Wrong Question on Highways

Here's an essay which asks the wrong question on the Wisconsin highway-funding controversy.

Bet you didn’t know this:  a typical motorist in Wisconsin’s four neighboring states pays an average of 61 percent more in gas taxes and registration fees than a Wisconsin driver....

We don't doubt that assertion, so we won't argue about it.  But it's an answer to the wrong question.

At the very end of the essay, the right question appears (although veiled):

...Either increase the comparatively low costs that motorists now face or begin a program of disinvestment in adequate state roads.

Uh-huh. 

I guess that depends on the meaning of the word "adequate," eh?  Shall we examine the "adequacy" of Hy. 16 from Oconomowoc to Watertown--which should be "adequate" until the year 2080?

Like Governor Walker, we'd like to see a DOT proposal which meets needs, not wants, and which meets those needs without artificially-enhanced wages. Let's also remember that there is no Constitutional right to a 20-minute commute from anywhere to anyplace.