This fee acknowledges that, despite privacy concerns, a Vehicle Miles Traveled Fee could be the most logical successor for the current gasoline tax. It fuels a large portion of the nation's transportation spending. The federal gas tax, which is paid at the pump and has not been increased since 1993, has been steadily falling in value as cars become more fuel-efficient. Infrastructure needs are still rising, so lawmakers are increasingly looking to fill the gap by increasing deficit spending.
Per-mile fees have the advantage of being able to capture all vehicles' road usage, even those that do not use fossil fuels. It comes with serious baggage. These include privacy and government tracking concerns, as well as impacts on rural Americans that can be difficult to overcome. Even the modest infrastructure bill step drew a culture warfare arrow from Republican Rep. Lauren Boebert of Colorado, who called it a "taxon rural America, imposed DC beltway liberals."
Many transportation experts believe it is still a decade away from becoming a viable option. However, the pilot program in the nation may help to narrow that gap.
This is not something you can do overnight. There's a 12-to-15-year lag. So the longer we wait before we start implementing it, the longer it will take to get revenue from it. Rob Atkinson, president and CEO of Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, a think tank in science and technology, chaired a 2009 panel to study funding options for infrastructure.
Federal champion is needed
It's actually a decade away. This is partly because, while many states have had pilot programs in place for years, the focus has been on national implementation. A 2015 testimony by Bob Poole, director of transportation policy at Reason Foundation, to a House committee stated that a federal VMT system was still 10 years away.
Poole stated that he has a new estimate of 10 years in a recent interview with POLITICO.
We joke that this is kind of like nuclear fission. It's been 10 years away for long periods and it's going 10 years longer, he said.
Poole stated that VMT isn't politically feasible due to the same dynamics as the federal gas tax raising. This is a lack of political will. Instead, Congress prefers to "in a rather subtle way just [fund] State Pilots," Poole said. He was referring to a grant program that Congress established in 2015 to fund VMT pilots in certain states.
Transportation experts support moving away from a gasoline taxes and to a VMT system because of the changing natures of American cars. Fuel taxes used to be a good indicator of how much damage vehicles caused to roads and bridges. However, cars are becoming more efficient at using fuel and some don't even use gasoline.
This means that they pay less at gas pumps and, in turn, contribute less to the maintenance of the infrastructure. VMT would include electric vehicles that currently pay nothing but other alternative fuel vehicles like natural gas, hydrogen, and hybrid vehicles.
Joung Lee, policy director of the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials said VMT is now in a better place in Washington than it was a decade back. There are signs of bipartisan support of the idea in recent years.
He said that there were many policy considerations being made at this time ten years ago. However, what was missing was I believe the political interest and willingness to seriously consider it as it was new at the time.
Lee believes that moving to VMT involves less about getting over bureaucratic hurdles and more about finding political will at federal level.
He said that if people truly want to do this, and can find an administrative way to do so, they will do it. It's all about how high this rank is.
Rep. Sam Graves (Republican from Missouri) The ranking member of House Transportation Committee, Sam Graves (R-Mo.), said that it was essential to move VMT to the national level "without any further delays" and to take the lessons from state pilots and apply them to a real-world demonstration environment. Graves stated that his support for such a switch is dependent on the resolution of privacy and rural equity concerns, but that progress made by the state on these topics suggests they are solvable issues.
Graves would be well-placed to push VMT switching from his position on the committee before the House changed to Democratic control.
Another long-standing supporter of VMT is Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.). He said that he uses VMT in Oregon for over a decade, and believes it to be the long-term solution to the Highway Trust Fund. However, he still thinks it is 10 years away.
He said that it is not ready to go mainstream and that we must be able to replace the gas tax in a comprehensive manner with a fair and sustainable road user fee. We have the time and resources to make it happen.
State testbeds
It doesn't necessarily mean that there hasn't been progress at the federal level. Utah and Oregon have fully-functioning opt in programs that earn miles-based revenue. Numerous states have conducted similar pilots and studies of the concept in other states. They are working to address the privacy and logistical issues that opposers claim make VMT impractical right now.
Among the issues these state-level programs are trying solve is the concern that VMT may disadvantage rural residents who have to drive more, that it is too expensive to collect, that it doesnt do enough for gas-guzzling vehicles off the roads, and that tracking drivers' locations would be a violation of their privacy.
Two multi-state coalitions consisting of state transportation officials from each state are responsible for much of the current research on these issues: RUC West (which has 17 members across Texas and Alaska) and the Eastern Transportation Coalition (17 members along the Eastern Seaboard).
Michelle Godfrey is a spokesperson for Oregons OReGO VMT Program and RUC West. She said that the west states coalition was formed out of states wanting to try VMT but were unable to obtain the funding or political support. They have become the main advocates for VMT without any federal program, even though they are not advocacy organizations.
Godfrey stated that Oregon receives a lot of calls from other states seeking advice on how to start and offers their assistance on a state-funded basis.
We do it because we want people to be helped. If another state has a road charging program, that lifts everyone and brings us closer to a national system. We support any state that shows interest.
Privacy challenges
Privacy concerns are one of the most difficult issues with any shift to VMT. VMT pilots in states have offered drivers the option of regular odometer checks or plug-in mileage meters. They also offer GPS trackers, smartphone apps, and GPS trackers.
Any options that might involve tracking of drivers will almost certainly raise privacy concerns. There is also the possibility that they could be politicized due to fears that the government may be tracking them.
Jay Stanley, senior policy analyst at ACLU, stated that privacy advocates will be closely watching VMT to ensure it is not possible for the government to obtain location information.
VMT advocates claim that privacy concerns are exaggerated.
Atkinson stated that VMT programs are "actually the opposite" to tracking systems. He compared the technology to toll transponders stuck to drivers' windshields. These devices collect anonymous location data and don't relay it to the government.
Nate Bryer is vice president of innovation at Azuga, which provides data processing services to Oregon's program. He has also worked with over a dozen VMT pilots and said that the data is anonymized as well as aggregated. Oregon also requires that it be deleted within 30 days.
Cost challenges
VMTs will be more costly to collect than the gasoline tax. This is because it requires additional bureaucracy as well as government funds. Rand Corporation's 2012 study showed that VMT, which is collected at wholesale level, can be administered for less than 1% of the revenue. VMT could take 5 to 6 percent of the revenue.
You can now make everyone who drives a vehicle a taxpayer by instituting a national mileage fee. This means that you are going from dozens to hundreds of entities that are liable for [gas] taxes to well over 200million [for VMT], according Liisa Ecola who was a senior policy analyst at RAND and who assisted in the study.
A second study by the American Transportation Research Institute showed that a national VMT program would cost $20 billion per year, which is 300 times more than the federal tax on fuel. A dongle that measures mileage can be purchased for every vehicle at an upfront cost of $13 billion.
Rural concerns
Others are concerned about the potential impact of a VMT fee on rural drivers. Rural drivers often need to drive long distances to get to work or to the grocery store and have limited or no alternatives for public transit.
RUC West conducted a study that found rural drivers drive less frequently, but for longer distances. Although the data was not consistent from one state to another, they found that rural drivers drove less miles than their urban counterparts. The study, which included Arizona, California and Idaho as well as Texas, Utah, Texas, Utah, and Washington, found that rural drivers could pay between 1.9 percent and 6.3 percent less for a VMT system than what they would pay in gas taxes.
A GPS-enabled vehicle tracking system that tracks VMT could also be used by a driver to exempt private roads from the total.
Acceptance by consumers is a challenge
This could cause problems for consumer acceptance.
Trish Hendren is the executive director of Eastern Transportation Coalition. She stated that managing public perceptions about VMT was one of the most pressing problems her organization has faced.
The coalition conducted surveys and found that 73% of New Jerseyans incorrectly believed transportation funding was stable or increasing. 73 percent weren't familiar with VMT.
Hendren stated that we have a huge job in the field of engaging with the public to say that you value transportation. We hear that you do. However, there is no link between how much you spend and how much money you pay.
