“One legal 80,000 pound GVW tractor-trailer truck does as much damage to road pavement as 9,600 cars. (Highway Research Board, NAS, 1962).”

“Overweight trucks chronically underpay their fair share of taxes and user fees for the repair of U.S. roads and bridges. By damaging roads, large trucks further degrade highway safety. (U.S. DOT, 1997).”

I wonder how many (million) bikes are required to damage the roads as much as one single truck does?

There’s an argument that building roads that can handle freight delivery should be paid for by the freight companies (and, eventually, the people buying the delivered goods), not by taxpayers in general. Especially if effectively subsidised road freight is competing against unsubsidised rail freight.

The city I live in spent $250 million on roads in 2007 and has budgeted $400 million for 2008 (city population is 1 million). The money comes directly from property tax they collect. It’s absolutely absurd. then they announce out of the other side of their mouths that there is not enough $$$ to upgrade our public transit system.

Our federal government put a program into place where gas guzzler vehicles have a $1000 surcharge added to the price, normal cars did not receive the surcharge and people that purchased cars that get better than average mileage got a $1000 rebate. What did I receive for not even driving a car? You guessed it.

“Cyclists Subsidize Motorists”? BIG Time