Toll Proposal
In an effort to keep the Pennsylvania Turnpike system under public control, in June 2007, the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission proposed tolling Interstate 80 as a means of raising transportation revenue. It is seeking the permission to put tolls on the highway through a Federal Highway Administration pilot program that allows three states to place tolls on interstates. Missouri's Interstate 70 and Virginia had already taken two of the spots. Under the plan, the PTC would assume all maintenance and toll-taking operations on I-80. The plan calls for up to ten toll plazas along the length of I-80 in Pennsylvania with a toll rate of 8 cents per mile, which would be comparable to the rate on the Pennsylvania Turnpike following a projected toll increase. Originally, I-80 was part of the PTC's 1,000 Mile Turnpike system, but with the passage of the Interstate Highway Act in 1954, the PTC abandoned the 1,000-mile (1,600 km) system and only maintained the original east–west Turnpike and its Northeastern Extension. Currently the only toll on I-80 in Pennsylvania is at the Delaware Water Gap bridge between Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Tolling on I-80 would be completed by 2010. On October 15, 2007, the lease for the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission to toll I-80 was signed.
This plan faced opposition from Northern Pennsylvania politicians who fear tolls will hurt the economy in the region and who do not want their tolls going toward funding mass transit. Congressmen John E. Peterson and Phil English have proposed a federal transportation bill that would ban the tolling of I-80. The chief executive officer of the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission has promised that the tolls would be used on highway projects in Pennsylvania and not on mass transit. On December 12, 2007, the FHWA rejected the plan, and returned Pennsylvania's application for tolling I-80 with questions stating why the state should place tolls on the highway.
On September 11, 2008, the Federal Highway Administration rejected Pennsylvania's application to toll Interstate 80 for the second time.
On April 6, 2010, the Federal Highway Administration rejected this application for the third time.
Read more about this topic: Interstate 80 In Pennsylvania
Famous quotes containing the word toll:
“one is in a shoe factory cursing the machine,
one is at the aquarium tending a seal,
one is dull at the wheel of her Ford,
one is at the toll gate collecting,
one is tying the cord of a calf in Arizona,
one is straddling a cello in Russia....”
—Anne Sexton (1928–1974)