interesting... freeways in Brazil are often non-gratis because they're privatized and then toll booths become profit centers, justified as funding the maintenance. it appears to make sense to have the people who most use the road to fund its maintenance, but the same argument could apply to public transportation. but somehow the latter makes it clearer how little sense that makes, and how much sense it makes to consider both as public infrastructure maintained with progressive/redistributive taxing, rather than burdening those who happen to have to rely more often on public infrastructure just because they lack the privilege it would take to be able to do otherwise