Free Republic

In life, some things are unavoidable: death, taxes — and if you live in South Florida — tolls. Coughing up money to drive on the highways add to the cost of living in South Florida. Drivers in Miami-Dade and Broward spent more than a half billion dollars in tolls fees in the last year. Consider: A daily trip from Kendall to downtown Miami costs over $4 roundtrip by Sunpass, or about $1,000 a year for a five-day a week, 50-week commuter. For those who haven’t signed up for Sunpass, the toll-by-plate rate of almost $8 per day amounts to $2,000...

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...

Gregg and Rusk county reps on a regional transportation board aren’t happy with the lack of progress, reporting and marketing for Toll 49 on which traffic and revenues have slowed.Northeast Texas Regional Mobility Authority directors hope a new on-ramp that opened Tuesday plus the addition of 6 more miles that open Nov. 1 — two months ahead of schedule — can resurrect sluggish toll revenue.Board member Dave Spurrier raised questions, however, about why more hasn’t been done to attract new drivers, especially from Interstate 20.“I’d just like to see an aggressive marketing plan,” Spurrier, who represents Gregg County, said soon...

The cost to construct the five-mile extension of the Gilcrease Expressway and the toll charged to motorists using it will be higher than initially reported, the executive director of the Oklahoma Turnpike Authority said Thursday.Tim Gatz told a group of local officials gathered in Tulsa for an update on the project that the roadway is now estimated to cost approximately $330 million to $340 million, or about 10 percent more than originally thought.Late last year, Gatz told the same working group that motorists driving private vehicles could expect to pay a toll of $1 to $1.50. The toll is now...

Expansion of the Turner Turnpike between Sapulpa and Bristow is anticipated to be done by early next summer — months ahead of the initially announced estimated completion date.“This is a long-term project, and we ask the public for their patience because the end results are going to be tremendous,” said Oklahoma Turnpike Authority spokesman Jack Damrill.“We should have whatever is currently under construction substantially complete by summer,” he said. “Unless we have a terrible winter, we should have all six lanes open summer of 2019.”He said the project has been progressing “very nicely.” The 22-mile, $300 million project involves expanding...

LAPORTE — Law enforcement in LaPorte County is preparing for the possibility of an already-congested and dangerous U.S. 20 being overrun with more semi-trucks as drivers avoid the 35 percent cost increase of traveling the Indiana Toll Road. Much of that stretch of highway being down to one lane in each direction for resurfacing adds to the concerns. LaPorte County Sheriff John Boyd said he’s reached out to Indiana State Police to help patrol U.S. 20 if an increase in truck traffic becomes too much for his staff to handle alone. “We’re going to prepare for it,” Boyd said. “We’re...

Railway Age editor William C. Vantuono wondered recently what exactly Amtrak CEO Richard Anderson is trying to accomplish by truncating long-distance routes, replacing fresh dining-car meals with MREs, and replacing station agents with nobody. Is Anderson trying to drive passengers off the long-distance system so he can close it? (Ben Biaggini tried that at Southern Pacific in the 1960s, and it worked.) Is Anderson just trying to please Congress by reducing “money-losing” operations so he can look like the kind of fiscal tough guy currently in fashion in Washington? Or maybe Anderson is being tactical rather than strategic, plotting to...

Link only due to copyright issues: https://www.greenbaypressgazette.com/story/money/2018/10/05/now-hiring-wisconsin-waives-tests-some-military-truck-drivers/1532384002/

It’s past five o’clock on a Friday night and you are reading this article as a break from a mountain of work that needs to get done before Monday. You think, well, this is adulting, but at least there is good takeout! But are most Americans pulling all-nighters after graduating college or sitting in traffic for hours a day to get to their jobs? Actually, are many Americans struggling to even find a job?

A freelance automotive journalist worries a testing site operated by the Illinois Tollway Authority could be for more than just testing automated tollway technology. Paul Brian said he’s noticed a site with various sensors on northbound I-294 for years with a sign that reads “for testing purposes only.” Illinois Tollway Authority officials said the site is used for testing various sensors, but only for tollway purposes. The site, established in 2015, had an initial price tag of $2.7 million. “The Illinois Tollway has used the test site to study a range of systems – some of which were adopted and...

In less than two years, the Illinois tollway has hired six Republican insiders for high-level jobs that collectively pay nearly $916,000 a year, including a former elected official, political operatives and the relative of a state GOP leader. That troubles some government watchdogs who say they are concerned about favoritism in an agency with a history of patronage. Tollway officials said the agency is staffed with qualified professionals. "More and more the Illinois tollway is becoming the 'Who's Who' of Republican political hires," said Illinois Campaign for Political Reform Chairwoman Susan Garrett, a former Democratic state senator. Tollway spokesman Dan...

It seemed like Frank Caputo had worked in construction with his family since he could walk, and at 61 years old, he had no plans of retiring anytime soon, his family said. “He would die with concrete on his hands, and he did,” said Lorraine Richards Caputo, his estranged wife. “His blood ran concrete. He was proud of his job. He was a good worker, and he did a damn good job.” Caputo was working Friday night on the northbound lanes of the Tri-State Tollway near Rosemont where two lanes had been closed for a construction project. Just before 10:20...

The Illinois Tollway is examining the possibility of embedding equipment into I-294 that would charge electric vehicles as they drive along the road. The agency is at the start of a $4 billion project to rebuild and widen a 22-mile stretch of I-294, also known as the Tri-State. As part of the project, the Tollway wants to add infrastructure to charge electric vehicles. Off the highway, that could include both conventional charging stations and “super-charger” stations that power up electric cars and trucks more quickly. The agency also is studying “smart-powered lanes,” a type of technology being tried in Sweden...

BRISTOL TOWNSHIP >> The long-awaited interchange connecting Interstates 95 and 276 (the PA Turnpike) in Bucks County is officially open. Officials from the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission, the Pa. Department of Transportation (PennDOT), the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) and representatives from ground-transportation agencies in neighboring states gathered on Friday to commemorate completion of major, Stage 1 components of the Turnpike/Interstate 95 Interchange Project. “Motorists who travel in this area have been waiting a long time to realize the benefits this direct link will bring, namely reduced congestion on Bucks County roadways and improved traffic flow in the Philadelphia region and the...

EL PASO, Texas (KTSM) - A little more than a year after El Paso's first toll road became history, it's resurfacing as part of a new construction project. This time it's going to be part of the Border West Expressway, an extension of Loop 375. It'll be going from West El Paso to Downtown El Paso, but many don't know this new stretch of highway is set to be a toll road. "The Border West Highway is what not enough of your viewers understand is being developed as a complete tolled project," said State Rep. Joe Pickett, (D) El Paso....

While there’s been much discussion about the pending plan to widen Interstate 10 through Baton Rouge, the $360 million earmarked for the project is not expected to cover all four phases of the work. Following a speech to the Baton Rouge Rotary Club today, Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development Secretary Shawn Wilson said state officials are confident the first two phases of the project—first widening and replacing the aging elevated portions of the highway from the I-10/I-110 merge to the City Park Lakes, then replacing the bridges over the lakes—can be completed within four years using federal Grant Anticipation...

MILTON — A driver was killed early Friday after rear-ending a car on Interstate 10 that had stopped due to road construction. According to a report from the Florida Highway Patrol, at around 2 a.m. Friday three cars were traveling east on Interstate 10 at mile marker 20, approaching Avalon Boulevard. Two of the cars, one driven by 38-year-old Amaury Cisneros Morales of Orlando and another driven by 57-year-old Brian Cordes of Slidell, Louisiana, came to a complete stop due to a construction roadblock in the area. A Freightliner truck traveling behind Morales’ car failed to stop and rear-ended the...

Humans have figured out lots of ways to shape metal -- casting it with a mold, stamping it, drilling holes and milling surfaces in a machine shop, even zapping it with a laser. Well, now you can add a new method: 3D printing. A number of companies offer metal 3D printing, which creates products and components layer by layer with a computer-controlled system tracing its lineage to ordinary inkjet printers. But on Monday, printing giant HP announced it's entered the market with the ambition to dramatically lower prices, courtesy of a $400,000 product called the Metal Jet. "We're really going...

There have been three crashes in about one month on the newly opened Interstate 11, resulting in four deaths and causing concern with transportation officials. Representing the first new portion of highway added in the United States in 25 years, I-11 is a 15-mile stretch linking motorists between the Mike O’Callaghan–Pat Tillman Memorial Bridge near the Hoover Dam and Henderson, bypassing Boulder City. The celebration of the newly opened road on Aug. 9 was short-lived. On Aug. 14, a two-vehicle crash left two men dead. On Aug. 28, a two-vehicle crash left two dead and three injured. On Sept. 6,...

Plans for Interstate 14 have been expanded, and the Texas Department of Transportation will have a say in how a portion of the project is executed. Rep. Brian Babin of Beaumont, who sits on the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, recently submitted a bill that would extend I-14 to Mississippi and effectively would bring two brand new interstates to West Texas. Under the already-approved plan known as Ports to Forts, I-14’s western terminus would be at I-10 and U.S. Route 190, near Iraan. US 190 would be converted to I-14 to Brady, and the project would continue eastward. The Midland-Odessa...