“Fix Our Damn Roads” Campaign Launched in Colorado

Wendell Cox — Tue, 08 May 2018 15:45:23 -0400

Radio host, television personality and President of Denver’s Independence Institute Jon Caldara has announced progress toward placing the “Fix Our Damn Roads” initiative on the Colorado ballot.

Caldara provided an update to the campaign in a recent email:

Since the Colorado State Legislature refuses to address our crumbling road system in Colorado, we are proud to bring the issue directly to the voters. I’m thrilled to let you know our Fix Our Damn Roads initiative is one step closer to reality.

The Title Board has approved our title, and the Colorado Secretary of State has approved our petition forms. Thousands of blank petitions are being printed as you read this and tomorrow we hit the streets to get the signatures we need to get this question on the fall ballot.

We’re told the only way to Fix Our Damn Roads is to raise taxes and raise fees. We’re told the only way to Fix Our Damn Roads is to pay ransom to ineffective transit schemes and pay off cities with slush funds. I’m here to say HELL NO! We’re not going to be played again!

We expect our lawmakers to Do Their Damn Jobs and fund this core function of state government. We expect lawmakers to STOP holding our roads and bridges hostage as a way to pay for their skyrocketing Obamacare Medicaid increases. If they wanted a tax increase for Obamacare, they should have asked for one instead on squeezing road funding so that 1 out of 4 Coloradans could be on Medicaid.

And now that the state has a MASSIVE budget surplus, thanks to the tax increase sell-out called the Hospital Provider Fee, we are going directly to the people. I am convinced voters will do what law makers refuse to do – Fix Our Damn Roads without raising taxes or fees, without siphoning off payola money to trolley cars and bike paths.

China Expressway System to Exceed US Interstates

Wendell Cox — Sat, 22 Jan 2011 18:12:13 -0500

This should be the year that China's intercity expressway system exceeds the length of the US interstate highway system. China's expressways are fully grade separated, freeway standard roadways, but unlike most interstate highways, have tolls.

The China Ministry of Transport indicates that, as of the end of 2010, China had 46,000 miles (74,000 kilometers) of expressways. Currently, the expressways of China have a total length about 1,000 miles (1,600 kilometers) less than that of the US interstate highway system. In the last year, 5,500 miles (9,000 kilometers) of new expressways were completed. If that construction rate continues, China's expressway system would exceed the interstate system length late in the first quarter of 2011.

By 2020, China expects to have 53,000 miles (85,000 kilometers) of expressways. This compares to the US total of approximately 57,000 miles (92,000 kilometers), including non-interstate freeways. However, the China expressway mileage does not include the expressways administered by provincial level governments, such as in Beijing (with its five expressway ring roads), the extensive system of Shanghai and the expressways of Hong Kong. No data is readily available for the lengths of these roads.

Now it is possible to travel, uninterrupted (except for traffic jams in the vicinity of the largest urban areas), from north to south from near the Russian border, north of Harbin (in Heilongjiang or Manchuria) to near the resort island of Hainan, well south of Guangzhou, Hong Kong and the Pearl River Delta and not far from the border with Viet Nam. This is a total distance of 2,700 miles (4,400 kilometers).

East to west travel without signals is now possible from Shanghai to near the Myanmar (Burma) border, beyond Kunming, a distance of 1,800 miles (3,000 kilometers). In the longer run, it will be possible to travel from the Russian border in Manchuria to the border of Kazakhstan in Xinjiang, a distance of 3,500 miles (5,700 kilometers).

The expressway system is indicated in the map below. The blue the routes have been opened and the red routes are yet to be completed.