Opinion: A $40 toll for a 10-mile trip? This is the new infrastructure math

Market Watch ^ | December 7, 2017 | John Rennie Short

[Hot Tabasco]

Blazing Saddles is on AMC right now...

[dfwgator]

I wonder how much they’ll cut out.

[Axenolith]

Carpool lanes are for the elite. You always could drive free in them if you had a driver. Tolling them was just a way to attempt to offset some load rather than expand lanes and given the complete mayhem new ones in my area of CA cause I doubt they’ll stay as they are for long.

Here, they are apparently load based, but if there is an accident or people are trying to go in and out of them outside of the sensors they load up and you end up paying your highest tolls while crawling or at a standstill. The most recently added, on I-680 and I-580 in the east bay have dashed lines delimiting them, so it’s “legal” to cross over and people appear to have clued into this quickly and crush the toll lane flow trying to exit during increasing traffic to avoid the photo sensor.

A couple weeks back I was cited for being in one before it’s 8:00 PM end time (my clock said 8, citation said it was 7:58:41) and I replied to it that I would need the photograph, timing instrumentation make and calibration information, and a copy of the contract documents granting whomever the power to assess fines. The response was “As a courtesy, we’ve voided this citation.”

[old curmudgeon]

Good

Discourge the cockroaches from living in NVA

[old curmudgeon]

Good

Discourge the cockroaches from living in NVA

[Pravious]

So what have these crooked government bastards been doing with all our gas taxes over the years??

-

Paying off people they’ve sexually molested, of course.

[Political Junkie Too]

The top four wealthiest counties are in the DC suburbs. These tolls are simply a reflection of the people's ability to pay.

The plebeians in DC are complaining that they're being outbid to use the toll roads.

DC-area drivers blast I-66 tolling system as fees hit $40 mark

All that wealth has to go somewhere.

-PJ

[AndyJackson]

There is another underlying scam in this fraud. You cannot know, when you leave home, what the demand is going to be. If there were universal posted prices $40 for Tue 8:15 - 8:45 AM that would be one thing. You can then choose to travel at a cheaper time.

Instead, this is surcharge based upon fluctuations in who shows up at that particular moment, something you can do nothing about. But the highway operator knows that such fluctuations, such congestion will occur and with some frequency and so can take the surcharge to the bank as windfall while portraying it as a "market incentive."

Anyone else doing this would be taken to the cleaners by a lot of big law firms for deceptive business practices.

[AndyJackson]

These tolls are simply a reflection of the people's ability to pay.

You are either a fool or a corrupt stooge if you believe any of that. This is just another example of swamp politicians selling out public interests in return for kickbacks.

[Zeneta]

What ten miles are subject to the toll?

Are all 5 lanes subject to toll or just the extreme left lane?

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Rt 66 “inside” the Beltway, it’s ten miles to DC.

It’s basically two lanes in each direction and has no reversible lanes. I remember when it was built back in the 1980s and it’s always been restricted during rush hour to HOV-3 and now HOV-2 and no Commercial vehicles ever.

They just opened the road to single passenger vehicles if they pay the Dynamically Priced Toll using EZ-Pass.

Their goal is to keep traffic flowing at ~45 MPH during rush hour by raising tolls when it gets crowded and dropping them when it’s wide open.

For those that are willing to pay? It definitely beats the alternative routes and I’m hoping it will take some pressure off those alternatives since that would affect my commute.

The trouble with DC Metro area traffic is that over the past 30 years it has become bi-directional in many areas.

[RicocheT]

If D.C. is so bad huge tolls are necessary, then Pres. Trump’s plan to move some agency offices to places other than D.C. is a good idea. Plus, he should shrink all of the federal government 10% by the end of his second term.

[deport]

Another article from yesterday with some 70 comments if anyone cares to scan thru them

https://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3611472/posts
DC-area drivers blast I-66 tolling system as fees hit $40 mark ^

[Political Junkie Too]

You don't think it's like the pricing models that airlines use when they escalate the rates as seats are sold, and then lower them again as the date of the flight approaches?

You don't think that same model raises toIls to maintain overcrowding on the roads, and as long as people keep paying to enter, the fee will rise until people stop paying?

Therefore, the wealthiest in DC have a higher tolerance for the expense and so the fee keeps rising past the point that "ordinary people" are willing to pay?

-PJ

[Zeneta]

.............you end up paying your highest tolls while crawling or at a standstill.

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Correct. Which seems a little messed up.

[AndyJackson]

You are dead wrong on all counts.

You don't show up at the airport and then discover then discover the price you are going to pay. You know it when you decide to purchase the ticket.

Second this has nothing to do with tolerance of the wealthiest. The poor are not even using that road anyway. This has to do with political corruption, which this being in the swamp should have been your first presumption until proven wrong.

This is not even the state doing this. This is done by a private contractor who discovered a new way to skim profits off of a contract.

[Political Junkie Too]

I thought these were using peak load models. The peak load for airlines is during advanced purchase, not at check-in. The peak load on a road is real-time.

-PJ

[AndyJackson]

I thought these were using peak load models.

Nope. These are surcharges imposed at the time based upon how many people show up. Traffic delays cause a backup at 3:00AM and you are on the road. Your toll goes up, sharply.

[AndyJackson]

Like I said. It’s not a fair business procedure. It is a deceptive business practice if anyone else did it.

[CdMGuy]

“We already pay gas taxes. And in some states, those taxes are pretty steep, on top of the federal gas tax. And some states, such as California, charge sales tax on gas, in addition to the other taxes.”

Maybe you are not aware of it but in California the state charges sales tax on the total per gallon price of gas INCLUDING both the Federal and state sales tax which is approaching 10% in some urban counties.

Our gas tax was increased by 12 cents per gallon two months ago but in reality that increase was a penny or more higher for Californians once the sales tax is added in. As I recall, we now have the highest gas tax in the nation. Plus, in the interest of protecting us from Jerry Brown’s global warming BS, it is anticipated that the tax per gallon will go up by another 70 cents around 2020.

If not for my age, we would be in search of a new home state along with so many of the conservative Californians who are fed up with Brown and his band of left wing a-holes. There is no hope for California which is filled with illegal aliens who vote along with a collection of immigrants who are now citizens and view government as their caregiver.

[Carl Vehse]

In addition to the $40 toll road charge there is the cost of hipwaders and a gas mask to wear when moving around in the DC swamp area.