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Fredericksburg-area telephone survey on transportation turns up mixed opinions on how to pay for roads, public transit Date published: 9/22/2009
By KELLY HANNON If new money is needed for transportation projects, a sizable number of Fredericksburg-area residents would be willing to pay for them through tolls, ticket fares or new taxes. More than a third of area residents--35 percent--would support the introduction of tolls or fares as a way to raise money for transportation, according to a summer telephone survey of residents in Caroline, Fredericksburg, King George, Stafford and Spotsylvania. Another large group of residents--26 percent--said transportation money could come from new taxes. Raising money by cutting funding to other programs sounded like a good idea to 23 percent of residents. Another 15 percent of residents contributed a wide range of fundraising ideas lumped together as "other," while 7 percent of residents said no new money should be given to transportation, and 5 percent said they didn't know which option they preferred. Respondents were allowed to choose multiple responses, allowing for overlap. The 22-minute telephone survey was conducted from July 16 to Aug. 2. Survey respondents included 450 Stafford residents and 450 Spotsylvania residents, and 200 residents each in Caroline, Fredericksburg and King George, selected at random. It was done at the request of the Fredericksburg Area Metropolitan Planning Organization, a transportation planning group made up of staff and elected representatives from Fredericksburg, Stafford and Spotsylvania. FAMPO paid the Southeastern Institute of Research to conduct the survey, mostly to gauge public awareness of a long-range transportation plan for the Fredericksburg area in 2035, published earlier this year. But the survey's findings on transportation funding are timely. More than 800 new road construction projects were cut from the state budget this year, since there is less money being collected through taxes on automobile and gasoline sales, and other tax sources. The Virginia Department of Transportation is cutting hundreds of staff positions, closing rest areas and mowing road medians less often because of the funding shortage. In this context, the FAMPO survey captures how local residents view the state of area transportation. Satisfaction with the region's transportation system was lukewarm. Residents were asked to rank their satisfaction on a scale of 1 to 5, with 5 being "very satisfied" and 1 being "not very satisfied."
I was called at 8:30PM and was aksed how many people commute to work.
Let's see, probably done during the day. Those at home probably not working, so maybe unemployed, on public assistance, not tax payers in the true sense of the word, so ......."Sure, raise taxes so we can have stuff! After all, I'm not paying them!" Fair poll...........depends on the demographics of those responding, and the intent of the poll taker (liberals would prefer one that showed positive interest in higher taxes).
Understand. Not a bad point.
Taxes - The ones who dont have the means or the desire to pay more taxes will just move.
folks get called for all of Virginia to yield statewide results... so this
is a good number... go look at some of the Virgnia and even
National Polls to see how many folks they ask.
here's the actual survey: http://tinyurl.com/le53e6
I could not find a margin of error - and I would agree that - that
number is important also...
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