Taxing to Pay for Transit Costs

“From the Freeway to the Feeway” (editorial, Dec. 28) demonstrated well the dual concern about new roads: the financial cost to taxpayers and the objection to more development that degrades the community and the environment. The Times wisely recognizes that there are legitimate local objections to the “interesting idea” of toll roads. One poorly appreciated fact among many motorists is that more roads do not decrease traffic congestion in the long run. The Southern California Air Quality Management District therefore needs to deal with growth, which Times reporter Larry Stammer put at 13% for vehicle miles driven over the past two years in Los Angeles.

Additional objections to more roads include lengthening of our oil supply lines. Besides perpetuating our destructive “way of life,” new roads today mean urban sprawl; they bring pollution to new frontiers at the expense of wilderness and farmland; they increase taxes, and the growth of roads sends a hypocritical signal to our fellow deforesting nations that we want to influence environmentally.

It is high time for a national paving moratorium on new roads and parking lots. White flight from the inner cities (via roads) has victimized blacks, who would fight back against inequity on environmental as well as economic grounds.

The revitalization of our cities can only come after we halt endless paving. The result would be a beginning for a more community-based, sustainable society.

JAN C. LUNDBERG, President

Fossil Fuels Policy Action Institute

Fredericksburg, Va.