While enviro-alarmists dream of electric sheep and such, practical free-marketeers have been thinking seriously about future transportation needs and how needed infrastructure can be constructed, operated, and maintained in a future of alternative energy and vehicular innovation. Taxes on motor fuels have always been a rough, problematic proxy for charging drivers according to use, but the problems have multiplied in recent years because increased fuel efficiency has reduced the amount drivers pay per mile driven. The result has been both inadequate investment in new capacity and a woeful neglect of road and bridge maintenance (it hasn’t helped that the aforementioned alarmists have successfully diverted much of the revenue generated by roadways into boondoggles such as choo-choo trains in low-density communities).

As efficiency gains continue and alternative-fuel vehicles proliferate, the gas-tax regime will sputter still more. Now is the time to rethink it. Some kind of direct charge per mile, probably collected via GPS and adjusted for peak price, will likely be the mainstay for the unlimited-access road and street grid, with public-private tollways using electronic collection supplementing the system with additional limited-access capacity.

Faced with more-accurate pricing, more motorists may indeed opt for transit, walkable communities, or telecommuting. Unfortunately, many of the alarmists dislike solutions based on markets and choices. They want a central plan. On that matter, as on so many others, they reveal themselves to be backward reactionaries.