Quoted from Diospinball:

For those that don't know this.
IL just also passed an huge increase in the gas tax as well. And on top of that, they also raised vehicle registration by 50 dollars.
So it now costs 150 or 160 to license your car.
Now... I won't get political here. We need the money because we had the worst governor in history who refused to pass a budget and that shot our bond rating and put us in the crapper.
However, our new governor... Well... Lets just say while he has done 1 or 2 good things... The bad outweighs his good. And really no difference from the old guard.
And then the article with the stupid democrat legislator who I don't think lives in the real world. Has the audacity to claim that no one would notice if the gas price goes up...
What BS is that. Everyone notices. in fact. I noticed when my gas reimbursement from work(its based on the fed rate) went down .5 cents a mile... That factors maybe 20-30 dollars less I get a year... But, I still noticed it. And not happy that while the rates for the nation have gone down. My own states have gone up.
And please don't attack me. I made comments about both left and right parties being equally as incompetent. And I work my 9-5 for a school district. So no having that budget for 2 years really was scary. And it made my school district take a political stance. So please. Don't attack me.
Lets just agree this is the stupidest piece of garbage legislation, and the lawmaker should be publicly shamed for being so stupid and out of touch with reality and not concerned at all about the ramifications for the people in her state.

Quoted from JodyG:

Same place all the millions of dollars went from legalizing gambling...back into the politicians and lobbyists pockets. Gambling was supposed to reduce property taxes. When you have the second largest state legislature in the nation, there are a lot of hands to grease.

Quoted from Trekkie1978:

Today's roads are horrible for several reasons:
1 - Blacktop isn't what it used to be. The environmental movement got ahold of blacktop...The oil used in blacktop today is not the same oil used many years ago. Back in the 80's, when you put down new pavement, it stayed dark black for well over a year. Today, when you put down new pavement, by the 3-5 month mark, it is already starting to turn gray. The oil used today is a much lighter oil then was used in the past.
2 - Millings. When a road is milled, those millings are recycled back into the blacktop mix. The biggest issue, is a majority of the plants in production today, were constructed before millings were used. In order to be compliant, they retrofitted their plants in order to use millings. A brand new plant, is designed, to handle it, thus their blacktop isn't weakened by the millings, to where every other pre-existing plant is effected by the millings.
3 - Old concrete roads. Ever drive on a road and 15 - 20 feet, you hit a bump? That's because they paved over an existing concrete road. Come the winter, the old concrete moved differently than the new blacktop on top, creating those bumps. Due to the older blacktop having much more strength, it wasn't that big of an issue...not anymore, cause the new blacktop can't handle the movement of the concrete underneath.
4 - Standards have not evolved. On most roads, there's 1.5" - 2" of a blacktop course, on top of the stabilized base underneath. Before millings and the lighter oil, this thickness was more than capable of handling the traffic. With the blacktop now weakened, IMO, the roads should have 3" of blacktop, to make up for the reduced strength...For full disclosure, I am not a scientist, not sure if 3" is the magic number. But I know the current thickness just isn't working.
5 - American way of paving vs. the German way of paving. Germany has the best roads in the world. The reason for this? They don't care if a road is shut down for an extended period. On any big contract in America, if you finish way ahead of schedule, you get completion bonuses. Also the way we pave. We put down the blacktop as fast as possible. In Germany, they run the machines as slow as possible. You get a better constructed road by going slow. Here, once a road is paved, we let traffic on it immediately. Germany? They keep the road closed for days.

Quoted from Trekkie1978:

I own a paving company...everything I said is 100% true.
Every public job has a guarantee period after it’s finished. There’s all sorts of bonds on the jobs to protect the government from having to pay it again to re-do the job.
The problem with most inspectors...they are just engineers. They’ve never ran a paving machine in their life.