The Nashville Tennessean really stirred up a hornet's nest with their story yesterday about the Tennessee Assembly and possible GPS tracking of automobiles for the purposes of taxation at the pump. In short, your car would have a GPS unit keeping track of mileage, which would talk to the gas pump and tax you accordingly. Sounds like a clever way to rob the deep-pocketed yuppies commuting from the 'burbs. The story generated the expected outrage, such as here, but we've seen significant pushback from the named players today. It's hard to summarize it any better than Bill Hobbs, but there have been some local developments.
One of the primary named players, State Senator Mark Norris, was on Mike Fleming's 600 WREC-AM radio show this afternoon to categorically deny he's behind any such thing. He claims the reporter from the Mid-State's morning publication misrepresented their interview. Wouldn't be the first time, for any paper. I'm not sure if Norris is climbing down or pushing back, but it sounded like the latter.
Regardless, even if GPS vehicle tracking is only a tailpipe dream right now it won't be the last of the "user fee" debate. Private pilots have been fighting it for years, but the concept probably has a better chance of coming to the streets as transportation budgets are increasingly strained resulting in fights about who should pay.
In some respects the idea sounds sensible--tax people based only on the amount of road they wear out. The main problem is the tracking part, especially considering the 'black boxes' already installed in the newer cars, not to mention cross state driving, out of state drivers, fraud, etc. But based on how many liberals have reacted to Bush's 'assault' on Constitutional freedoms it'll be interesting to hear their take on this issue.
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