Matt Picio 1. Motor travel has been subsidized at public expense for over 50 years, and continues to be subsidized.
JK: Oh, really? Lets look at some numbers:

Lets get our first number from a rabid anti-auto web site that some users here consider a good source, the Center for Transportation Excellence which is basically a shill for mass transit. This page: cfte.org/critics/what.asp gives a high side estimate of the annual subsidy for automobiles as $1 trillon dollars.

Lets accept that massive subsidy as the correct number, even though it was probably the result of every one-sided assumption possible.

Now look to the Feds for what that subsidy gets. Referring to a Fed paper reproduced here: DebunkingPortland.com/Transit/Docs/vm1(2005)/vm1.htm, Under 2005 “Person-miles of travel (millions)” we find 4,884,557 or 4,884 trillion person miles.

So the subsidy per person mile is:
$1 trillion / 4,884 trillion miles = $1 / 4,884 = 0.02 cents per mile.

For comparison, Trimet’s average cost per passenger mile is $0.67 (calculated from Trimet’s data at DebunkingPortland.com/Transit/Cost-Cars-Transit-Details(2005).htm), of which about 79% is taxpayer subsidized. $0.67 x 0.79 = $0.53 See pie chart on last page of trimet.org/pdfs/publications/factsheet.pdf

Bottom line:
subsidy to cars: ............$0.0002 per passenger mile
Subsidy to Trimet:........$0.53 per passenger mile

Trimet receives 2650 times the subsidy that the CTFE claims cars receive.

(I await Bob R’s comment on this one.)

Matt Picio 2. Motor vehicles produce the bulk of wear on roads. Motorists *should* pay to repair the roads they are destroying.
JK: They do through user fees such as the gas tax, licenses etc.

Matt Picio Studies have shown that the amount of road wear caused by bicycles is so negligible as to be nearly indistinguishable from weathering.
JK: Sounds accurate to me. Now lets talk about road area taken up by the bike lanes:
(Picking numbers from memory):
2 parking lanes @ 8' each................16'
2 driving lanes @ 11' each...............22'
2 bike lanes @ 5' each.....................10'

In this hypothetical example, bikes take 10' of the total 48' or about 20%. Shouldn’t they pay for this portion of the road width they take up?

Matt Picio 4. As for directly taxing cyclists - how do you propose to do that? A "tube" tax? Tire tax?
JK: How about this for an idea that no one seems to have though of: a license plate. Some people claimed that a tax would be too costly to administer. Lets look at numbers again (just guessing):
20,000 bikers. $50 tax (adults only.) Intake: 1 million annually. Do you suppose someone can set up a web site to take pay-pal and visa cards and mail out the plates for maybe $2 each?

Matt Picio Unlike motorized transport, HPVs increase general health, do not emit harmful emissions, do not support prolifigate use of non-renewable resources, etc. We want to encourage this - therefore, don't tax it.
JK: Taxes are to pay for infrastructure ans services, not to re-engineer society. Once you cross the line to social engineering, whose goals do you peruse? George Bush’s or Bill Clinton’s, so to speak. In either case, you end up subjecting the minority to the will of the majority or to the politically powerful. That is the crap that our bill of rights is supposed to protect us from.

Matt Picio As a cyclist, I'd be willing to accept a direct tax when the city stops giving tax breaks to developers, when they properly assess the properties in the Pearl (and South Waterfront), and when they stop subsidizing growth.
JK: We need to do both.

Thanks
JK