There’s a reason the Washington region now has the worst traffic congestion in America. It’s not because area motorists don’t pay enough taxes, as many politicians, Smart Growth advocates, and the editorial page of the Washington Post would have you believe. No, the real reason Washingtonians spend a cumulative three days a year stuck in traffic, wasting time and burning gas, is that their political leaders planned it this way.
Time and again, local officials approved real estate development projects without making adequate provision for the transportation needs of the new residents and businesses who would occupy them. State legislators spent tax dollars on pet projects of far less urgency than increased road capacity. Literally billions of dollars were diverted to mass transit, which serves just 12 percent of the region’s commuters, at the expense of the other 88 percent.
And the same politicians and activists are still determined to make things even worse. The Fairfax Board of Supervisors just approved five new high-density residential towers in Tysons Corner in the proximity of four new Metro stations under construction. Unfortunately, they haven’t the slightest clue how to pay for the estimated $1.7 billion in needed road and transit upgrades to accommodate traffic both through Tysons and to the Metro stops.
Meanwhile, the Dulles Rail boondoggle will suck billions in construction, debt service and operating costs from local taxpayers for the next 50 years without doing anything to relieve traffic congestion.
Today, traffic is at a virtual standstill in Montgomery County around the new Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda. Even with five years to plan for the facility’s move from D.C., county officials failed to make even a single major road improvement to keep traffic moving. Small surprise — it took 40 years of litigation to get the 18-mile Intercounty Connector built.
Fifty years ago, transportation experts predicted that the Washington area would need several new bridges over the Potomac River to accommodate a growing population. None were built. Neither was an Outer Beltway, which could have diverted East Coast through-traffic away from the city core. State budgets in Maryland and Virginia have doubled since just 2000, but legislators and governors of both parties have raided transportation trust funds, deferred essential highway and bridge maintenance, and put drivers’ needs far down on their priority lists.
As the circulatory system of the regional economy, transportation is as basic to the public welfare as schools, law enforcement and safety net programs — all of which grew fatter while roads were being starved for funds. Gridlock is the inevitable result of this irresponsible so-called “planning.”
