How much more money do you wish to invest in roads, bridges, buses and trolleys? How about $886 million a year? Or $2.2 billion a year? Nothing?

Pennsylvanians will learn tomorrow the final recommendations of the special Transportation Funding and Reform Commission that Gov. Ed Rendell appointed in February to study needs, offer changes and propose financial solutions.

		Construction around the region

An interim report issued in August, "Investing in Our Future," said $866 million a year in new funding would preserve the status quo, but $2.2 billion a year would significantly improve getting around.

If you prefer the $2.2 billion scenario to put the state's crumbling transportation infrastructure back on track and make Pennsylvania a better, more competitive place, everybody age 18 and over would have to pay an average $225 a year in extra taxes. This does not count fare increases to help cover staggering budget deficits facing public transit agencies.

An individual's share breaks down to $4.33 a week. Several months ago, when gasoline cost $3 a gallon, people grumbled but handed their money over to the oil companies. The money helped sheiks, stockholders and anti-Americans, but it didn't pave a road or buy a bus.

How would you like to pay? Higher gasoline, personal income, sales or realty transfer taxes? Tolls to private companies? Higher license and vehicle registration fees? A combination?

Whoa!

Do I see lots of hands raised in support of nothing? Nada? Not one more cent for PennDOT or the Port Authority?

But now that Tuesday's general election is history, voting on transportation funding and reform issues (and politicking) will take place in Harrisburg, not at the local fire hall or municipal building.

With a reshuffled Legislature to convene in January, with our newly re-elected governor, with a transit funding crisis looming, with highway-building costs skyrocketing, with bridges falling apart, the coming days should be interesting.

You can't wait, can you?

Woeful Wabash. Because too few use it, they stand to lose it, the Port Authority's governing board says of the 103-year-old Wabash Tunnel abandoned by a bankrupt railroad in the late 1940s.

By next month, authority staff is to devise a "definitive exit strategy" for the adopted, remodeled Mount Washington hole-in-the-wall that neither the transit agency nor PennDOT now wants because of low traffic, high expenses and possible reimbursement to the federal government for money spent on a boondoggle.

Numerous readers have weighed in on the matter. Some comments:

Linda Benedict-Jones, South Side gallery director: "I've lived and commuted in Pittsburgh for almost 14 years and the Wabash Tunnel is the best thing that has happened to me."

Lee Foltyn: "How many people know the Wabash Tunnel is there? I came across it by accident one day."

Gary Bielski: "Point out the absurdity of HOV-only use. The tunnel would be heavily used and a major benefit if opened to all commuters."

Christopher A. Beck, of Mt. Lebanon: "The real problem is access. Traffic backs up on the Smithfield Street Bridge and East Carson Street. Either way, when it's too much trouble to get there, I take another route."

Carol Probst, South Hills commuter: "We would use the Wabash except we are unsure how to access it and are even more uncertain where we go to get Downtown or to Oakland."

Lesley Homer: "At the Woodruff Street intersection on the South Hills side, we have waited for more than five minutes for the light to turn green. Put the light on a sensor, not a timer."

Keith O'Toole, who recently moved to the South Hills: "Traffic into the city is insane. They need to eliminate the HOV restriction. Closing the tunnel would be the ultimate in government insanity."

The price is not right. The $28.9 million, 10-story North Shore parking garage has been a dud for all but sports events since it opened four months ago.

Less than 10 percent of its 1,255 spaces are being used for all-day parking and here's why: Commuters are not going to pay $7 when they can park in stadium lots for $5 and catch a convenient shuttle to and from Downtown.

"I'd park [in the garage] instead to protect my car, but I'm not paying an extra $2 for it," Curt Gardner e-mailed. "They could be earning $3,000 a day instead of $700. Does anyone at Alco Parking have a brain?"

The Pittsburgh Stadium Authority, owner of the parking garage, said the facility is ahead of its time.

So are its prices.

Believe it! Volunteers and PennDOT employees picked up and removed 16,663 bags of trash from state-owned roads in Allegheny County alone this year. Debris such as tires, mattresses and appliances is not included in the statistics.

Plate du jour. Jack Samuels, of Bethel Park, spotted the Pennsylvania personalized license plate MAD FISH in the South Hills. I'm looking for the BIG FISH.