PD Editorial: Summertime, and the rides may be bumpy

Are you hitting the road this weekend? Perhaps catching a flight out of town?

Memorial Day traditionally marks the start of the summer vacation season, and more than 38 million Americans, including 4.67 million Californians, are expected to travel over the three-day weekend, the most since 2005. Travelers are expected to spend $12 billion over the holiday weekend, a 1.2 percent increase over last year - a nice bump for the economy.

If you are driving, look out for potholes and crumbling pavement.

And if you are flying out of San Francisco or some other major airport, be ready for security lines snaking through crowded (and often aging) terminals. At some airports, passengers are being warned to arrive three hours early to get through security checkpoints.

We don’t mean to be spoilsports, but a broken axle or a missed flight can spoil a trip.

Besides, summer travels are a prime opportunity to see the nation’s deteriorating infrastructure in all its faded glory.

The shakeup this week at the federal Transportation Safety Administration won’t provide any immediate relief at understaffed airport security checkpoints. TSA staffing declined by about 6,000 over the past four years, the result of cutbacks ordered by a penny-pinching Congress, even as the number of airline passengers has increased by almost 100 million over the same period.

About 765 new screeners will be trained and on duty next month, but long lines are likely to persist beyond the holiday weekend.

“Clearly, the summer travel season is going to be busy,” TSA chief Peter Neffenger told the House Homeland Security Committee on Wednesday.

Most holiday weekend travelers will be on the road, and it probably will be a bumpy ride.

Congress passed a five-year, $305 billion highway bill in December, but it dodged the larger issue of finding a sustainable source of revenue for the Highway Trust Fund, which has been propped up for eight years by infusions from the U.S. treasury.

California lawmakers haven’t managed to do that much. It’s been almost a year since Gov. Jerry Brown called a special session to address the state’s awful roads and highways. This month, a state commission cut $754 million in road and transit projects while postponing other projects totaling $755 million because the highway fund is close to exhausted.

There’s only one solution: more revenue. A bill in the state Senate would boost the gas tax for the first time in 20 years and establish a new fee to ensure that electric vehicle owners help pay for upkeep of the state’s roads and highways.

The prospects for action this year? Not so good, one legislator told us recently.

OK, enough discouraging news. Not everything is gloomy this holiday weekend. Gas prices are down considerably from a year ago in California and are nearing their lowest level in 11 years nationally. Consumers also can find bargain airfares.

But don’t believe anyone who tells you that getting there is half the fun.