ST. PAUL - Democrats and Republicans are miles apart on proposals for fixing Minnesota’s crumbling roads and bridges.

Democrats in the Minnesota Senate this week released their plan for spending $800 million a year for roads, bridges and mass transit construction.

That’s more than four times the amount of transportation spending proposed by House Republicans last week.

Sen. Tom Saxhaug, DFL-Grand Rapids, said the two groups will have to work towards a solution, but he said it will be closer to the Senate DFL’s version than the plan put forth by the House.

“We might tap a portion of the reserve but we’re not going to make that the guts of our plan,” he said. “We need to increase the revenue stream in some way to ensue there’s enough money to address our infrastructure needs.”

Rep. David Dill, DFL- Crane Lake, said additional transportation funding is needed with the current state of roads and bridges across the state.

Rep. Jason Metsa, DFL-Virginia, agrees that fixing Minnesota’s deteriorating roads and bridges is essential.

“We all agree that transportation is a statewide concern,” he said.

Minnesota Depart-ment of Transportation statistics show more than 65 percent of the state’s roads and 40 percent of its bridges will be more than 50 years old by 2025. Over the same time frame, freight semi-truck traffic is projected to rise by 30 percent, and the state will have 430,000 additional residents.

MnDOT officials say the state needs $6 billion over 10 years for the state’s roads, with most of that money going to modernizing existing roads, but some of it also going to new projects.

Senate Transportation Committee Chair Scott Dibble has proposed spending nearly $700 million more in new revenue each year to repair and expand the state’s roadways. That money would come from a new 6.5 percent gas sales tax imposed at the wholesale level wholesale tax on gasoline and higher car registration fees.

Dibble’s plan would add a one-cent increase in a metropolitan area sales tax to pay for transit projects in the Twin Cities. It also would authorize more than $1.5 billion in borrowing for other road projects.

Under Sen. Dibble’s plan, the proposed wholesale tax would be on top of the current gas tax, which is levied on a per-gallon basis. The Minnesota Department of Transpor-tation says that as people drive less and cars become more efficient, the current tax is bringing in less money.

Republicans are critical of the DFL proposal.

“To come out and talk about tax increases for that amount I think is premature,” said state Rep. Tim Kelly, R-Red Wing.

Kelly, chair of the House Transportation Committee has proposed a much smaller plan that would put about $187 million a year into roads and bridges over the next four years.

Most of that money could come from authorizing the Department of Transportation to spend money it already has in the state’s highway fund and giving the department $200 million from the state’s $1 billion surplus. Kelly’s plan also directs MnDOT to find $65 million in savings and efficiencies that could be used on road and bridge repairs.

Move MN, a transportation advocacy group has also proposed increases in the gas tax and other fees to fund transportation. The group’s proposal would generate an estimated $856 million annually.

The average Minnesota driver, according to Move MN, would pay about $1.60 more per week as a result of the increases it proposes, with Twin Cities residents paying an additional $1.30 per week as a result of a metro-county sales tax hike, dedicated mostly to expanding public transit. Businesses would pay roughly $900 more per semi-truck annually under the plan.

“Everyone agrees that an efficient, reliable transportation system is essential to Minnesota’s economic competitiveness,” Move MN co-chair Margaret Donahoe said in a press release. “But by 2025, Minnesota’s entire transportation system will be on life support as congestion, reliability and safety concerns put our state’s long-term economic health at risk.”

Minnesota Public Radio contributed to this report.