable, the officials can alter it as they see fit.  The final list isn't due until October.

On the bright side, maybe not budgeting all the money could provide an incentive to get things done under budget?  Just so long as it's not done shoddily, putting lives at risk...

My (First) MARTA Column

Now that Sunday alcohol sales (see my "Will to Power" post) is done with, I've been in need of a new topic to write column after column about.

And so I found it--the transportation one-percent tax, or as I've always called it, the TSPLOST.

(For those of you who aren't from Georgia, a Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax or SPLOST is a one-percent sales tax implemented for a limited time to pay for certain projects, like a new government building or a land-purchase.)

Here's my first column:

http://www.northfulton.com/Articles-c-2011-06-28-188000.114126-sub-Expansion-of-rail-beneficial-for-the-state.html

When I was in Griffin, I did some state-level stories about the passage of the TSPLOST, which took multiple legislative sessions, as well as the Atlanta-Macon passenger rail line that was on the unconstrained project list and was a topic of political debate in Griffin and Spalding County's local government.

However, Matt Schafer pointed out in a Facebook discussion that expanding MARTA northward would be more effective than the Atlanta-Macon line in getting commuters off the roads and after some thinking, I've come to believe he's correct.  The Atlanta-Macon line would take care of people commuting from the southside, but I think there are more commuters coming from the north.  Plus expanding the MARTA Red Line north would be within one county (Fulton) and not be so difficult politically, unlike a multi-county Atlanta-Macon line.

I concede MARTA does have some issues that would make suburbanites leery of it coming to their county, but I think that would be more applicable to Cobb and Gwinnett, which historically rejected MARTA, than to North Fulton, whose residents already pay the MARTA tax but have to drive down to North Springs to actually use the train.  Plus MARTA's own leadership wants their agency merged into a wider Metro Atlanta transit entity--an entity including the other counties' transit systems (like Cobb's bus line) might be more effective and more palatable to voters and taxpayers.

I've written a second column about the first wave of cuts to the unconstrained project list.  I'll post it here when it goes live, probably this coming Tuesday.

The voters will approve the regional sales tax in 2012, but the final project list must be completed by August 15 of this year.  I think I'll be flacking for rail expansion all summer long.

Anybody Got Suggestions for Improvement?

I attended a meeting of the Atlanta bloggers meetup.com group the other day.  Unfortunately, due to getting out of the office late and taking the train to the wrong MARTA station*, I missed a substantial chunk of the meeting.

*I went to the North Avenue station and walked several blocks when it turns out the Midtown station is right next to the restaurant.  At least I saved gas and didn't need to worry about my car...

I pick up some interesting suggestions.  One of them is to set up a Twitter account to accumulate followers and, I assume, cross-pollinate with the blog (refer Twitter folk here and blog-followers to Twitter).  I'll be sure to do that, but not right now.

The most relevant suggestion to this post, however, is to ask your readers for feedback.  So....

1. What parts of my blog do you all like?

2. What parts do you all dislike?

3. What are some improvements you think I could make?

Any comment would be appreciated.

First News Article Round-Up of 2011

Here's my first news-article round-up of 2011...

http://www.ajc.com/news/cobb-gwinnett-receive-federal-784889.html

Cobb and Gwinnett Counties rejected participating in MARTA back in the 1970s and Gwinnett rejected it once again in the 1990s.  This is a significant turnaround.  Whatever concerns there are about costs and importing hooligans via train (crime around Lenox went up soon after MARTA connected there) must've paled in the face of the possibility of $4 per gallon gasoline starting next summer.

Given Atlanta's notorious traffic, anything that will take cars off the road will certainly be beneficial.  Although the project paying for itself via fares is unlikely, reducing congestion and air pollution will be a major benefit and in my opinion, worth paying for.

And including Cobb and Gwinnett in MARTA might improve the governance of the organization, which has been plagued by boneheadedness and corruption in the past.

Of course, there's the issue of finding money to pay for MARTA expansion, especially in a time of budget deficits.  I don't think monies from the TSPLOST voters will vote on in 2012 can be used to pay for MARTA operations, but they could be used to pay for building the lines.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/04/world/asia/04china.html?_r=1&adxnnl=1&src=un&feedurl=http://json8.nytimes.com/pages/world/asia/index.jsonp&adxnnlx=1294156855-LPhLoeD57e9INs3S6Z+r/Q

This is good news.  Considering how the alternative to reprocessing nuclear fuel is burying it somewhere for 10,000 years (and making sure our descendants know not to mess with it) or letting it pile up at the nuclear plants themselves, this is very good news.

One quibble: The article states that the National Research Council found that Bush's reprocessing program would have been uneconomical.  Here's the actual report and it's much more nuanced--the technology is not at the point needed to justify an accelerated timetable for building reprocessing sites. 

http://www8.nationalacademies.org/onpinews/newsitem.aspx?recordid=11998

That does NOT mean that reprocessing in the United States is uneconomical.

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/01/03/to-beat-back-poverty-pay-the-poor/

Now this is interesting.  It reminds me of something that Richard Nixon proposed back in the 1970s, a guaranteed minimum income.

I'm not a big fan of handouts, but in the countries where this has been implemented, they've imposed all sorts of conditions on it like making sure one's children are educated and giving the monies to women rather than men. 

(Lest anyone accuse me of bashing men, I read about micro-financing in Haiti and how they gave the money to women because the men would gamble it all away on cock-fighting.) 

In the long run, this could break the cycle of poverty, producing a net gain in income (from educated workers rather than vagrants) and savings (lower incarceration and law-enforcement costs, for one).

However, IF such a thing were to be implemented, I would make it conditional on not drinking, smoking, and especially doing illegal drugs.  Drug- and alcohol-testing is surely doable.  Including classes for the adults receiving the monies would also be a good idea, since lack of education contributes to poverty and related problems, plus there is a "culture of poverty" that makes things worse for the poor that needs to be eradicated.

The Brookings Institute Report on Passenger Rail

For the last few months, the Spalding County branch of Georgians for Passenger Rail has been raising money to pay for a report by the Brookings Institute on the feasibility of a passenger rail line from Atlanta to Macon.

Here's the full PDF of the report, which is posted on the state organization's web-site:

http://www.georgiarail.org/Brookings%20Institute%20Study.pdf

Looks really interesting, and if it takes a lot of cars off the road (primarily people who work in only one place the entire day--if I wanted to do this, I'd need to live near a station and leave my car at the office most of the week, which would be difficult if I wanted to drive somewhere in the evening), it would do wonders for Atlanta's notorious traffic and (so I've heard) air pollution.  Plus it should reduce gas prices, if many cars are taken off the road.

One issue people who don't support passenger rail have raised is what to do transport-wise when one gets to the city.  In Atlanta, this could be less problematic due to the presence of MARTA rail lines to other places (if I took the train to something in Atlanta, I would probably use this) as well as the bus system. 

However, I am not aware of there being similarly-convenient public transportaton options in some of the other cities along the line.  Macon and Clayton County look to have a respectable bus system, but it seems Henry County (site of the Hampton station) and Spalding County (site of the Griffin station) only have on-call bus service, not a regular bus system in the mode of Athens (whose bus service I sometimes used when a student at UGA).

One praise for the report--clearly whoever wrote it has read How To Win Friends and Influence People.  He acknowledges the usefulness of the car-centric 20th Century mode of development rather than mindlessly attacking it, but said that this needs to be updated for the 21st Century.

Thing is, between capital costs from 2016 to 2018 (construction) and maintenace/operations from 2018 to 2030, it's going to come out to $725 million.  That's quite a pretty penny there.  There's a federal earmark for rail on the Southside that the state has held for several years, but it's not going to cover all or even most of that (IIRC it was around $37 million).

Paying for that is going to be tricky, especially since the majority of public-transit does not pay for itself at the fare-box (if I recall correctly, for example, the only profitable AMTRAK line is one of the ones up north).  This means the project will have to be subsidized by taxes.  The goal is that economic development brought about by the rail line--people moving to areas served by the rail so they can take the train to work, for example, increased travel to Atlanta due to reduced traffic issues, money that would have been spent on gas elsewhere, etc--will provide the increased tax revenues needed to get the project going without it burdening the taxpayers.

However, the report does suggest that conservative estimates of local revenue could pay for a significant--$400+ million--chunk of this project.  Other sources of revenue include public-private partnerships, for example.  If the train has got a fair number of passengers, this could mean advertising and businesses setting up there, much like how the Atlanta airport has got all kinds of restaurants and the like there.  The TSPLOST I mentioned in my blog earlier, if it passes in 2012, could be used to provide funds as well, although the report acknowledges that the cities where the stations will go are in different tax jurisdictions and this will require an intergovernmental agreement on spending the tax monies.

Now for the ideological issue.  It may seem odd for me, a Libertarian and/or conservative (I tend to view Libertarianism as a type of conservatism, a view not universally shared), to profess support for this project, which is in effect a very large tax-funded program. 

However, I think that as far as the constitutionality of the project is concerned, it's up there with the Interstate Highway system.  Transportation infrastructure has historically been something the government has done.  The Atlanta airport is public, for example, even though it is used by private airlines and has a significant number of private vendors.

In fact, this project on even sounder constitutional footing than the Interstate system, since it's a state project, with the feds only chipping in some funds and not doing it themselves.

I wonder if there's a Henry County chapter of Georgians for Passenger Rail I could join?  Convincing the more rural sectors of Metro Atlanta to support the project is going to be more difficult than convincing Atlantans, I imagine.

TSPLOST Awaits Governor's Signature

http://www.ajc.com/opinion/transportation-down-budget-to-494204.html?cxtype=ynews_rss

http://www.ajc.com/news/georgia-politics-elections/transportation-funding-the-rocky-487827.html

I refrained from blogging about this for awhile because I was writing an article for my paper on it and I'm not supposed to compete with my own company.  Now that article has run, I feel better blogging about it.

This thing has been going on since soon after I first started working for my newspaper.  I remember it failing by three votes at the last minute in 2008, which meant the amendment would not be up for a vote in 2010.  That was somewhat irritating, although it might well be a blessing in disguise.  In 2012, the economy will have turned around and the voters might be more willing to vote for a tax increase when times are good than when times are bad.  Plus, the way the tax is structured, getting the projects together for each region to vote on will take time.


For the record, since this is a Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax (SPLOST), it's not the same as a tax increase coming down from On High.  The people of the regions will vote directly to tax themselves (or not), on projects that are in their immediate area. 
One reason I support this is that it could provide a funding mechanism for passenger rail in Georgia.  Right now, there is an $87 million federal earmark to build and maintain passenger rail on the Southside for a few years.

(When the matter first came up, I think it was Atlanta-Lovejoy or Atlanta-Griffin for three years.  Now, since the current plan is Atlanta-Macon, it might not cover as long a period of time.)

Large-scale transit projects generally do not pay for themselves and thus require an outside source of funding.  This applies to roads, ports, and airports just as it does to large-scale passenger rail.  If I recall correctly, the only portion of the AMTRAK system that's self-sustaining is the northeastern line.

A regional SPLOST--although given the way the state is divided up, you'd need multiple regions involved--could be used to pay for the Atlanta-Macon line that's currently the first phase of Georgians for Passenger Rail's proposed network of passenger rail lines throughout the state.

Come 2012, it will be the task of rail advocates and those who support other necessary transportation improvements to convince the people of the regions to support the TSPLOST.  However, if gas prices return to their pre-Great Recession levels by then (they're trending upward now with the economy recovering), this will likely encourage people to support mass transit and other gas-saving solutions.  After all, hybrids and even full electric cars got a lot of attention when gas was $4 per gallon.

Though large-scale government projects seem antithetical to small-government conservatism, the state is facing a lot of transportation problems, particularly gridlock in the Metro Atlanta area.  If passenger rail was put in place, this would likely "thin out" traffic on the highways as people who do not need their car for work but live in the outlying areas will simply be able to take the train in and out of town.

(This could also make it easier for people to live in Atlanta itself and commute to jobs in outlying areas, although this would not be an option for me since I need my car for my job.)

Either way, that's less traffic on Atlanta roads, which will help with local air pollution and congestion.  Less demand for gasoline means lower gas prices as well.

Sometimes very big problems need very big solutions.

On State Transit Funding and Gay Marriage...

Now I've gotten y'all's attention with this title, here's what I've got to say:

Georgia Governor Sonny Perdue has thrown his support behind a constitutional amendment would enable twelve regions within the state to vote to have a penny tax used to fund transportation projects in their areas.

http://www.gpb.org/news/2010/01/14/governor-proposes-penny-tax-to-fund-state-transportation-projects

http://www.ajc.com/news/georgia-politics-elections/governor-backs-regional-transportation-275473.html

However, he wants this to wait until 2012, to give the economy time to rebound.

I'm torn about this.  Until I read the first article, I thought the state didn't have a good reason to wait until 2012.  It's not like there's no time to put it on the ballot--the constitutional amendment banning gay marriage in Georgia was on the ballot eight months after the Massachusetts Supreme Court ruled gay marriage constitutional in that state.  I was going to make some snarky remark about the state legislature caring more about that than about the vital issue of the state's transportation infrastructure.

However, the GPB article makes more sense.  Tax increases aren't popular when economic times are bad and even a mechanism to allow people to tax themselves at some future date (as this regional tax would be) would likely suffer from that, even if it would not immediately impose any tax increases.  It would be better to propose a constitutional amendment two years later and have it pass than to propose a constitutional amendment now and have it fail.

On the other hand, the House and Senate have deadlocked on this matter two years in a row.  I should know--I wrote the stories on it for my paper.  Not ramming it through now could provide additional opportunities for deadlocking, delaying it even more.

Furthermore, the state is on the verge of losing an $87 million federal earmark for an Atlanta-Griffin passenger rail line.  That would be the first leg of an Atlanta-Macon line, which would have both economic and environmental benefits: 

For example, If I could take the train from Griffin or McDonough to the proposed intermodal station in Atlanta and then use MARTA for church, Thrashers games, DragonCon, etc. I'd do it.  That'd save me some gas money and I could read, write, or just look out the window while I'm moving instead of having to pay attention to the road.  Plus I wouldn't be contributing to Atlanta's smog.

(I am but one person, but multiply me by thousands.  Plus there are people who commute to Atlanta from the Southside every day who contribute much more to the traffic and smog problems.  A passenger rail line could go a long way to fixing these problems.)

Plus, in the city where I work, I remember hearing about how a few years ago, when it looked like commuter rail would come to the city, there was a lot of investment in the northern part of town where the rail station would likely go.  Given how that's the poorer part of the city, that investment was needed.  With the rail line, many outlying cities would become "bedroom communities" and attract more residents and investment, benefiting their economies.

There's also the benefit to the state rail system.  The rail lines in Georgia "radiate" from Atlanta and Macon--which are not connected to each other.  An Atlanta-Macon line could greatly improve the rail network in general and make rail connection with other states easier.

(I hope endorsing these arguments doesn't make me a Keynesian.)

The regional transit tax could make providing the necessary local funding easier.  This might be the state's last chance to get the money needed to implement passenger rail without blowing the state's budget.

So what do you all think?  Is voting on it this November a better idea vs. voting on it in 2012?