Can anybody figure out what is going on with HB 151? This is a demand from the legislature that TDOT finish 35 four lane roads that would connect county seats to the nearest Interstate by 2015. The estimated cost was $438 million per year for nine years. I am beginning to suspect that this is a counter strike against the TDOT long range plan which features a planned shortfall of funds from 2008 to 2015 of about $2 billion dollars. That is more than one year of income for TDOT but the legislature, according to the 25 year plan already has approved $1.9 Billion dollars of bond refinancing, nearly ten times what is usually required to smooth out and accelerate large projects. The 25 year plan had a lot of coverage and public meetings and the press hardly noticed that it looked like it was written by the Sierra Club. The 25 year plan also looked like it was compiled from an old Comptroller's Audit, ordered by the governor in 2003, that found that TDOT was spending too much money on cars. The transfers of highway money to transit and "alternative" transportation ( "alternative" means it does not work) projects would be responsible for most of the projected $2 Billion dollar shortfall. Will it be the legislatures intention to make TDOT spend money on county seat connector roads to prevent the eco-freaks from having their trains, bicycle paths and transit projects? Or, was it the intention that the connector road project will add another $3.9 Billion to the $2 billion that is already in the planned shortfall by the year 2015? Either plan could be considered to be a poison pill for financial responsibility. Will TDOT get to chose it's poison or have to take both pills?

We've had this problem for years in Virginia as well!