Regional Measure 3, the $3 bridge toll hike on the June ballot that would raise money for transportation improvements, is a highly flawed initiative born out of dysfunctional policy-making. Voters should reject it.

There is no question that the San Francisco Bay Area urgently needs new investment in transportation. The fact that many voters are willing to pay substantially higher tolls reflects their frustration with traffic congestion. Workers are facing too many hours stuck in traffic, stressful commutes in crammed BART cars, lost family time and reduced productivity.

As I and others have argued, if the Bay Area fails to address the challenges of traffic and affordable housing, we will lose our competitive edge. However, Regional Measure 3 is not the answer.

The measure would permanently increase the price to travel the Bay Area’s state-owned toll bridges from $5 to $8 by 2025, and from $6 to $9 on the Bay Bridge during commute hours.

It demands that bridge commuters take hundreds of dollars out of their paychecks to fund a grab bag of transportation projects cobbled together by state lawmakers behind closed doors. By 2025, typical commuters would pay about $700 more each year, but would see little to no improvement in their commutes.

East Bay residents make up half of the affected bridge commuters. While the $4.45 billion of planned capital projects in the spending measure was tinkered with to slightly decrease the transfer of wealth from the East Bay to Silicon Valley, simply making the numbers come out so they are not so blatantly offensive and exploitative is no way to plan regional transportation.

Major decisions about transportation investments should be based on thoughtful planning, engineering modeling, and analysis with an understanding of how they would help move people and goods more efficiently.

Instead, Regional Measure 3 provides no framework for performance measures and oversight to gauge progress, no vision for how residents would reap a return on the investment they would have to make, and no analysis to show how congestion on major corridors would be reduced, or how long that might take.

In fact, several projects that toll-payers would be required to fund are far from shovel-ready, and it is unclear when they will have necessary approvals.

Some argue that despite Regional Measure 3’s many flaws, we need to do something, and something is better than nothing. I disagree.

For far too long, East Bay residents have been willing to pay their share for infrastructure improvements, only to be met with projects that are delayed and overbudget, and that have failed to address long-term, fundamental needs.

The Bay Bridge, the Metropolitan Transportation Commission headquarters acquisition and renovation, and the Transbay Terminal are projects that have involved billions in cost-overruns and undermined confidence in governments’ ability to plan and prioritize.

Related Articles East Bay Times editorial: Why vote for flawed $3 bridge toll hike

Mercury News editorial: Regional Measure 3 will ease Bay Area commutes Now is the time to stop this cycle of waste and frustration and to engage in serious and coordinated planning, because the Bay Area needs and deserves better. Without greater transparency and accountability, Regional Measure 3 would result in, at best, moderate improvements in the short run, but no meaningful solution in the long term.

Rep. Mark DeSaulnier, D-Concord, serves on the U.S. House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure and previously served as chair of the California Senate and Assembly transportation committees.