There's a new turn in the debate over high occupancy toll lanes or HOT lanes.Jimmy Carter was right, sort of: in America, anything will be re-interpreted to be racist. England too.
A lawsuit filed by Arlington County last month claims the lanes benefit wealthy white people and discriminates against minorities. While the only rule to get in the HOV lanes on Interstate 395 is you must have three people in the car, Arlington claims adding HOT lanes would cut out poor and minorities by defacto.
That claim doesn't sit well with Fairfax County Supervisor Pat Herrity (R-Springfield).
"I don't think race or class warfare has any standing in this argument," Herrity said.
Buried in the lawsuit filed last month, county attorneys argued the HOT lanes, "encourage and enable a financially-able, privileged class of suburban and rural, primarily Caucasian residents from Stafford and Spotsylvania counties operating single occupancy vehicles ("SOV") unimpeded access on toll lanes."
In other words, it benefits wealthy white people.
(via JammieWearingFool)
4 comments:
OK, these appear to be lanes which
1) charge a toll
2) require 3 people or more in the vehicle
So how does it benefit rich white SOVs?
OBH:
HOT lanes only require one or the other, either a toll or a carpool, not both. Therefore rich people get to "cheat" the system.
So...poor people have only single occupant vehicles?
> HOT lanes only require one or the other, either a toll or a carpool, not both. Therefore rich people get to "cheat" the system.
OK, that makes vaguely more sense, but still -- they're paying for the use, which shouldn't be a problem as long as the government is using the money wisel...
Oh. I see.
:oP
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