You have commented 339 times on Rantburg.

Your Name
Your e-mail (optional)
Website (optional)
My Original Nic        Pic-a-Nic        Sorry. Comments have been closed on this article.
Bold Italic Underline Strike Bullet Blockquote Small Big Link Squish Foto Photo
Submit your comments on this article
Home Front: Culture Wars
Lil' Obama Wants $2 Carbon Tax At Logan Airport
2009-03-02
As if parking at Logan wasn't expensive enough...
In the same month that Logan International Airport hiked its parking rates by $1, Governor Deval Patrick is asking for another $2 parking "carbon fee" as part of his transportation overhaul filed this week.

The carbon fee, described on page 137 of Patrick's 141-page bill, would that mean a 20- or 30-minute trip to pick up a relative at Logan could cost $6 in parking alone, not including tunnel tolls, which could rise to as much as $7 if legislators fail to pass Patrick's other proposal to raise the gas tax. Three hours in a Logan garage would cost $18; all-day parking in a garage would run $26.

Boston's short-term rates are currently higher than those in the nation's largest cities - from New York's LaGuardia to Los Angeles International, to Chicago's O'Hare.

"It makes me never want to park here," said Pam Nagy of Sutton, who was hauling luggage into Logan on Friday.

Patrick's transportation secretary, James A. Aloisi Jr., said he will be glad if people stop parking at the airport and use public transportation to get there, a sentiment that has led several environmental groups to endorse the parking fee. "It should not be inexpensive to park at convenient facilities in the middle of Logan Airport," Aloisi said. "We need people to understand that there are better ways to get to Logan."
Best way of all is to stay away from Boston. Stay home folks, Boston really doesn't want you there.
He wants the parking fee - which requires approval from the Legislature - to be used for improvements to airport-related transit projects, including a proposal to build a new tunnel under South Boston to speed up the Logan-bound Silver Line bus service, and the initial phases of a long-term plan to build a transit loop around the city. Based on Logan's most recent parking figures, the new fee would probably raise about $5.4 million per year.
Given that a tunnel in Boston costs oh, about $15 billion, I think they'll be scratching for more loose change ...
But many who travel to the airport come with bulky luggage or young children, making public transit a harder sell, if not an impossibility.

Ben Kaplan pulling a cart piled high with luggage and accompanied by his wife and two young sons, said taking public transit would be tough for his family. "We'd be more likely to take a cab," he said.

Cab rides to and from Boston usually cost a minimum of $20 to $30, depending on traffic, luggage, and tolls, which are higher for taxis. The rates are substantially higher for suburban trips.
Charge the cabbies a higher toll? Brilliant, simply brilliant ...
Aloisi's comments, and Patrick's proposal, represent a shift for Massachusetts, just 14 months after the state finished building a $15 billion tunnel project designed in large part to improve driving access to Logan. Aloisi said the plan is also designed to get the agency that runs Logan, the Massachusetts Port Authority, to do a better job of dealing with public transportation from the city to Logan, to grab some power for himself "to have some skin in the game." The plan takes the Tobin Bridge out of Massport's control, using the $10 million in toll profits it generates every year to fund statewide transportation.
Rest at link. We're not called Taxachusetts for nothing...
Posted by:Raj

#4  T.F. Green in Rhode Island is also a good alternative.
Posted by: tu3031   2009-03-02 17:28  

#3  I fly into Mancester NH and rent a car. It's cheaper and much less frustrating.
Posted by: Formerly Dan   2009-03-02 17:27  

#2  I've actually taken the Silver line from Logan several times. Once it got stuck in traffic; the other two times everything went fine. The really annoying thing is that you have to take a shuttle to get to the red line.
Posted by: mhw   2009-03-02 15:27  

#1  Anybody that parks at Logan is outta their friggin minds.
You either take the Logan Express bus or get a ride in for departures. Proper procedure for pickups is to orbit the airport until you get the cellphone call that your party has hit the street, thereby spewing carbon for the ten to twelve orbits before this happens.
The only "green" this corrupt little pygmy is worried about is the green it takes to keep some extra hack jobs around at Massport.
Posted by: tu3031   2009-03-02 14:10  

00:00