Here we go again... But it does have some interesting graphs.
"I always find it amusing when folks want to lump suburbanites into the "urban" bucket. We know from their voting that many of them including myself associate with the folks in rural MN much better than the urban folks
The reality is that much of the spending on rural roads is so that us urban and city folks can get to cabin country and our beautiful parks. I am pretty certain the folks who live near Brainerd had no need for a huge highway and bypass. And do you think the North Shore residents need huge roads to handle their local traffic?
The reality is that much of the tax revenues come from the folks who live in the burbs. They are the citizens who fund both the urban and rural areas of the state. So I think the Urban folks should stop acting like they are paying all the bills...
The big cities receive a huge amount of local government aid and school funding from the state. And those coffers are filled by the well to do suburbanites that people here like to disparage." G2A
"I always find it amusing when folks want to lump suburbanites into the "urban" bucket. We know from their voting that many of them including myself associate with the folks in rural MN much better than the urban folks
The reality is that much of the spending on rural roads is so that us urban and city folks can get to cabin country and our beautiful parks. I am pretty certain the folks who live near Brainerd had no need for a huge highway and bypass. And do you think the North Shore residents need huge roads to handle their local traffic?
The reality is that much of the tax revenues come from the folks who live in the burbs. They are the citizens who fund both the urban and rural areas of the state. So I think the Urban folks should stop acting like they are paying all the bills...
The big cities receive a huge amount of local government aid and school funding from the state. And those coffers are filled by the well to do suburbanites that people here like to disparage." G2A
48 comments:
your "here we go again" link doesn't work
Thanks for heads up. I will fix it when the memorial blood vampires are done draining me. :-)
The article is in minnpost by greta
My own suspicion is that historically, there was sort of a deal between the cities and greater Minnesota to the disadvantage of the suburbs. My sense is now, that that deal has been rescinded as cities and rural Minnesota see other more as rivals than allies.
--Hiram
Link is fixed...
Hiram,
It is kind of like two parties dividing the golden egg from the goose... Both think they are not getting their fair share... In stead of just being thankful for the egg being there in the first place. :-)
It was a cooperative alliance of two sides that needed each other. In your example, rural Minnesota could explain to the city, "Hey, you benefit from the roads you build for us because you need them to get to your lake places." I think it's a logic that works, and that did work for a long time. But the logic has gotten disrupted. Each side now objects to things which help the other, losing sight of the benefits to both. And who benefits? The outsiders who benefit from the disruption.
--Hiram
Heh. Remember the "Democrat-Farmer-Labor" party? They've alienated Labor with their anti-mining stance, and the Farmers with their urban concentration (schools, light rail, ignore roads).
I have had this conversation with my legislator a lot, and what I am told is that there just isn't a lot on the agenda of greater Minnesota that's not getting addressed. The griping I hear was about things like the senate office building; what we never hear are a lot of rural projects going unfinanced. Certainly urban and suburban legislators support rural schools, as expensive as they are to maintain.
--Hiram
Hiram,
You are correct, many rural folks would prefer a tax cut instead of more office buildings, light rail, etc.
What they'll get is a tax cut and fewer services for themselves...that's how Republicans roll...but they can't seem to understand that.
Moose
I think most of them are pretty independent personalities, so they are pretty okay with that.
It seems that urban folks are more dependent, want more taxes and more spending.
I went to school in Wisconsin in the early 1990s. I was always amazed while I was there how strong the rural-urban divide was there -- it was perceived as Madison and Milwaukee versus the rest of the state -- and I was glad back then that Minnesota didn't operate that way.
Well, that's over now. I think it's sad that it's devolved into a partisan pissing match where denying the other side something is viewed as victory instead of realizing that different parts of the state have different needs and that we all benefit from making sure that we all do well.
"It seems that urban folks are more dependent"
The facts don't really support that notion.
You are correct, many rural folks would prefer a tax cut instead of more office buildings, light rail, etc.
But it won't be their taxes that will be cut. The people who finance those campaigns in rural Minnesota, and who do so with the objective of getting their taxes cut don't live in rural Minnesota.
--Hiram
Sean,
I don't think I have ever seen any facts that keep the suburbs out of the comparison... Usually the "urban" numbers include the suburbs which skews the data.
Using myself as an example... I live in Plymouth and have worked in Hamel, Osseo and Eden Prairie... Why should my expenses and incomes go to the "Urban" bucket instead of the rural bucket?
The suburbs look a lot more "urban" by pretty much every socio-economic factor.
I of course strongly disagree...
Go visit a classroom in Waconia / Orono and one in Minneapolis / St Paul if you disagree.
Better yet, here is a East Carver to Minneapolis comparison for you.
Or this one that shows urban and rural incomes are similar...
Sure, if you pick wealthy exurbs it's going to look different. Pick Richfield or Hopkins or Robbinsdale or North St. Paul or Brooklyn Center or Bloomington... Even Eden Prairie has quite a bit of diversity these days.
My point still stands. Statements like this are SO WRONG...
"People in cities make more money, too: the average full-time, year-round worker in an urban area makes nearly $51,000, more than $10,000 more than people in rural areas, small and big towns." Greta
The reality is that our urban folks probably make the same or less than the Rural folks. Check the map if you doubt this. Their is a lot of tan and red in where population density is high.
And a lot of green and purple surrounding it...
Here is an great link. LGA by city.
I assume the $0's are the payers and the big number cities are the receivers.
I read the MP article and found it interesting how they lumped central cities and suburbs together and called it urban whereas here people want to make a distinction between city and suburb dwellers. I live in the burbs and have no trouble considering myself urban, even if I am less liberal than the loudest voices in the city.
I do get annoyed by people rural and others who object to transit funding. I sit in traffic everyday to and from work and am all for some level of subsidizing getting more people off the road riding light rail or buses.
Mostly I don't understand the cultural / voting divide and how out state MN has become so solidly red. It didn't use to be so stark. I think rural voters mistakenly believe they are given short shrift. I think we are all doing pretty well over all here in MN (aside from urban traffic jams)
That's ironic... I often wonder how the urban dwellers became so liberal high tax big government blue...
It is easy for me to understand how the rural areas became red. Just think of all the regulations and social norms the blue city folks have forced upon them. No wonder they are pushing back.
Also, please remember that unlike State Highways... Light rail has a very limited group of people who benefit from a very large expenditure... (ie can only be used for commuting)
LRT is not a significant expenditure from a state perspective. Most of the funding is local or federal. The notion that building LRT for the metro takes away from rural priorities is not accurate.
Nonetheless, most folks, suburban and rural, see LRT as a large and foolish expenditure of money that could go elsewhere. For example, adding two lanes each way to every freeway in the Metro would benefit the 99% who use roads rather than transit. Or we could expand the bus routes by 20x, for the same cost. It's basically indefensible from an economic and functional perspective, and I think it points out the "divide" is more a matter of liberal/conservative than it is about "carving up the pie." It's liberal, high-taxing pipe-dream do-gooders against the "Lord helps them that helps themselves" self-sufficient folks.
Sean,
Since federal income taxes are paid by people from all over the State, I am not sure most of us are pacified by the idea that 90% of the SW Light Rail would be paid for with Federal dollars.
Now if 90% was going to be paid for by the Users and Local communities that would be much better. And if the users would even pay the full cost operation, that would even help.
The idea the user would pay for only a small portion of the construction and its operation would be need to be subsidized forever explains why folks are hesitant to support it.
"Or we could expand the bus routes by 20x"
I'm tired of hearing conservatives pipe up about buses. You guys don't like buses, so don't give that crap. The state GOP budget whacked funding for buses, not increased it.
When you actually come forward with a proposal to increase busing instead of LRT, then we can talk. But until then, enough.
"Since federal income taxes are paid by people from all over the State, I am not sure most of us are pacified by the idea that 90% of the SW Light Rail would be paid for with Federal dollars."
So you'd rather pay for LRT in Phoenix or Denver or Salt Lake? Because that is the real world impact of what you are saying.
"And if the users would even pay the full cost operation, that would even help."
There's not a means of transportation around that is fully paid for by user fees.
Sean, here is a proposal for you: QUIT spending money on LRT, and then if more busses are the best solution to our transit needs, use the money there. Here's a little light reading for you:
traffic congestion
Blaming the Met Council for lack of road construction is kind of odd, because it's not their responsibility.
Sean,
I would think roads and bridges are probably closer to being self funding since they are strongly tied to fuel taxes, property development, etc. Thoughts?
They have a role in terms of helping to plan, but ultimately, MnDOT controls the amount of road construction that occurs.
State highways in Minnesota are highly tied to user fees. City, county, and federal highways are highly dependent on non-user fee revenue.
I am not sure there.
Fed Highway Trust Fund
And developers / home owners pay for a lot of the local road construction and maintenance.
Though you are probably correct about the roads and bridges in between. However I am not sure where this state aid comes from.
"And developers / home owners pay for a lot of the local road construction and maintenance."
That's not a user fee.
"Blaming the Met Council for lack of road construction is kind of odd, because it's not their responsibility." -- Sean
And yet it is hard to hold them blameless when money is diverted from roads and bridges, which they "do not control" to transit, which the DO control. Doesn't anybody remember that constitutional amendment that passed guaranteeing that "at least 50%" of gas tax money gets diverted to transit?
"Doesn't anybody remember that constitutional amendment that passed guaranteeing that "at least 50%" of gas tax money gets diverted to transit?"
Nope. State gas tax dollars are devoted to road construction.
Perhaps you're thinking of the motor vehicle sales tax amendment, which splits that revenue 60% roads and 40% transit?
I know I use the roads in front of my house... Don't you?
Even people who don't drive receive shipments, visitors and need their garbage collected.
"I know I use the roads in front of my house... Don't you?"
That doesn't make it a user fee. A "user fee" is directly tied to your usage. Charging people for road construction based on property adjacency has no direct tie -- it doesn't charge the people who use the road but don't own property near it.
"Perhaps you're thinking of the motor vehicle sales tax amendment, which splits that revenue 60% roads and 40% transit?" Yes, that is correct, except as I recall the wording it was "no less than 50% for transit." I thought it rather odd, since 1% of us use transit and 99% of us use roads.
I live in the SE metro and the best route home from work for me includes going south of Mpls on 35W. If some people who are currently jamming the highway rode SW lightrail line instead, my commute might be slightly better. If you haven't noticed nearly all metro highways have no room for more lanes. Why do you conservatives hate transit so much?
I don't hate transit as long as the users pay most of the bill.
The problem is that Light Rail is just so incredibly expensive to build... Given that pretty much all it can do is haul commuters back and forth during it's hours of operation.
And remember another benefit to traffic jams, it helps encourage businesses to build all around the metro. Not just downtown.
And if you really dislike traffic, find a job closer to home. That is what I have always done.
Laurie, one of my favorite things to do is math. I am guessing SW light rail would be similar, but for the University Ave line, I came up with the following: For the capital cost of the line, "we" could buy a fleet of hybrid busses and run them up and down that route every 4 minutes, for the next 700 years! Or, we could buy every potential rider a new car and put gas in it for life. (And with the lane not taken up by the trains, they would have an easier commute.)
Light Rail is simply the wrong solution. Long before the bonds to build it are paid off we will have smart cars, smart highways, or driverless cars that will make the roads less congested, at far less cost. We could build 20 times the bus routes, or ten times the "personal rapid transit" routes, either of which would satisfy the "public transit needs" better than fixed LRT lines. A world expert from the UM said it perfectly: "If you can take people from where they are to where they want to go, when they want to go and for less than it costs them to drive, they'll take it." PRT, busses, and smart cars all come in ahead of LRT on that score. So why LRT?
"Yes, that is correct, except as I recall the wording it was "no less than 50% for transit.""
Nope.
Sean, your memory is better than mine; I stand corrected. Nonetheless, my criticism stands. Buy a car, pay for a train? Really?
Jerry,
Without going deep into the details I think I actually agree with you to a fair extent that buses are much more cost effective than light rail. I also agree that smart cars or driverless cars will make roads/ highways less congested. I don't know exactly what cars /driving will be in the future but big changes are not that far off.
It is strange. I thought that smart cars or smart highways were that next-gen driving solution. Indeed, adaptive cruise control and lane-keeping and automatic crash avoidance are already available. Nobody seems to be working on smart highways any more. I never thought driverless would come as quick as it has. but where smart/driverless cars would benefit everybody,urban or rural, LRT serves only a very narrow slice of urbanity. It's just disproportionate and "unfair."
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