Posted on 06/27/2010 9:05:52 AM PDT by Willie Green
NEW YORK (Reuters) - The operator of a South Carolina toll highway sought bankruptcy protection on Thursday in a rare filing by a municipal entity under Chapter 9 of the U.S. Bankruptcy Code.
Connector 2000 Association Inc filed for protection with the U.S. bankruptcy court in Spartanburg, South Carolina, with more than $200 million of bonds outstanding, court records showed.
The nonprofit had been set up in 1996 by the South Carolina Department of Transportation to operate the 16 mile "Southern Connector" toll road in Greenville County, and build an extension to South Carolina Highway 153, records showed.
Revenue, however, fell short of forecasts. According to its website, (www.southernconnector.com), the Piedmont-based entity has in recent weeks collected roughly 12,000 tolls in an average day, compared with the 21,000 it originally expected.
According to court records, Connector 2000 had a $173.3 million deficit at the end of 2009, and defaulted on some bonds in January. Legislation to permit a debt restructuring failed to pass, the records showed.
"The debtor is insolvent," Connector 2000's lawyers wrote.
(Excerpt) Read more at reuters.com ...
Well, there’s no reason to use the road and the $1 toll is INSANE. Any fool could have told them it wouldn’t get the traffic they expected. The only time anyone ever used the road was when word leaked out that the cops weren’t patrolling it for speeders, so you could go as fast as you wanted. Maybe if they left it that way, it might be worth the $1.
lulz!
Prolly shouldda built a RR instead.
If passenger rail was viable, there would be a lot more of it.
Toll roads suck ...
Ping!
I know that stretch of highway. I avoided it by driving to the other side of Greenville and coming down 385 rather than pay the toll.
Even my GPS directed me to avoid this stretch of road.
Bankruptcy of a toll road is somehow rare?
Maybe the author of that headline should read up on a little history from the early 1800’s. Back then, roads were built mainly by privateers who charged tolls for their use.
Unfortunately, the folks who used the roads found all sorts of interesting routes to circumvent the toll booths. Which, of course, caused many privateers to go bankrupt.
Not wanting to let a good crisis go to waste, the State and Federal governments soon took over the building of new roads and infrastructure-—paying for it by collecting even more taxes from the People.
Cheers
So, some politicians decided to build a road, and together with other politicians decided to create a non-profit corporation to run it as a toll road, probably promising the taxpayers that their taxes would not be raised to build or maintain the road.
It may be a “toll road” but what does anything about it have to with “free enterprise”? Nothing at all.
But, I am sure that the big construction unions and road-building companies were real helpful in those politician election campaign$.
Rare?
I predict Chapter 9 is going to become a whole lot more common in the next few months/years
A year or so ago, they raised the toll on this to $1.25 each way. Cars towing a trailer or boat are $2 plus. The road doesnt save much time but is somewhat safer than I-85. The unusual thing is that the toll takers are all very friendly and cheerful. I predict the state will end up owning it.
Wow, I didn’t know they raised it. The last time I was on it was a couple of years ago.
The toll-takers are the best though, aren’t they? I love South Carolina. It’s where I was meant to be.
Agree, overall SC is a great state. Moved here 20 years ago from PA.
How much gas does it save? If more than a gallon - it’s worth it!!!
Using the toll road only saves about 5 minutes of driving. When you factor in that you have to stop at 2 different toll booths and pay before you move on, the gas savings is zilch.
From the article, it appears that 9,000 daily commuters agreed with you and stayed with the public roads.
At $2 a day they lost $18,000 X 250 work days !!!!!!
miscalculated demand before supply.
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