With the coming Spring, it’s nice to see the daffodils blooming on the roadside.  However, what really catches your eye are the miles and miles of…abandoned cars on the side of the road with flat tires caused by all of these GOD-forsaken POTHOLES!!!!!

For fuck’s sake!!  Some of these are three layers deep—you can actually see different layers of paving material, and the gravel substrate.  I swear, I think I’m flying over the Grand Canyon!

With the millions of people who reside in middle Tennessee, and the hundreds of thousands who own cars and pay a registration fee, where are the paving crews??

I’d like to know where to send the bill for my car’s alignments…

Mild rant.  45 > 9mm, chili with beans, I consistently blade at 45, my answer is 87, you aren’t getting a photo of Household 6, but here’s my general mood…
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5/10

Registration fees in TN are hilariously low.  Also, no income tax.

Since you brought up the Grand Canyon…. We could have buttery smooth roads like Arizona has, but I used to pay about $400 per car annually for registration plus income tax.

Exactly my point…let’s just say that 50% of our state’s residents own/register a car.  I realize this number may be off quite a bit, but it’s a starting point.  I travel exclusively between Sevier County and Davidson County twice a week, and daily between Wilson County and Davidson County for my work.  My daily 29 mile, one-way trip, has several miles of torn-up roads with pot holes all over the place.  Waze calls them out so much, it’s almost non-stop.  So, TN has a population of just under 7 million (reference 2020 census from Wikipedia, you get what you pay for), and Nashville has around 689K…with a $26 registration fee, Nashville (Davidson County) generates $17.9M in revenue alone.  I’m not including all of the other counties that border Nashville.  There’s no wheel tax, which would be another revenue stream.  I don’t have access to what a paving company charges by-the-mile, but it would seem plausible that $17 million could fix this issue.

The lack of an income tax is offset by a 9.25% sales tax on everything…the entire state, including me, would revolt if an income tax was ever passed.

I’d be fine with raising the registration fees if we could get decent roads out of it.  Hell, we started a lottery to help pay for education, and have a huge surplus that no one talks about.

I’d like to know where the fuel taxes are going, as well.  Everyone, personal drivers and company trucks, all pay this.  Wasn’t this tax supposed to be the main source of infrastructure maintenance, specifically for roads?

I’d also be fine with a proper 3M underpayment prior to paving to increase blacktop life.  

It’s frustrating to see a daily line of cars with flat tires, and it pisses me off that no one seems to give a shit about correcting these 8-10 inch deep holes.  My only bright point is that I now know where these are on my daily commute…

I’m not a city engineer, paving company owner, nor did I sleep in a Holiday Inn last night.

Sorry for the weak rant.  I’ll try to better moving forward.

State sales tax is 7%.  Cities add a couple of points.  Other states do the same thing.  Tennessee is just slightly higher than other states by about 1pp.

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You are correct.  Semantics aside, my question remains about the metric fuck ton of money/taxes being paid into state coffers, but the roads suck.

You think the roads in Tennessee are bad... until you go drive literally anywhere else in the eastern half of the US.

It’s not semantics if it’s actually NOT a metric shit ton of money compared to other states that collect income tax and charge way more for auto registration.  We may actually be getting what we pay for.

My driveway is 8-ish feet wide and about 700 ft long.  I was quoted almost $20k to resurface it.  Apples to apples, that's $28.50 per foot, or $150,480/mile.  Divide your $17million in registration revenue by $150,480 per mile and it paves 113 lane-miles of road.  A 2-lane (per direction) road gets a whopping 28 miles resurfaced, and that's JUST resurfacing.  I realize there are scales of economy, etc, but this gives you an idea.

I am in favor of a consumption model of 'taxation' for road use vs. a general "stick it to everybody" model.  I work from home and drive MAYBE 2k miles per year.  But I acknowledge that everything I buy and consume was moved on a truck that utilized the highway.  Let the trucks pay a per mile fee to use the roads, and let commuters do the same.  Companies using trucks to move goods will pass that cost along to the consumer, and commuters can choose to live closer to work, or negotiate with their employer higher wages to cover their commuting "road consumption tax".

Fort Campbell?

Gas is also taxed to pay for the roads.

https://www.tn.gov/tdot/finance/gas-tax1.html

Between the registration fees and fuel taxes, we have something of a hybrid of 'road consumption tax' and 'stick it to everybody', though the EV crowd is currently bypassing the 'road consumption tax' portion.

Fair point.  Still, apples to apples, other states do the same.

Picking apart my own argument….  What I don’t know is if any income tax in other states goes toward roads/infrastructure, and I’m far too lazy to research that.  I do believe the substantially higher annual auto registration fees do.

I take it you have never driven in Arkansas or Mississippi .

Nashville now.  Proud East Tennessean serving a new master in Middle Tennessee.

As I recall, the 'bump, bump, bump...' rhythm is one of the clues that you have left Memphis, when heading west.

Honestly...we came from IL (yuk!) last year, and roads there are *much* worse than they are here (near Crossville.)

And registration was $157/year/car, so I don't think TN is doing that bad at all.

Larry

Condolences