Since Rebuilding America’s Infrastructure launched in May, we’ve talked a lot about the cash-strapped and outdated financing system upon which our aging bridges and roads depend. In this column, rather than slay the slain anew, let’s focus more on the future. For me, that future is VMT.

Of course, past is prologue
The gas-tax model, which supports the Highway Trust Fund (HTF), is a living dinosaur. Actually that’s not quite right, because an oxymoron like that would be appropriate only if the massive anachronism in question was, in any way, awe-inspiring. According to the February 2009 report by the congressionally mandated National Surface Transportation Commission, “the federal gas tax has experienced a cumulative loss in purchasing power of 33 percent since 1993 — the last time the federal gas tax was increased.” The report points also to a troubling gap between estimated surface transportation investment needs and revenue projections.

This gap will creep toward $400 billion over the next five years, a period in which, as evidenced by the Cash for Clunkers hysteria, fuel-efficient or alternative-energy automobiles will gain more market share, allowing more Americans to travel more miles while paying less in taxes for the promise of safe and efficient bridges and roads. As the above commission noted, “Basic economic theory tells us that when something valuable — in this case roadway space — is provided for less than its true cost, demand increases and shortages result.”

So what do we need? We need a system that forces motorists — using all types of engines — to pay for the bridges and roads they use. As for how much they should pay, that crucial detail is left to the lobbyists and legislators. As for the implementation, that should be up to Jim Whitty.

Thank you, Oregon
Jim Whitty is the project manager of the Oregon Department of Transportation’s Office of Innovative Partnerships and Alternative Funding. In 2001, the Oregon state legislature green-lit a task force to design a new road funding system to replace the gas tax, and they tapped Whitty to help make it go. Whitty, who was promoted to project manager during the project, started in 2003 along with three other outside-the-gas-tank thinkers.

Whitty and his team landed on a vehicle miles traveled (VMT) fee as the fundamental alternative, and after getting approval, refining the concept, and creating a system, they started a pilot program in 2005 with 300 motorists, mostly in the Portland area.

The pilot program revolved around a pay-at-the-pump model, in which a driver’s miles were tabulated by an on-board device; the data was uploaded from the vehicle at a designated pumping station and sent to a central computer; and the required tax was relayed back to the point-of-sale. The program ended successfully in 2007.

Whitty said the program’s goals were to prove that a government jurisdiction could charge and collect a mileage-based fee electronically, inexpensively, and without burden on the motorist. “We believe we achieved those objectives,” said Whitty.

Next, Whitty and his team will gear up for a larger test — 5,000 motorists — that includes a free-market element, in which the drivers get to decide which type of on-board tabulating device they’d like to use. This would also help to quell the Orwellian conspiracy theories that will surely crop up. According to Whitty, such theories are ridiculous.

“We wanted to avoid interfering with people’s privacy,” said Whitty, and explained that people often confuse VMT technology with a GPS system, which has an internal map and an outbound signal. “We eliminated the signal, so there’s no ability for people to follow it, and there’s no travel map, so you can’t track it.”

Whitty clarified that there is a faint signal, like an I.D. badge or a grocery store barcode, so the mileage totals can be read wirelessly at the pump, but the power of that signal pales in comparison to something like, say, the cell phones we carry already.

Other states are researching VMT, such as Iowa and Minnesota, but according to Whitty, no approach has been as comprehensive as Oregon’s.

Talking to Whitty, you get the sense that VMT is ready to roll. Early in our conversation, I asked him how long it would take to implement VMT on a national level. “Eight years,” he said, but then added that his estimate was based on political will. “If we had the ‘go’ to put it in place now, it could be up and running in four or five years. If you put enough engineers in a room and say, ‘This is our timeline,’ they’ll do it.”