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If I could spare 15 to 20 cents per mile to give to this company (about $5,000 per year, for my family, based on present driving requirements), then I would agree with your viewpoint.

Even if you never drive on the toll roads, you benefit from them. Every car or truck they carry is one less car or truck you have to contend with on the alternate free routes.

"Even if you never drive on the toll roads, you benefit from them. Every car or truck they carry is one less car or truck you have to contend with on the alternate free routes."

I know - I do try to think that way. But what you say only applies if those free roads are not left to "wither on the vine" (to pardon an expression).

That's what happened in CA when they let a private company build a toll road down the center of the freeway. The private company extracted a non-compete clause, which meant they had final say over the State improving any parallel road section (within a certain distance). Think about that for a moment. Anyway, CA needed to add a singe lane 3/4 mile long (to a state road) to deal with a really nasty bottleneck, but they were prevented by the private company.

"Even if you never drive on the toll roads, you benefit from them. Every car or truck they carry is one less car or truck you have to contend with on the alternate free routes."

One other thing - back when I lived in California in the 80s, they did a survey at a freeway on-ramp. The question that they asked was to the effect: "Do you support the proposed subway for Los Angeles, and why". The prevalent answer was "yes, because it will get people off the road". Of course it wouldn't get the respondents off of the road, as their driving outweighed the extra time and inconvenience of taking the train, but it would clear the freeways of those others.

Of course it did not and the project is a giant white elephant. Something like 90% of the few people who do ride the train do so only because their roughly parallel bus lines were eliminated due to the availability of the trains.

I see the same thing with grossly overpriced toll roads. Charge me about 5 cents per mile, as in Florida, the Northeast, or Midwest, I would at least consider the option. Start pushing 20 cents per mile, then I'll only use it in real emergencies, or if I'm somehow forced to use it. I think that one can argue, in the end, that with the toll road option being available, any thought to upgrading freeways is out the window (even if there is no non-compete clause), and the toll road becomes more of a way to lock up huge amounts of land and prevent it from development.