Citing a continuing slide in gas tax and other transportation revenues, Gov. Bev Perdue today proposed a $3.6 billion budget for the state Department of Transportation for each of the next two years, down from $3.9 billion.
Spending would drop for road construction, and even more for road maintenance.
Perdue also proposes an increase to hire 79 more people in the state Ferry Division, to comply with new Coast Guard regulations that require two more employees on each ferryboat crew. The Ferry Division [correction added 3:45pm] today announced that it will cut ferry schedules this summer so it can comply with the new staffing requirements.
Perdue wants to stick with the legislature’s commitment to reduce the yearly transfer from the Highway Trust Fund to the General Fund -- something Marc Basnight, the Senate leader, has said should be reconsidered.
Perdue endorses the existing plan to divert that extra money each year to the N.C. Turnpike Authority, to cover the projected gap between toll collections and total costs for turnpike projects the state plans to start up in the next few years. The turnpike gap funding would grow from $25 million this year to $64 million in 2009-10 and $99 million in 2010-11.
At DOT, Perdue proposes to ...
- Cut construction spending by $200 million or 12 percent, to $1.5 billion a year.
- Cut maintenance spending by $125 million (13%) to $819 million in 2009-2010, and by $156 million (17%) to $787 million in 2010-2011.
- Cut multimodal (transit, rail, ferry, aviation, bike-pedestrian) spending by $7.8 million (7%) to $156 million a year.
- Cut Powell Bill aid to municipalities by $20 million (14%) to $127 million each year.
Perdue wants to spend an extra $14.1 million over the next two years on new technology at the Division of Motor Vehicles, to combine motor vehicle registration with county property tax collection.
Bruce Siceloff reports on traffic and transportation. A News & Observer reporter and editor since 1976, he took over the 
Comments
Except NCTA doesn't use NCDOT engineers
Tue, 03/17/2009 - 16:48 — bendalNCDOT does very little work with NCTA; when the transit authority was set up initially it was specifically intended to be completely separate from NCDOT in everything. Consultants would provide the engineering designs, and NCTA would review the designs themselves.
When the first plans came in, though, FHWA objected strenuously to NCTA wanting to relax design standards to save money, and insisted that NCDOT review and approve all toll road designs before any Federal money could be used on them. That's the only assistance NCDOT gives to NCTA. As for funding, there's no reason why taxpayer money should be given to an agency that will build roads by issuing bonds. The bonds provide the construction money, which are then paid back by toll road revenue. If the tolls can't pay off the bonds, then perhaps the road shouldn't be tolled! That's what stymied the southern half of I-540; FHWA determined the toll revenue was not enough to meet their criteria, so they pulled their funding.
Turnpike questions
Tue, 03/17/2009 - 14:58 — BruceSiceloff (author)A few years from now when the Turnpike Authority is actually in the turnpike business, it will have its own source of revenue -- toll collections -- and it will be more independent from NCDOT than it is now. NCDOT will be building and maintaining roads with tax dollars, and NCTA will be building and operating toll roads. It makes sense for NCTA to start out making use of NCDOT engineering etc expertise (and money), but as the agency matures it will probably go its own way.
As for diverting gas tax money, this isn't new and it isn't Perdue's idea. FWIW the NCTA says it won't build toll roads that can't recover a substantial amount of their costs from toll collections -- so it is rejecting proposals, for example, to put tolls on Greensroboro's northeast loop.
Turnpike Staffing
Tue, 03/17/2009 - 13:54 — kbarhamMr. Siceloff, could you please help to explain how the Turnpike Authority has its own office space and support staff separate from the DOT?
Thought toll roads paid for themselves
Tue, 03/17/2009 - 11:51 — bendalSo now Purdue and the legislators want to divert gas tax money to toll roads to make up the difference between costs and generated revenue. Talk about a bait and switch; it appears that the NCTA has become an entity more interested in its own survival than actually finding toll routes that are viable on their own merits. With this kind of non-toll revenue stream, there's nothing stopping NCTA from proposing tolls on any controlled access road, and then expecting yet more gas tax money be 'diverted' to pay them when the tolls can't pay off the bonds.