Mark Schremmer
Addressing Highway Trust Fund shortfalls and a lack of truck parking were among the topics discussed at the House Highways and Transit subcommittee’s first hearing of the 119th Congress.
The subcommittee held the hearing “America Builds: Highways to Move People and Freight” on Wednesday, Jan. 22.
Rep. David Rouzer, R-N.C., chairman of the subcommittee, used his opening statement to discuss inequities with the current Highway Trust Fund, which uses fuel taxes to pay for federal road and bridge projects. According to Rouzer, the fund hasn’t been fully solvent since 2008.
“We must also have a frank conversation about the solvency of the Highway Trust Fund – the main funding source for highway projects,” Rouzer said. “Since 2008, Congress has transferred approximately $275 billion to cover the shortfall of revenues as expenditures have grown.”
Although the problem is not a new one, the congressman said it is time for lawmakers to figure out a new funding mechanism, as electric vehicles are not contributing to the current system.
“Highway funding relies on a user-pay principle,” Rouzer said. “It’s pretty simple: You purchase fuel to fill up your vehicle to use the roads, and the fuel tax collected from that purchase is put into the Highway Trust Fund. However, electric vehicles, which are often heavier than their conventional counterparts because of the weight of their batteries, do not pay in the Highway Trust Fund.”
In previous sessions, a vehicle-miles-traveled tax and tolls have been presented as potential ways to correct the issue. However, a VMT tax has raised concerns over privacy, and the trucking industry has argued against efforts to create truck-only tolls.
Rouzer suggested that getting all vehicles to pay their fair share should be a priority.
“It is wholly unfair that an entire segment of users doesn’t contribute to the roads and bridges they use,” he said. “This won’t address the greater solvency issue, obviously, but we must rectify this so that all users are treated fairly and contribute to the systems on which they rely.”
Dennis Dellinger, president of Cargo Transporters, testified that funding should be generated in an equitable manner.
“The trucking industry is the leading payer into the Highway Trust Fund, contributing almost half of all revenues while representing less than 5% of road users,” Dellinger wrote in his submitted testimony. “While the trucking industry is proud to pay our fair share, Congressional attention and action is necessary to ensure a lasting, viable and equitable revenue source for continued infrastructure investments.”
Truck parking
The truck parking crisis across the nation has been well-documented. The 2019 Jason’s Law Report found that 98% of drivers regularly experience problems finding safe parking. According to the Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association and the American Trucking Associations, there is only one truck parking space for every 11 truckers nationwide.
Rep. Mike Bost, R-Ill., introduced the Truck Parking Safety Improvement Act in the previous two sessions. The bill would allocate $755 million over three years to the construction of parking spots. According to the bill text, any project funded by the bill cannot include paid parking. All parking under the bill must be publicly accessible and free of charge.
Bost, who is expected to reintroduce the bill, asked Jim Tymon of the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials if states would pursue funding for truck parking if Congress created a grant program.
“If there was a grant program for truck parking, states would be interested in that,” Tymon said. “I would say that it’s not just availability of funding on the state DOT side. A lot of the right-of-way that the state DOTs have control of, there is a restriction as to what they can do within that right-of-way, including establishing new rest areas and commercializing them to be able to support truck parking.”
Bost then asked Tymon for additional conversations with his staff to determine what would need to be done to make sure truck parking expansion was possible.
