Editorial: Crosstown shows MnDOT is out of gas

06/21/2006

Star Tribune
June 21, 2006

In the 1942 film classic “Casablanca,” Claude Rains pockets his winnings while professing shock that gambling is going on at Rick’s cafe. We were similarly “shocked” when no contractor fell for the Pawlenty administration’s scheme of asking road builders for up-front money to finance reconstruction on the state’s most notorious bottleneck. And so, for a lack of bidders, the $250 million Crosstown Commons separation has been postponed yet again, while costs (and traffic) mount.

This should deeply embarrass the administration. Leave aside the scheme’s doubtful legality. This sad episode exposes the desperation of a state so far behind on transportation—and with its borrowing capacity so stretched—that it resorts to a shenanigan.

Transportation requires a steadier hand. More than other government functions, it is harmed by cycles of feast and famine. To keep up with daily movements and changing demands of a growing and mobile population, transportation needs a predictable stream of public funding. Minnesota has been a poor steward in that regard. It has not increased its gasoline tax (the life blood for roadway improvements) since 1988, and still lacks reliable funding for transit.

While the Pawlenty administration has borrowed aggressively to accelerate a slew of visible projects and deserves credit for the orange barrels lining many roadways, its strategy of borrow-and-spend masks the deeper problem and now seems to be hitting the wall. Indeed, MnDOT looks increasingly like an agency running on empty with no gas station willing to take its credit card.

Crosstown isn’t the only indication. The long-awaited bypass of Hwy. 12 around Long Lake and Orono had to be further delayed and its scope reduced because the agency could not afford a $6.6 million cost overrun on a $72 million project. Similar postponements have hit the nightmarish interchange of Interstate Hwy. 494 and Hwy. 169 in Bloomington and the reconstruction of Hwy. 7 near Silver Lake.

At the Crosstown Commons, MnDOT couldn’t afford to start the project without a loan from private contractors. “Innovative” was the preferred term to describe the deal. Contractors were asked to put up their own borrowed money to keep construction going between state payments. Contractors balked when it became clear that expensive private financing would push the project’s cost well above its advertised price—and that taxpayers might blame them for the overrun. The lesson for voters is that borrowing has limits—that politicians cannot forever shift burdens to the next generations. At some point, today’s taxpayers must begin paying the true costs of driving and road building.