A poll on toll lanes

On some issues, there are very few or no “pro” letters to balance out the “con” ones. Take, for example, the Los Angeles Unified School District’s iPad program. Since it was unveiled this year, I could perhaps count on my fingers the number of letters we’ve received in support of the district’s effort.

Toll lanes are another idea that doesn’t sit well with many readers. As of this writing, we’ve received at least 15 letters responding to The Times’ article Thursday on the changing attitudes in Orange County about tollways, which motorists pay a fee to access so they can bypass traffic, and none has said it’s a good idea to add any more of these pay-to-play lanes. Some writers have gone so far as to say these lanes are undemocratic.

-- Paul Thornton, letters editor

Manhattan Beach resident Kenneth Thompson sees no benefit for the non-rich:

“There is great unfairness in converting hard-won carpool lanes into tollways for the rich. These lanes don’t offer a choice to those saddled with low wages and poverty. Nor do they provide a choice for seniors on fixed incomes.

“Washington’s attempt to force toll roads onto an unwilling public is the ugliest form of hubris. And let us not forget that FasTrak — a non-government, for-profit entity — siphons off some of the funds generated.

“I applaud the people of Orange County for standing up against this double-taxation business model.”

Dee White of Capistrano Beach calls for vision:

“We in Southern California are so far behind in providing affordable public transportation compared to most Western European countries and many cities within the United States.

“We do not need wider freeways and more toll roads, as our highways will only suffer from more gridlock. We need vision, the kind that thinks to put monorails down our clogged freeways.

“Just think of the impact this would have even on our environment.”

Claremont resident Geoff Kuenning has a “modest proposal”:

“Caltrans official Ryan Chamberlain says that taxes can’t cover the cost of our highway system. It may be true that taxes don’t currently cover the cost, but it’s wrong to say they can’t.

“Meanwhile, Robert Poole of the Reason Foundation finds it strange that we run our highways ‘with equal misery for everyone.’ Right on: Equality stinks. Let’s stick all the misery on the poor people, who thoroughly merit it for having the audacity to earn low incomes.

“Why should the rich have to suffer the consequences of driving solo instead of taking public transit? We deserve to

have a better deal than all those wage slaves.”

Scott Trimingham of Torrance boils it down to one word:

“It’s one thing to create new toll lanes at private expense and on private land. It’s another thing to expropriate existing freeway lanes or add lanes to existing freeways that were built with taxpayer dollars and then convert them to toll lanes.

“The latter is called theft.”

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