Free Republic

As part of its controversial plan to widen the Capital Beltway and Interstate 270, Maryland says it intends to focus on the implementation of toll lanes — as many as four on each highway — and abandon earlier considerations of more general-purpose lanes, bus rapid transit and bus-only lanes. Maryland transportation officials have narrowed the number of possible construction alternatives to seven from an original list of 15 for further study of potential toll operations in the two corridors that suffer some of the worst traffic congestion in the region. Gov. Larry Hogan (R) in September 2017 proposed widening the...

A powerful General Assembly committee voted Friday to revise Gov. Larry Hogan’s more than $46 billion budget proposal to provide millions more in funding for Maryland’s public schools, while cutting some of the Republican governor’s prized initiatives. Led by Baltimore Democrat Maggie McIntosh, the House Appropriations Committee approved a spending plan that provides about $320 million more for operating Maryland’s public schools. That would be the first step toward implementing recommendations from the so-called Kirwan Commission, which has proposed ambitious new programs to boost student performance. The committee’s spending plan also includes $500 million for public school construction and $46...

AUSTIN, Texas — Deep in the heart of Texas is an artery that's been clogged for decades. According to the Texas A&M Transportation Institute, the portion of Interstate 35 that runs through downtown Austin is the third-most congested highway in Texas. About a quarter of a million cars in the Austin area use it daily. Gabrielle Guevara, a New Orleans native who works as a nurse at the Austin Cancer Center in Georgetown, drives on I-35 every day. She describes her commute home as "frustrating." "When I first moved here in August, I thought it was going to be about...

Interstate 4’s overhaul will run eight months beyond a scheduled finish in early 2021 and $100 million over a $2.3 billion budget, according to a recent claim by the builder. Neither the builder, I-4 Mobility Partners, nor the state Department of Transportation previously had publicly disclosed a potential change in schedule or budget. Details first emerged from Moody’s Investors Service, with reports on I-4 Mobility’s financial footing. The state Department of Transportation issued a statement on Thursday, emphasizing that the I-4 Mobility Partners claim remains undetermined. “While the claim is being reviewed, construction activities are continuing and the contractor is...

Commuters who live in western Prince William and Fauquier counties can leave the driving to someone else come Dec. 17 when a new bus begins round-trip service from Haymarket to Arlington. The “OmniRide Haymarket Express” will make four trips in the morning and four return trips in the afternoon and early evening. It will run along I-66 between Haymarket and the Rosslyn Metro station. The trips will originate from the new park-and-ride lot on the northeast corner of U.S. 15 and Interstate 66. The Monday-through Friday service is meant to give workers an alternative to traveling by car. It’s the...

When the 66 Express Lanes opened a year ago, officials promised the tolls would mean a smoother ride on the interstate, a major east-west thoroughfare from Northern Virginia into the District that is infamous for its headache-inducing congestion. The state’s promise — less congestion and faster travel times during rush hour — has been fulfilled for many commuters able to pay or carpool, but the new toll system has had an adverse effect for many of the remaining road users. For some commuters, the rush-hour period has simply shifted later — outside the toll hours — and dumped them onto...

WASHINGTON — Toll lanes around the Capital Beltway and I-270 in Maryland could be built in several separate phases and even operated by different companies under the latest plans released to industry insiders. It indicates Beltway construction could last for years. The first phase would include fixes for the Legion Bridge.A new document sent last week ahead of the next forum for private companies that could design, build and operate the lanes said that while Maryland eventually plans more than 70 miles of toll lanes from Frederick to Bethesda and from the Legion Bridge to near Oxon Hill, building out...

WASHINGTON — Some rush-hour commutes on Interstate 95 have been better since a 2-mile extension of the 95 Express Lanes opened to reduce backups in the regular and toll lanes at the original southern merge, but others have been slower, according to analyses by VDOT and the Express Lanes’ operator.Transurban said average afternoon rush hour tolls for trips from anywhere in the lanes that end at or south of Garrisonville dropped by 8.2 percent — from $21.52 between Nov. 1, 2016, and Sept. 30, 2017, to $19.76 in the period between Nov. 1, 2017, and Sept. 30, 2018.The one-lane extension...

By Bruce DePuyt — When Gov. Lawrence J. Hogan Jr. (R) announced a major plan to widen three Maryland roadways last year, even transportation insiders were caught off-guard. “I was surprised by it, but I rejoiced at it,” said John B. Townsend II, AAA mid-Atlantic’s manager of public and government affairs. “As much as people are loath to admit it, the congestion in Maryland has limited economic development in the state. And [it has] impacted the quality of life because of the amount of hours — more than 80 hours a year [on average] — we spend being stuck in...

Maryland voters narrowly oppose adding express toll lanes to widen three of the state’s most congested highways, a Washington Post-University of Maryland poll finds, highlighting public skepticism about one of Gov. Larry Hogan’s signature transportation plans. The centerpiece of the Republican governor’s proposal — a $9 billion project to add four lanes apiece to the Capital Beltway, Interstate 270 and the Baltimore-Washington Parkway — is even opposed by voters in the Washington suburbs, whom the plan is supposed to help. More than half of voters in the D.C. suburbs prefer to invest in public transit rather than building more roads....

North Carolina officials are trying to figure out how to unwind parts or all of a 2014 public-private partnership that is building managed toll lanes on a Charlotte-area highway.Ever since the ink dried on North Carolina’s first transportation P3 contract, the plan to relieve severe congestion in the Charlotte region has generated controversy.Public opposition remains just as fierce today to the project that will add express lanes on Interstate 77, even though more than one report says the deal with I-77 Mobility Partners LLC, a consortium led by Cintra Infraestructuras S.A., was properly authorized and permitted.The 26-mile-long project is designed...

WASHINGTON — Extended Interstate 66 HOV hours and high morning tolls aimed at reducing the number of cars hitting a chokepoint passing the Dulles Connector Road appear to be the biggest drivers of traffic changes since tolls for solo drivers began in December.A new state review of traffic and tolling data on I-66 and parallel roads over the first six months finds more concentrated and severe eastbound traffic delays through the Rosslyn area now than in the same period last year between 8 a.m. and 9:15 a.m., but significantly reduced traffic jams on I-66 inside the Beltway elsewhere and during...

After nearly 15 years of planning, hundreds of public comments, and a handful of lawsuits, a page turned Friday morning for a 10-mile stretch of Interstate 70 in north Denver.A slate of prominent transportation officials and politicians, including Gov. John Hickenlooper, formally broke ground on the $1.2 billion "Central 70" Project that will remake that section of freeway that officials call the lifeblood of the quickly growing Denver metro area."Without infrastructure, you can't grow. That's just a fact of life," Hickenlooper said after the event. "It's really building the foundation for the next 50 years of economic development for Colorado."Critics...

Marylanders spend more time commuting to work than the residents of every other state, apart from New York. The time spent stuck in I-270 or Beltway traffic is maddeningly frustrating. Congestion results in less time spent with families and discourages workers from taking jobs involving longer commutes. Economists estimate that congestion costs run into the billions. The statewide cost of congestion based on auto delay, truck delay and wasted fuel and emissions was estimated at $2 billion in 2015. This is an increase of 22% from the $1.7 billion estimated cost for congestion in 2013. As serious a problem as...

Maryland’s $9 billion plan to expand the Beltway and Interstate 270 is among the nation’s biggest boondoggles, a public-interest advocacy group said Tuesday in a new report. The report — issued by U.S. PIRG Education Fund and Frontier Group — highlights nine highway projects, including Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan’s plan to widen certain roadways using public-private partnerships and tolling to pay for them. The advocates say these projects are unwise for several reasons. They say expanding or building new highways always leads to more congestion over time through the wholly predictable phenomenon of “induced demand”: When new capacity opens up,...

Area residents who use the 183A toll road will likely see new tolls heading northbound to Liberty Hill and southbound into Austin in the coming years. The Central Texas Regional Mobility Authority, operator of the 183A toll road, is looking to extend 183A for 6 miles to the north from the current end of the toll segment in Leander to just north of S.H. 29 in Liberty Hill. CTRMA also seeks to widen the existing U.S. 183 south of S.H. 45 near Lakeline Mall down to the Arboretum area in Northwest Austin, adding a pair of variable toll ‘express lanes’...

Use of the MoPac toll lanes has been steadily growing in the seven months since the lanes opened throughout their entire 11-mile lengths, but it is falling slightly short of a first-year estimate made before construction began. Revenue from the added lanes on each side of North MoPac Boulevard, due to variable toll rates that on average have been higher than expected, has at least met expectations this spring and could exceed them when the agency begins in earnest to pursue unpaid tolls. “I wouldn’t be surprised to see the numbers bump up a bit” as collections efforts step up,...

Any Montgomery County voter looking for traffic relief will not get much hope from the transportation manifestos of Montgomery County’s “progressive” Democrats this primary season. Collectively, they all try to outdo each other in their opposition to anything involving spending for roads. Instead of supporting projects that will reduce travel times, they propose diverting more money to public transit. They push a strategy of “planned gridlock” that is intended to drive motorists from their cars. If alleging “planned gridlock” seems harsh, consider the Montgomery County Council legislation designed to slow traffic flow by significantly narrowing travel lane widths on some...

WASHINGTON — Maryland Republican Gov. Larry Hogan is responding to ethics concerns raised over a proposed consulting contract that is tied to a huge transportation project.The $68.5 million contract, related to Hogan’s $7.6 billion plan to widen parts of the Capital Beltway and Interstate 270, was pulled from consideration Wednesday by the Maryland Board of Public Works, which approves state contracts.“We held up the approval just to make sure that there isn’t any conflict,” Hogan told WTOP in an interview Friday. “I expressed some of the same concerns that other people have and that’s why the board of public works...

WASHINGTON — A group of powerful business leaders is calling for more toll lanes on highways from Richmond, Virginia, to Baltimore.The first focus of the Greater Washington Partnership’s toll lane push is expected to be on Maryland’s plans for toll lanes around the Capital Beltway and up part of Interstate 270, with lobbying from the CEOs of some of the largest companies in Maryland, Virginia and the District to get the rules in Maryland to match those on Virginia’s Interstate 495 Express Lanes.Virginia’s lanes are free with a minimum of three people in the car and an E-ZPass Flex, while...