THE ROADS ARE PRODUCTIVE ASSETS.

Perhaps, after they've tried everything else, local politicians will figure it out.

In the past few years, residents of the Fox River Valley to the west of Chicago have received some new river crossings, including a Fabyan Parkway bridge that makes it possible for somebody headed from West Chicago or points east to either Kaneville or Elburn to avoid the congestion of downtown Geneva and the retail clutter at Randall Road, and a McDonald Road extension that's almost an expressway as built.

A third such bridge is under construction upstream from Elgin.

The Kane County Board on Tuesday morning approved a 95-cent toll for most vehicles utilizing the bridge on the Longmeadow Parkway, which is slated to open in 2022, according to the Daily Herald.

Those living in unincorporated Algonquin and Kane County can also apply to pay a flat annual fee of $200, which will allow them to cross the bridge an unlimited number of times, according to the article.

The money from the toll will go to pay off the $28 million bridge construction project, the Daily Herald reports. Once the debt is paid off, the toll funds will go into a special account meant for the future maintenance of the bridge.

A county supervisor from the Algonquin area saw the toll as an undue hardship on his constituents, offering an amendment to impose tolls on the Stearns and Fabyan crossings.

That last-minute amendment came from county board member Chris Kious, who said the Longmeadow Parkway tolls represent an unfair cost to his constituents. He pointed to the Stearns Road and Fabyan Parkway bridges as two county projects that allow toll-free crossings.

"By passing this (toll), you are subjecting the residents of the northernmost part of this county to pay an extra tax/user fee for the use of this Kane County bridge, which they have to use to access each side of their own villages," Kious said. "No other roadway in the county has such a toll."

To be fair, he said, people who use the Stearns Road and Fabyan Parkway bridges should also pay a toll.

That proposal drew a stampede of "no" votes from all board members except for Kious and fellow area representative Jarett Sanchez.

"I appreciate the political statement, but this is, frankly, ridiculous," said board member Drew Frasz. "We should all vote 'no' on this as soon as possible."

Yes, let's continue to pretend that we can live at the expense of others, or hope for a future Member of Congress from Illinois to have enough clout to put these pet projects into an omnibus infrastructure appropriation.

Here's why critics of government will say "more like a business."

The owners of employee-only parking lots are beginning to figure out that they have assets that are productive outside business hours.

These are all lots that are owned by private businesses—a law firm, a credit union, a gym. Now the public can pay to use them—through a simple electronic pay station, with cash or a credit card, all managed by a middleman company who takes a cut of the proceeds. No attendant is on site. Technology has made this arrangement easier than ever for anyone who owns a patch of asphalt.

In the very recent past, most of these lots were reserved 24-7 for those businesses' employees. This meant that at dinner time on Saturday, there would simultaneously be, on the one hand, a huge number of cars cruising for on-street parking spaces and snarling up traffic. But on the other hand, a huge number of empty parking spaces existed that were off-limits to that public, owned by businesses that were not open at 7 p.m. on Saturday (or at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, for that matter).

We are talking, literally, about $100 in the street, waiting to be picked up!

People who come downtown now mostly expect to pay for parking. But because of this expectation, they go straight to a lot (often one of these privately-owned ones) or garage or metered street space, instead of circling for ten minutes. Cheapskates like me who don't mind walking a few blocks know where the free parking is: on the fringes of downtown where demand isn't high enough to justify meters. We go there, park easily for free, and walk.

What will happen if we reach a point where all of those private surface lots have been developed? (I'd love to see us get there, because it would mean a much improved walking experience and a livelier downtown.) I expect larger office buildings that own their own garages will start doing the same thing: renting out their excess space for a bit of profit.

Slowly, they learn.

There is no such thing as free parking, the use of a parking space is exclusive and rivalrous, and it would be salutary for political economy to get people thinking that paying for a parking space ought be no different from paying for a hamburger or a seat at a concert.

There is no such thing as a freeway, either.  The extension to treating those roads as productive assets ought to be straightforward.

In addition, recognizing that space devoted to parking affects the kind of housing that occupies a lot might mean a pattern of land use with more housing, and perhaps lower land rents.

The great thing about this is that it exposes the trade-off that is using valuable downtown land for the low-value use of parking. The market will provide parking, but only where it's a profitable endeavor, which means the price of that parking is determined by the opportunity cost of using the land for something else (like housing or office space). In places where land is cheap, it may be profitable to provide parking for next to nothing. In places where land is incredibly expensive, parking will cost a lot more. So be it.

I have literally never been anywhere where there was, in fact, "not enough parking." What people really mean when they fear that there won't be enough parking is that there won't be enough free parking exactly where they want to go.

I get it: when you're used to having something subsidized for you, taking the subsidy away feels like an imposition. But it's a necessary step toward reclaiming our cities. We'll get over it. And I bet we'll even like the results.

Slowly they learn.