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How Electric Cars Could Make America's Crumbling Roads Even Worse

posted by Fnord666 on Tuesday February 26 2019, @02:36PM   
from the exceedingly-crumbly dept.

Phoenix666 writes:

Phys.org:

To fix the potholes and crumbling roads, federal, state and local governments rely on fuel taxes, which raise more than US$80 billion a year and pay for around three-quarters of what the U.S. spends on building new roads and maintaining them.

I recently purchased an electric car, the Tesla Model 3. While swerving down a particularly rutted highway in New York, the economist in me began to wonder, what will happen to the roads as fewer and fewer cars run on gasoline? Who will pay to fix the streets?

Will toll roads become universal to bridge the funding gap?

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Original Submission

• Re:Pretty simple solution to that. Re:Pretty simple solution to that. (Score: 2) by Pino P on Wednesday February 27 2019, @03:59AM (1 child)

  by Pino P (4721) on Wednesday February 27 2019, @03:59AM (#807462) Journal

  I'm pretty sure that all the electrics out there have the capability to [count electric miles in each U.S. state]. All that is required is an update from [the auto maker]

  I'm not so sure that an update would be practical for extended-range electric vehicles (also called plug-in hybrids), such as Toyota Prius and Holden/Chevy Volt, or early all-battery EVs that predate wide Tesla availability, such as Nissan Leaf.

  Parent

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• Re:Pretty simple solution to that. (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday February 27 2019, @03:34PM

  by Runaway1956 (2926) on Wednesday February 27 2019, @03:34PM (#807641) Journal

  Fair enough - maybe they can't all be updated. But, the feds can certainly mandate that all new cars have that ability.

  Parent