Pay by the mile: lose a gas tax, lose your privacy?

• Author: Doherty, Brian
• Position: Oregon to tax vehicles based on miles rather than gas consumed - Brief article

FACED WITH declining gas tax revenues, the state of Oregon is test-driving an experimental Road User Fee Pilot Program. The program relies on GPS units in cars to record where the vehicles have been, then charges the drivers based on miles driven rather than gas consumed.

Right now, 280 participants are equipped with the GPS readers. They have to purchase gas at two cooperating stations in Portland, where readers subtract the standard gas tax and add a fee of 1.2 cents per mile driven in Oregon.

The Oregon Department of Transportation's Web site assures that "vehicle location data is not collected, [thus] cannot be accessed. The only data collected and transmitted is the mileage, sent to the gas pump reader through a radio frequency that can only travel about three to four feet." But as a requirement of the Federal Highway Administration's Value Pricing Pilot Program--from which Oregon is getting most of the funding for this project--the state is also testing the...