Since 1935, the Vehicle License Fee (VLF) has been assessed on all privately owned registered vehicles in California. It is a property tax currently set at 2% of a vehicle’s value, based upon its most recent purchase price and a fixed depreciation schedule. The Legislative...

Most states tax the value of residents’ motor vehicles. In recent political debates over the future of these levies, the relative effects of these taxes on different socioeconomic groups have been a prominent question. By linking data from the Nationwide Personal Transportation Survey...

Choices among alternative transit capital investments are often complex and politically controversial. There is renewed interest in the use of performance indicators to assist in making rational and defensible choices for the investment of public funds. To improve the evaluation of rail and bus...

Since 1923 motor fuel taxes have been the principal instrument by which revenues are raised for the construction and maintenance of the California highway system. Fuel takes are distinguished from most other taxes because they have been conceived of as a "user fee" rather than as a general tax....

Transportation investments have in the past among society’s most important contributors to environmental improvement, but today transportation programs and projects are more often of concern as sources of major environmental problems. Over the past 30 years, since the enactment of the...

Just as the Eiffel Tower is the symbol of Paris, and the Statue of Liberty is the symbol of New York, it can be said that the freeway is an internationally recognized symbol of California. The California transportation system was not too long ago the envy of the world, yet there is today a...

This study examines the extent to which states have devolved one of the most fundamental decisions in transportation policy – whether to use taxation powers to fund transportation improvements – to local and regional governments. The purpose of the study is to generate a baseline...

I arrived here at the UC Transportation Center just nine months ago. A former lawyer and aspiring writer, I had only a layman's knowledge of transportation systems, mostly based on my personal experiences.  Growing up in Hilo, Hawaii, I thought traffic jams meant having to circle the parking...