Tennessee’s Department of Transportation maintains Tennessee’s roads the best it can with the resources it has, according to Community Relations Officer Mark Nagi.
State legislators, however, are realizing that TDOT may not have enough.
According to a January study conducted by TRIP, a transportation research group based in Washington D.C., 40 percent of major roads and highways in Tennessee have pavement surfaces in “poor, mediocre or fair condition,” due mostly to a lack of state funding.
“The pavement condition data that we use comes from the Federal Highway Administration,” said Carolyn Kelly, associate director of research and communications at TRIP. “Each year, states are required to measure the smoothness of all their pavement and report it to the FHWA.”
TRIP has estimated that deteriorating road conditions cost the average Knoxville driver $1,280 per year due to additional vehicle operating costs, car repairs from crashes and congestion-related fees.
Knoxville boasts the lowest figure of the four analyzed cities: Chattanooga drivers pay $1,440 per year, Nashville drivers $1,628 and Memphis drivers shell out around $1,821 per year.
Yet not everyone shared TRIP’s view of Tennessee’s roads. Deputy Governor Jim Henry depicted road conditions differently when he spoke during the Senate Transportation and Safety Committee on Monday.
“The state spends the third least per person on its roads and bridges,” Henry said. “It’s ranked now as the third best transportation system in America.”
Henry also acknowledged the cost of transportation projects tripling in the past 20 years.
“This is a problem that’s not going to go away. It’s going to worsen … The cost of building and maintaining roads continues to increase, and the state’s not going to be able to budget or efficiency itself out of this problem,” Henry said.
TDOT Commissioner John Schroer spoke after Henry and described TDOT’s approach to infrastructure.
“We are a fix-it-first state. We want to make sure that our roads, our current capital and our investments are taken care of … You don’t want to build a swimming pool in your backyard if your roof leaks,” said Schroer.
Schroer showed a graph of TDOT’s annual budget totals from 1987 to 2016. He pointed out that it increased from 1987 to 2006 but decreased or stayed the same from 2006 to 2016.
“The reason why the (graph) is flat is that people are driving more now,” Schroer said. “There are more trucks on the road, but they’re getting better gas mileage, so they’re spending about the same. But they’re driving more and putting more wear and tear on our roads … It’s an issue that we will continue to face.”
Schroer also cited constantly rising asphalt prices and Tennessee’s projected population growth as reasons to think about the future of Tennessee’s roads and highways.
As a potential solution to TDOT’s insufficient funding, legislators are discussing the possibility of increasing the tax on gasoline, which goes toward repairing roads and highways as a type of user fee.
According to Tennessee Comptroller of the Treasury January review, the current gas tax of 21.4 cents per gallon has not been increased since 1989.
Rep. Eddie Smith is currently not in favor of increasing the gas tax, but he remains open to considering all options. He does believe that the diesel tax rate needs to be adjusted to account for the increased fuel efficiency of trucks, as well as for the considerable damage that tractor-trailers inflict upon state roads.
“The biggest wear and tear on the road are not independent vehicles – they do put some wear and tear – but the trucks, the 18-wheelers that carry massive amounts of weight in their trucks. They do more damage than cars,” Smith said.
Smith also thinks it is important that legislators consider ways to tax alternative fuel sources as they become more prevalent in the future.
“What can we put in place for hydrogen, for natural gas, for propane, for any other technologies that are on the horizon, to ensure that everyone is paying for the infrastructure that we all use?”
