HIGHER gasoline prices are prompting many West Virginians to drive less. Those decisions, in turn, are forcing the state to take a fresh look at how it will fund the roads people want.
Toll roads are one of the options that will have to be considered.
The state's gasoline tax is based on the number of gallons used, not on price per gallon. As cars become more fuel-efficient, and as high gas prices cause people to drive less, the state's Road Fund loses money.
Virgil Helton, revenue secretary for the Manchin administration, has noted that the state's gas tax collections for April were down by $2.35 million - about 4 percent - compared to April of last year.
The state estimated it will collect about $380 million in gas taxes in the 2008-09 budget year - and that source provides 60 percent of the funding for the state Division of Highways. It's not nearly enough to maintain and build the roads and bridges West Virginians want.
The state Department of Transportation recently released a draft study of three roads needed in the Eastern Panhandle. It found that a 19-mile stretch of U.S. 522 across West Virginia from the Maryland border to the Virginia border could probably support a toll road.
Practically simultaneously, Putnam and Mason county commissioners signed a joint resolution urging the state to "seek alternative funding sources, including the possibility of toll roads," to pay for the portion of the new U.S. 35 between the Buffalo Bridge and County Route 40.
Toll roads are not a popular idea, as many local officials acknowledge.
But West Virginians might like tolls a good deal more than they like bad roads, unnecessarily long and dangerous trips, and snail's-pace progress on needed highways.
