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Toll road

A toll road, also known as a turnpike or tollway, is a public or private road (almost always a controlled-access highway in the present day) for which a fee (or toll) is assessed for passage. It is a form of road pricing typically implemented to help recoup the costs of road construction and maintenance.

Collecting tolls on SR 417 near Orlando, Florida, United States. This shows the two common methods of collection of tolls: tollbooth (on right) and electronic toll collection (on left).

Toll roads have existed in some form since antiquity, with tolls levied on passing travelers on foot, wagon, or horseback; a practice that continued with the automobile, and many modern tollways charge fees for motor vehicles exclusively. The amount of the toll usually varies by vehicle type, weight, or number of axles, with freight trucks often charged higher rates than cars.

Tolls are often collected at toll plazas, toll booths, toll houses, toll stations, toll bars, toll barriers, or toll gates. Some toll collection points are automatic, and the user deposits money in a machine which opens the gate once the correct toll has been paid. To cut costs and minimise time delay, many tolls are collected with electronic toll collection equipment which automatically communicates with a toll payer's transponder or uses automatic number-plate recognition to charge drivers by debiting their accounts.

Criticisms of toll roads include the time taken to stop and pay the toll, and the cost of the toll booth operators—up to about one-third of revenue in some cases. Automated toll-paying systems help minimise both of these. Others object to paying "twice" for the same road: in fuel taxes and in tolls.

In addition to toll roads, toll bridges and toll tunnels are also used by public authorities to generate funds to repay the cost of building the structures. Some tolls are set aside to pay for future maintenance or enhancement of infrastructure, or are applied as a general fund by local governments, not being earmarked for transport facilities. This is sometimes limited or prohibited by central government legislation. Also, road congestion pricing schemes have been implemented in a limited number of urban areas as a transportation demand management tool to try to reduce traffic congestion and air pollution.[1]

History

 
A table of tolls in pre-decimal currency for the College Road, Dulwich, London SE21 tollgate
 
Toll bar in Romania, 1877
 
Entrance fees collection in a local community road checkpoint near Bagan (Myanmar)

Ancient times

Toll roads have existed for at least the last 2,700 years, as tolls had to be paid by travellers using the SusaBabylon highway under the regime of Ashurbanipal, who reigned in the seventh century BC.[2]

Aristotle and Pliny refer to tolls in Arabia and other parts of Asia. In India, before the fourth century BC, the Arthashastra notes the use of tolls. Germanic tribes charged tolls to travellers across mountain passes.

Middle Ages

Most roads were not freely open to travel on in Europe during the Middle Ages,[3] and the toll was one of many feudal fees paid for rights of usage in everyday life. Some major European "highways", such as the Via Regia and Via Imperii, offered protection to travelers in exchange for paying the royal toll.

Many modern European roads were originally constructed as toll roads in order to recoup the costs of construction and maintenance, and to generate revenue from passing travelers. In 14th-century England, some of the most heavily used roads were repaired with money raised from tolls by pavage grants. Widespread toll roads sometimes restricted traffic so much, by their high tolls, that they interfered with trade and cheap transportation needed to alleviate local famines or shortages.[4]

Tolls were used in the Holy Roman Empire in the 14th and 15th centuries.

17th-century Dahomey

After significant road construction undertaken by the West African kingdom of Dahomey, toll booths were also established with the function of collecting yearly taxes based on the goods carried by the people of Dahomey and their occupation. In some cases, officials imposed fines for public nuisance before allowing people to pass.[5]

19th century

Industrialisation in Europe needed major improvements to the transport infrastructure which included many new or substantially improved roads, financed from tolls. The A5 road in Britain was built to provide a robust transport link between Britain and Ireland and had a toll house every few miles.

20th century

In the 20th century, road tolls were introduced in Europe to finance the construction of motorway networks and specific transport infrastructure such as bridges and tunnels. Italy was the first European country to charge motorway tolls, on a 50 kilometres (31 mi) motorway section near Milan in 1924. It was followed by Greece, which made users pay for the network of motorways around and between its cities in 1927. Later in the 1950s and 1960s, France, Spain, and Portugal started to build motorways largely with the aid of concessions, allowing rapid development of this infrastructure without massive state debts. Since then, road tolls have been introduced in the majority of the EU member states.[6]

In the United States, prior to the introduction of the Interstate Highway System and the large federal grants supplied to states to build it, many states constructed their first controlled-access highways by floating bonds backed by toll revenues. Starting with the Pennsylvania Turnpike in 1940, and followed by similar roads in New Jersey (New Jersey Turnpike, 1952 and Garden State Parkway, 1954), New York (New York State Thruway, 1954), Massachusetts (Massachusetts Turnpike, 1957), Illinois (Illinois Tollway, 1958), and others, numerous states throughout the 1950s established major toll roads. With the establishment of the Interstate Highway System in the late 1950s, toll road construction in the U.S. slowed down considerably, as the federal government now provided the bulk of funding to construct new freeways, and regulations required that such Interstate highways be free from tolls. Many older toll roads were added to the Interstate System under a grandfather clause that allowed tolls to continue to be collected on toll roads that predated the system. Some of these such as the Connecticut Turnpike and the Richmond–Petersburg Turnpike later removed their tolls when the initial bonds were paid off. Many states, however, have maintained the tolling of these roads as a consistent source of revenue.

As the Interstate Highway System approached completion during the 1980s, states began constructing toll roads again to provide new controlled-access highways which were not part of the original interstate system funding. Houston's outer beltway of interconnected toll roads began in 1983, and many states followed over the last two decades of the 20th century adding new toll roads, including the tollway system around Orlando, Florida, Colorado's E-470, and Georgia State Route 400.

21st century

London, in an effort to reduce traffic within the city, instituted the London congestion charge in 2003, effectively making all roads within the centre of the city tolled.

 
Tolls in the UAE

In the United States, as states looked for ways to construct new freeways without federal funding again, to raise revenue for continued road maintenance, and to control congestion, new toll road construction saw significant increases during the first two decades of the 21st century. Spurred on by two innovations, the electronic toll collection system, and the advent of high-occupancy and express lane tolls, many areas of the U.S saw large road building projects in major urban areas. Electronic toll collection, first introduced in the 1980s, reduces operating costs by removing toll collectors from roads. Tolled express lanes, by which certain lanes of a freeway are designated "toll only", increases revenue by allowing a free-to-use highway to collect revenue by allowing drivers to bypass traffic jams by paying a toll.

The E-ZPass system, compatible with many state systems, is the largest ETC system in the U.S., and is used for both fully tolled highways and tolled express lanes. Maryland Route 200 and the Triangle Expressway in North Carolina were the first toll roads built without toll booths, with drivers charged via ETC or by optical license plate recognition and are billed by mail. In addition, many older toll roads are also being upgraded to an all-electronic tolling system, abandoning the hybrid systems they adopted during the late 20th century. These include the Massachusetts Turnpike, one of the oldest American toll roads, which went all-electronic in 2016, and the Pennsylvania Turnpike, America's oldest toll freeway, which went all-electronic in 2020.

 
19th-century toll booth in Brooklyn, New York

United Kingdom turnpikes

Turnpike trusts were established in England and Wales from about 1706 in response to the need for better roads than the few and poorly-maintained tracks then available. Turnpike trusts were set up by individual Acts of Parliament, with powers to collect road tolls to repay loans for building, improving, and maintaining the principal roads in Britain. At their peak, in the 1830s, over 1,000 trusts[7] administered around 30,000 miles (48,000 km) of turnpike road in England and Wales, taking tolls at almost 8,000 toll-gates.[8]

The trusts were ultimately responsible for the maintenance and improvement of most of the main roads in England and Wales, which were used to distribute agricultural and industrial goods economically. The tolls were a source of revenue for road building and maintenance, paid for by road users and not from general taxation. The turnpike trusts were gradually abolished from the 1870s. Most trusts improved existing roads, but some new roads, usually only short stretches, were also built. Thomas Telford's Holyhead road followed Watling Street from London but was exceptional in creating a largely new route beyond Shrewsbury, and especially beyond Llangollen. Built in the early 19th century, with many toll booths along its length, most of it is now the A5. In the modern day, one major toll road is the M6 Toll, relieving traffic congestion on the M6 in Birmingham. A few notable bridges and tunnels continue as toll roads including the Dartford Crossing and Mersey Gateway bridge.[citation needed]

Toll roads elsewhere

Some cities in Canada had toll roads in the 19th century. Roads radiating from Toronto required users to pay at toll gates along the street (Yonge Street, Bloor Street, Davenport Road, Kingston Road)[9] and disappeared after 1895.[10]

19th-century plank roads were usually operated as toll roads. One of the first U.S. motor roads, the Long Island Motor Parkway (which opened on October 10, 1908) was built by William Kissam Vanderbilt II, the great-grandson of Cornelius Vanderbilt. The road was closed in 1938 when it was taken over by the state of New York in lieu of back taxes.[11][12]

Toll roads in Russia

The first toll road in St. Petersburg appeared in the 2000s. The Western High-Speed Diameter (WHSD) is a multilane motorway running from the South to the North. The road connects the southwest of the city, including the Sea Port area, with the Ring Road, Vasilievsky Island, Kurortny district and the Scandinavia motorway. The WHSD is divided into three sections: Southern, Central and Northern. The entire stretch of the WHSD was opened for traffic in 2016.

There are 16 toll plazas on the WHSD. Paying toll by transponder is mostly recommended for frequent drivers. The Flow+ toll collection system was implemented on the WHSD. The system was designed for automatic calculation of the driving distance of a vehicle equipped with a transponder. The system does not require constructing toll plazas at each entrance to or exit from the highway. Transponders mounted on vehicles are read by signal receivers installed at the entrance and exit ramps.

Charging methods

Road tolls were levied traditionally for a specific access (e.g. city) or for a specific infrastructure (e.g. roads, bridges). These concepts were widely used until the last century. However, the evolution in technology made it possible to implement road tolling policies based on different concepts. The different charging concepts are designed to suit different requirements regarding purpose of the charge, charging policy, the network to the charge, tariff class differentiation, et cetera:[13]

  • Time-based charges and access fees: In a time-based charging regime, a road user has to pay for a given period of time in which they may use the associated infrastructure. For the practically identical access fees, the user pays for the access to a restricted zone for a period or several days.
  • Motorway and other infrastructure tolling: The term tolling is used for charging a well-defined special and comparatively costly infrastructure, like a bridge, a tunnel, a mountain pass, a motorway concession, or the whole motorway network of a country. Classically a toll is due when a vehicle passes a tolling station, be it a manual barrier-controlled toll plaza or a free-flow multi-lane station.
  • Distance or area charging: In a distance or area charging system concept, vehicles are charged per total distance driven in a defined area.

Some toll roads charge a toll in only one direction. Examples include the Sydney Harbour Bridge, Sydney Harbour Tunnel, and Eastern Distributor (these all charge tolls city-bound) in Australia, in the United States, crossings between Pennsylvania and New Jersey operated by Delaware River Port Authority and crossings between New Jersey and New York operated by Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. This technique is practical where the detour to avoid the toll is large or the toll differences are small.

Collection methods

 
Balintawak toll plaza of the North Luzon Expressway in Caloocan, Philippines. The toll barrier has both electronic toll collection and cash payment in the same barrier, before a new toll plaza was added.
 
Tipo toll plaza in Subic–Clark–Tarlac Expressway, Hermosa, Bataan, Philippines, before the integration with NLEX.
 
The open road tolling lanes at the West 163rd Street toll plaza, on the Tri-State Tollway near Markham, Illinois, United States
 
In 2018 Rhode Island became one of the first states to setup gantries to exclusively toll only tractor trailer trucks. Gantry shown on I-95 North.
 
Overhead cameras and reader attached to a gantry on Highway 407 in Ontario

Traditionally, tolls were paid by hand at a toll gate. Although payments may still be made in cash, it is more common now to pay using an electronic toll collection system. In some places, payment is made using transponders which are affixed to the windscreen.

Three systems of toll roads exist: open (with mainline barrier toll plazas); closed (with entry/exit tolls); and open road (no toll booths, only electronic toll collection gantries at entrances and exits or at strategic locations on the median of the road). Some toll roads use a combination of the three systems.

On an open toll system, all vehicles stop at various locations along the highway to pay a toll. (This is different from "open road tolling", where no vehicles stop to pay a toll.) While this may save money from the lack of need to construct toll booths at every exit, it can cause traffic congestion while traffic queues at the mainline toll plazas (toll barriers). It is also possible for motorists to enter an 'open toll road' after one toll barrier and exit before the next one, thus travelling on the toll road toll-free. Most open toll roads have ramp tolls or partial access junctions to prevent this practice, known in the U.S. as "shunpiking".

With a closed toll system, vehicles collect a ticket when entering the highway. In some cases, the ticket displays the toll to be paid on exit. Upon exit, the driver must pay the amount listed for the given exit. Should the ticket be lost, a driver must typically pay the maximum amount possible for travel on that highway. Short toll roads with no intermediate entries or exits may have only one toll plaza at one end, with motorists travelling in either direction paying a flat fee either when they enter or when they exit the toll road. In a variant of the closed toll system, mainline barriers are present at the two endpoints of the toll road, and each interchange has a ramp toll that is paid upon exit or entry. In this case, a motorist pays a flat fee at the ramp toll and another flat fee at the end of the toll road; no ticket is necessary. In addition, with most systems, motorists may pay tolls only with cash or change; debit and credit cards are not accepted. However, some toll roads may have travel plazas with ATMs so motorists can stop and withdraw cash for the tolls.

The toll is calculated by the distance travelled on the toll road or the specific exit chosen. In the United States, for instance, the Kansas Turnpike, Ohio Turnpike, New Jersey Turnpike, most of the Indiana Toll Road, New York State Thruway, and Florida's Turnpike currently implement closed systems.

The Union Toll Plaza on the Garden State Parkway was the first ever to use an automated toll collection machine. A plaque commemorating the event includes the first quarter collected at its toll booths.[14]

The first major deployment of an RFID electronic toll collection system in the United States was on the Dallas North Tollway in 1989 by Amtech (see TollTag). The Amtech RFID technology used on the Dallas North Tollway was originally developed at Sandia Labs for use in tagging and tracking livestock. In the same year, the Telepass active transponder RFID system was introduced across Italy. Several US states now use mobile tolling platforms to facilitate use of payment via smartphones.

Highway 407 in the province of Ontario, Canada, has no toll booths, and instead reads a transponder mounted on the windshields of each vehicle using the road (the rear licence plates of vehicles lacking a transponder are photographed when they enter and exit the highway). This made the highway the first all-automated toll highway in the world. A bill is mailed monthly for usage of the 407. Lower charges are levied on frequent 407 users who carry electronic transponders in their vehicles. The approach has not been without controversy: In 2003 the 407 ETR settled[15] a class action with a refund to users.

Throughout most of the East Coast of the United States, E-ZPass (operated under the brand I-Pass in Illinois) is accepted on almost all toll roads. Similar systems include SunPass in Florida, FasTrak in California, Good to Go in Washington state, and ExpressToll in Colorado. The systems use a small radio transponder mounted in or on a customer's vehicle to deduct toll fares from a pre-paid account as the vehicle passes through the toll barrier. This reduces manpower at toll booths and increases traffic flow and fuel efficiency by reducing the need for complete stops to pay tolls at these locations.

 
E-ZPass lanes at a New Jersey Turnpike (I-95) Toll Gate for Exit 8A in Monroe Township, New Jersey, United States

By designing a toll gate specifically for electronic collection, it is possible to carry out open-road tolling, where the customer does not need to slow at all when passing through the toll gate. The U.S. state of Texas is using a system that has no toll booths. Drivers without a TollTag have their license plate photographed automatically and the registered owner will receive a monthly bill, at a higher rate than those vehicles with TollTags. A similar variation of automatic collection is the Toll Roads in Orange County, CA, US, wherein all entry or collection points are equipped with high-speed cameras which read license plates and users will have 7 calendar days to pay online using their plate number or else set up an account for automatic debits.

The first all-electronic toll road in the northeastern United States, the InterCounty Connector (Maryland Route 200) was partially opened to traffic in February 2011,[16] and the final segment was completed in November 2014.[17] The first section of another all-electronic toll road, the Triangle Expressway, opened at the beginning of 2012 in North Carolina.[18]

Financing and management

Some toll roads are managed under such systems as the Build-Operate-Transfer (BOT) system. Private companies build the roads and are given a limited franchise. Ownership is transferred to the government when the franchise expires. This type of arrangement is prevalent in Australia, Canada, Hong Kong, Indonesia, India, South Korea, Japan, and the Philippines. The BOT system is a fairly new concept that is gaining ground[colloquialism] in the United States, with California, Delaware, Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Mississippi,[19] Texas, and Virginia already building and operating toll roads under this scheme. Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and Tennessee are also considering the BOT methodology for future highway projects.

The more traditional means of managing toll roads in the United States is through semi-autonomous public authorities. Kansas, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia manage their toll roads in this manner. While most of the toll roads in California, Delaware, Florida, Texas, and Virginia are operating under the BOT arrangement, a few of the older toll roads in these states are still operated by public authorities.

In France, some toll roads are operated by private or public companies, with specific taxes collected by the state.[citation needed]

Arguments against toll roads

Toll roads have been criticised[by whom?] as being inefficient[clarification needed] in various ways:[20]

  1. They require vehicles to stop or slow down (except open road tolling); manual toll collection wastes time and raises vehicle operating costs.[citation needed]
  2. Collection costs can reduce revenue by up to a third, and revenue theft is considered[by whom?] to be comparatively easy.[citation needed]
  3. Where the tolled roads are less congested than the parallel "free" roads, the traffic diversion resulting from the tolls increases congestion on the road system and reduces its usefulness.[citation needed]
  4. There are concerns about government surveillance associated with both electronic tolls and some forms of "classical" toll collection

A number of additional criticisms are also directed at toll roads in general:

  1. Toll roads are a form of regressive taxation; that is, compared to conventional taxes for funding roads, they benefit wealthier citizens more than poor citizens.[21][22]
  2. If toll roads are owned or managed by private for profit entities, the citizens may lose money overall compared to conventional public funding because the private owners or operators of the toll system will naturally seek to profit from the roads.[23]
  3. The managing entities, whether public or private, may not correctly account for the overall social costs, particularly to the poor, when setting pricing and thus may hurt the neediest segments of society.[24]

Arguments in favor of toll roads

See also

References

  1. ^ . Federal Highway Administration. Archived from the original on July 2, 2012. Retrieved May 23, 2012.
  2. ^ Gilliet, Henri (1990). "Toll roads-the French experience." Transrouts International, Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines.
  3. ^ "Toll". Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved October 6, 2020.
  4. ^ Bernstein, William J.; "The Birth of Plenty: How the Prosperity of the Modern World was Created"; p. 245-6; McGraw-Hill (2010); ISBN 978-0071747042
  5. ^ Herskovits, Melville J. (1967). Dahomey: An Ancient West African Kingdom (Volume I ed.). Evanston, IL: Northwestern University Press.
  6. ^ Jordi, Philipp (2008): "Institutional Aspects of Directive 2004/52/EC on the Interoperability of Electronic Road Toll Systems in the Community." Europainstitut der Universität Basel.
  7. ^ Parliamentary Papers, 1840, Vol 280 xxvii.
  8. ^ Searle 1930, p. 798.
  9. ^ "Toronto.ca". from the original on September 30, 2007. Retrieved September 19, 2014.
  10. ^ . Archived from the original on May 19, 2014. Retrieved September 19, 2014.
  11. ^ Patton, Phil (October 12, 2008). "A 100-Year-Old Dream: A Road Just for Cars". The New York Times. from the original on December 9, 2008. Retrieved March 27, 2010.
  12. ^ "BBS.keyhole.com". from the original on September 22, 2009. Retrieved September 19, 2014.
  13. ^ Oehry, Bernhard (2004): Tolling with Satellites – a System Concept for Everybody?" in: Jordi, Philipp (2008): "Institutional Aspects of Directive 2004/52/EC on the Interoperability of Electronic Road Toll Systems in the Community." Europainstitut der Universität Basel.
  14. ^ . lostinjersey.wordpress.com. March 19, 2009. Archived from the original on August 29, 2013. Retrieved February 23, 2012.
  15. ^ (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on January 1, 2010.
  16. ^ Michael Dresser (February 7, 2011). . Baltimore Sun. Archived from the original on February 10, 2011. Retrieved February 7, 2011.
  17. ^ Kevin Rector (November 5, 2014). "Final section of ICC to Laurel, new I-95 interchange to open this weekend". Baltimore Sun. from the original on June 26, 2015. Retrieved June 19, 2015.
  18. ^ "Drivers roll on state's first toll road". WRAL.com. January 31, 2012. Retrieved April 7, 2012.
  19. ^ [1][permanent dead link]
  20. ^ Roth, Gabriel (1998). Roads in a market economy. Ashgate Publishing Company. p. 122. ISBN 978-0-291-39814-7.
  21. ^ Peters, Jonathan R.; Kramer, Jonathan K. (Summer 2003). "The Inefficiency of Toll Collection as a Means of Taxation: Evidence from the Garden State Parkway" (PDF). Transportation Quarterly. 57: 26. Nakamura and Kockelman (2002) show that tolls are by nature regressive ...
  22. ^ Robertson, Christopher Charles; Prozzi, Jolanda; Walton, C. Michael (2008). Who Uses Toll Roads?: An Analysis of Central Texas Turnpike Users. Southwest Regional University Transportation Center, Center for Transportation Research, University of Texas at Austin. p. 30. from the original on March 1, 2018. Low income users unable to pay to use toll facilities, however, will not gain most of the benefits accessible to those with the ability to pay. ... The study concludes that ... toll roads are a regressive form of funding road systems ...{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  23. ^ Kurtz, David L.; Boone, Louis E. (2008). Contemporary Business. p. 17. ISBN 978-0324653847. from the original on March 1, 2018.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  24. ^ von Hirschhausen, Christian (January 1, 2002). Modernizing Infrastructure in Transformation Economies. p. 155. ISBN 9781781959787. from the original on March 1, 2018.
  25. ^ "Toll Roads and Externalities". 18 August 2004.
  26. ^ Yin, Yafeng; Lawphongpanich, Siriphong (1 July 2006). "Internalizing emission externality on road networks". Transportation Research Part D: Transport and Environment. 11 (4): 292–301. doi:10.1016/j.trd.2006.05.003.
  27. ^ "Dynamic Pricing on the Road: How Managed Tolls Are Increasing Efficiency and Innovation". 16 November 2015.
  28. ^ Liu, Louie Nan; McDonald, John F. (1 November 1998). "Efficient Congestion Tolls in the Presence of Unpriced Congestion: A Peak and Off-Peak Simulation Model". Journal of Urban Economics. 44 (3): 352–366. doi:10.1006/juec.1997.2073.
  29. ^ Dargay, Joyce M (1 November 2001). "The effect of income on car ownership: evidence of asymmetry". Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice. 35 (9): 807–821. doi:10.1016/S0965-8564(00)00018-5.
  30. ^ "Getting Around, or Just Getting By? Where People Live with Fewer Cars". Trulia.com. 16 May 2019.
  31. ^ "Household, Individual, and Vehicle Characteristics | Bureau of Transportation Statistics". Bts.gov.
  32. ^ "Rich versus Poor, Near versus Far from Transit: Who Travels More?". Transfers,agazine.org.
  33. ^ "Low-income households drive much less than high-income households". Bikeportland.org. 25 January 2016.
  34. ^ "The Growth Ponzi Scheme". Strongtowns.org.

External links

  • Turnpike Info
  • Toll Tickets Official Website
  • International Bridge, Tunnel and Turnpike Association The International Bridge, Tunnel and Turnpike Association (IBTTA) is the worldwide alliance of toll operators and associated industries that provides a forum for sharing knowledge and ideas to promote and enhance toll-financed transportation services.
  • Toll Roads News from contractor perspective
  • Turnpike Roads in England and Wales, for background on toll roads during the turnpike era in England

toll, road, toll, road, also, known, turnpike, tollway, public, private, road, almost, always, controlled, access, highway, present, which, toll, assessed, passage, form, road, pricing, typically, implemented, help, recoup, costs, road, construction, maintenan. A toll road also known as a turnpike or tollway is a public or private road almost always a controlled access highway in the present day for which a fee or toll is assessed for passage It is a form of road pricing typically implemented to help recoup the costs of road construction and maintenance Collecting tolls on SR 417 near Orlando Florida United States This shows the two common methods of collection of tolls tollbooth on right and electronic toll collection on left Toll roads have existed in some form since antiquity with tolls levied on passing travelers on foot wagon or horseback a practice that continued with the automobile and many modern tollways charge fees for motor vehicles exclusively The amount of the toll usually varies by vehicle type weight or number of axles with freight trucks often charged higher rates than cars Tolls are often collected at toll plazas toll booths toll houses toll stations toll bars toll barriers or toll gates Some toll collection points are automatic and the user deposits money in a machine which opens the gate once the correct toll has been paid To cut costs and minimise time delay many tolls are collected with electronic toll collection equipment which automatically communicates with a toll payer s transponder or uses automatic number plate recognition to charge drivers by debiting their accounts Criticisms of toll roads include the time taken to stop and pay the toll and the cost of the toll booth operators up to about one third of revenue in some cases Automated toll paying systems help minimise both of these Others object to paying twice for the same road in fuel taxes and in tolls In addition to toll roads toll bridges and toll tunnels are also used by public authorities to generate funds to repay the cost of building the structures Some tolls are set aside to pay for future maintenance or enhancement of infrastructure or are applied as a general fund by local governments not being earmarked for transport facilities This is sometimes limited or prohibited by central government legislation Also road congestion pricing schemes have been implemented in a limited number of urban areas as a transportation demand management tool to try to reduce traffic congestion and air pollution 1 Contents 1 History 1 1 Ancient times 1 2 Middle Ages 1 3 17th century Dahomey 1 4 19th century 1 5 20th century 1 6 21st century 1 7 United Kingdom turnpikes 1 8 Toll roads elsewhere 1 9 Toll roads in Russia 2 Charging methods 3 Collection methods 4 Financing and management 5 Arguments against toll roads 6 Arguments in favor of toll roads 7 See also 8 References 9 External linksHistory Edit A table of tolls in pre decimal currency for the College Road Dulwich London SE21 tollgate Toll bar in Romania 1877 Entrance fees collection in a local community road checkpoint near Bagan Myanmar Ancient times Edit Toll roads have existed for at least the last 2 700 years as tolls had to be paid by travellers using the Susa Babylon highway under the regime of Ashurbanipal who reigned in the seventh century BC 2 Aristotle and Pliny refer to tolls in Arabia and other parts of Asia In India before the fourth century BC the Arthashastra notes the use of tolls Germanic tribes charged tolls to travellers across mountain passes Middle Ages Edit Main article Road toll historic Most roads were not freely open to travel on in Europe during the Middle Ages 3 and the toll was one of many feudal fees paid for rights of usage in everyday life Some major European highways such as the Via Regia and Via Imperii offered protection to travelers in exchange for paying the royal toll Many modern European roads were originally constructed as toll roads in order to recoup the costs of construction and maintenance and to generate revenue from passing travelers In 14th century England some of the most heavily used roads were repaired with money raised from tolls by pavage grants Widespread toll roads sometimes restricted traffic so much by their high tolls that they interfered with trade and cheap transportation needed to alleviate local famines or shortages 4 Tolls were used in the Holy Roman Empire in the 14th and 15th centuries 17th century Dahomey Edit After significant road construction undertaken by the West African kingdom of Dahomey toll booths were also established with the function of collecting yearly taxes based on the goods carried by the people of Dahomey and their occupation In some cases officials imposed fines for public nuisance before allowing people to pass 5 19th century Edit Industrialisation in Europe needed major improvements to the transport infrastructure which included many new or substantially improved roads financed from tolls The A5 road in Britain was built to provide a robust transport link between Britain and Ireland and had a toll house every few miles 20th century Edit In the 20th century road tolls were introduced in Europe to finance the construction of motorway networks and specific transport infrastructure such as bridges and tunnels Italy was the first European country to charge motorway tolls on a 50 kilometres 31 mi motorway section near Milan in 1924 It was followed by Greece which made users pay for the network of motorways around and between its cities in 1927 Later in the 1950s and 1960s France Spain and Portugal started to build motorways largely with the aid of concessions allowing rapid development of this infrastructure without massive state debts Since then road tolls have been introduced in the majority of the EU member states 6 In the United States prior to the introduction of the Interstate Highway System and the large federal grants supplied to states to build it many states constructed their first controlled access highways by floating bonds backed by toll revenues Starting with the Pennsylvania Turnpike in 1940 and followed by similar roads in New Jersey New Jersey Turnpike 1952 and Garden State Parkway 1954 New York New York State Thruway 1954 Massachusetts Massachusetts Turnpike 1957 Illinois Illinois Tollway 1958 and others numerous states throughout the 1950s established major toll roads With the establishment of the Interstate Highway System in the late 1950s toll road construction in the U S slowed down considerably as the federal government now provided the bulk of funding to construct new freeways and regulations required that such Interstate highways be free from tolls Many older toll roads were added to the Interstate System under a grandfather clause that allowed tolls to continue to be collected on toll roads that predated the system Some of these such as the Connecticut Turnpike and the Richmond Petersburg Turnpike later removed their tolls when the initial bonds were paid off Many states however have maintained the tolling of these roads as a consistent source of revenue As the Interstate Highway System approached completion during the 1980s states began constructing toll roads again to provide new controlled access highways which were not part of the original interstate system funding Houston s outer beltway of interconnected toll roads began in 1983 and many states followed over the last two decades of the 20th century adding new toll roads including the tollway system around Orlando Florida Colorado s E 470 and Georgia State Route 400 21st century Edit London in an effort to reduce traffic within the city instituted the London congestion charge in 2003 effectively making all roads within the centre of the city tolled Tolls in the UAE In the United States as states looked for ways to construct new freeways without federal funding again to raise revenue for continued road maintenance and to control congestion new toll road construction saw significant increases during the first two decades of the 21st century Spurred on by two innovations the electronic toll collection system and the advent of high occupancy and express lane tolls many areas of the U S saw large road building projects in major urban areas Electronic toll collection first introduced in the 1980s reduces operating costs by removing toll collectors from roads Tolled express lanes by which certain lanes of a freeway are designated toll only increases revenue by allowing a free to use highway to collect revenue by allowing drivers to bypass traffic jams by paying a toll The E ZPass system compatible with many state systems is the largest ETC system in the U S and is used for both fully tolled highways and tolled express lanes Maryland Route 200 and the Triangle Expressway in North Carolina were the first toll roads built without toll booths with drivers charged via ETC or by optical license plate recognition and are billed by mail In addition many older toll roads are also being upgraded to an all electronic tolling system abandoning the hybrid systems they adopted during the late 20th century These include the Massachusetts Turnpike one of the oldest American toll roads which went all electronic in 2016 and the Pennsylvania Turnpike America s oldest toll freeway which went all electronic in 2020 19th century toll booth in Brooklyn New York United Kingdom turnpikes Edit Main article Toll roads in Great Britain Further information Turnpike trust Turnpike trusts were established in England and Wales from about 1706 in response to the need for better roads than the few and poorly maintained tracks then available Turnpike trusts were set up by individual Acts of Parliament with powers to collect road tolls to repay loans for building improving and maintaining the principal roads in Britain At their peak in the 1830s over 1 000 trusts 7 administered around 30 000 miles 48 000 km of turnpike road in England and Wales taking tolls at almost 8 000 toll gates 8 The trusts were ultimately responsible for the maintenance and improvement of most of the main roads in England and Wales which were used to distribute agricultural and industrial goods economically The tolls were a source of revenue for road building and maintenance paid for by road users and not from general taxation The turnpike trusts were gradually abolished from the 1870s Most trusts improved existing roads but some new roads usually only short stretches were also built Thomas Telford s Holyhead road followed Watling Street from London but was exceptional in creating a largely new route beyond Shrewsbury and especially beyond Llangollen Built in the early 19th century with many toll booths along its length most of it is now the A5 In the modern day one major toll road is the M6 Toll relieving traffic congestion on the M6 in Birmingham A few notable bridges and tunnels continue as toll roads including the Dartford Crossing and Mersey Gateway bridge citation needed Toll roads elsewhere Edit Some cities in Canada had toll roads in the 19th century Roads radiating from Toronto required users to pay at toll gates along the street Yonge Street Bloor Street Davenport Road Kingston Road 9 and disappeared after 1895 10 19th century plank roads were usually operated as toll roads One of the first U S motor roads the Long Island Motor Parkway which opened on October 10 1908 was built by William Kissam Vanderbilt II the great grandson of Cornelius Vanderbilt The road was closed in 1938 when it was taken over by the state of New York in lieu of back taxes 11 12 Toll roads in Russia Edit The first toll road in St Petersburg appeared in the 2000s The Western High Speed Diameter WHSD is a multilane motorway running from the South to the North The road connects the southwest of the city including the Sea Port area with the Ring Road Vasilievsky Island Kurortny district and the Scandinavia motorway The WHSD is divided into three sections Southern Central and Northern The entire stretch of the WHSD was opened for traffic in 2016 There are 16 toll plazas on the WHSD Paying toll by transponder is mostly recommended for frequent drivers The Flow toll collection system was implemented on the WHSD The system was designed for automatic calculation of the driving distance of a vehicle equipped with a transponder The system does not require constructing toll plazas at each entrance to or exit from the highway Transponders mounted on vehicles are read by signal receivers installed at the entrance and exit ramps Charging methods EditMain article Road pricing Road tolls were levied traditionally for a specific access e g city or for a specific infrastructure e g roads bridges These concepts were widely used until the last century However the evolution in technology made it possible to implement road tolling policies based on different concepts The different charging concepts are designed to suit different requirements regarding purpose of the charge charging policy the network to the charge tariff class differentiation et cetera 13 Time based charges and access fees In a time based charging regime a road user has to pay for a given period of time in which they may use the associated infrastructure For the practically identical access fees the user pays for the access to a restricted zone for a period or several days Motorway and other infrastructure tolling The term tolling is used for charging a well defined special and comparatively costly infrastructure like a bridge a tunnel a mountain pass a motorway concession or the whole motorway network of a country Classically a toll is due when a vehicle passes a tolling station be it a manual barrier controlled toll plaza or a free flow multi lane station Distance or area charging In a distance or area charging system concept vehicles are charged per total distance driven in a defined area Some toll roads charge a toll in only one direction Examples include the Sydney Harbour Bridge Sydney Harbour Tunnel and Eastern Distributor these all charge tolls city bound in Australia in the United States crossings between Pennsylvania and New Jersey operated by Delaware River Port Authority and crossings between New Jersey and New York operated by Port Authority of New York and New Jersey This technique is practical where the detour to avoid the toll is large or the toll differences are small Collection methods Edit Tollbar redirects here For other uses see Tollbar disambiguation See also Tollbooth Toll house and Electronic toll collection The examples and perspective in this section deal primarily with the United States and do not represent a worldwide view of the subject You may improve this section discuss the issue on the talk page or create a new section as appropriate May 2017 Learn how and when to remove this template message Balintawak toll plaza of the North Luzon Expressway in Caloocan Philippines The toll barrier has both electronic toll collection and cash payment in the same barrier before a new toll plaza was added Tipo toll plaza in Subic Clark Tarlac Expressway Hermosa Bataan Philippines before the integration with NLEX The open road tolling lanes at the West 163rd Street toll plaza on the Tri State Tollway near Markham Illinois United States In 2018 Rhode Island became one of the first states to setup gantries to exclusively toll only tractor trailer trucks Gantry shown on I 95 North Overhead cameras and reader attached to a gantry on Highway 407 in Ontario Traditionally tolls were paid by hand at a toll gate Although payments may still be made in cash it is more common now to pay using an electronic toll collection system In some places payment is made using transponders which are affixed to the windscreen Three systems of toll roads exist open with mainline barrier toll plazas closed with entry exit tolls and open road no toll booths only electronic toll collection gantries at entrances and exits or at strategic locations on the median of the road Some toll roads use a combination of the three systems On an open toll system all vehicles stop at various locations along the highway to pay a toll This is different from open road tolling where no vehicles stop to pay a toll While this may save money from the lack of need to construct toll booths at every exit it can cause traffic congestion while traffic queues at the mainline toll plazas toll barriers It is also possible for motorists to enter an open toll road after one toll barrier and exit before the next one thus travelling on the toll road toll free Most open toll roads have ramp tolls or partial access junctions to prevent this practice known in the U S as shunpiking With a closed toll system vehicles collect a ticket when entering the highway In some cases the ticket displays the toll to be paid on exit Upon exit the driver must pay the amount listed for the given exit Should the ticket be lost a driver must typically pay the maximum amount possible for travel on that highway Short toll roads with no intermediate entries or exits may have only one toll plaza at one end with motorists travelling in either direction paying a flat fee either when they enter or when they exit the toll road In a variant of the closed toll system mainline barriers are present at the two endpoints of the toll road and each interchange has a ramp toll that is paid upon exit or entry In this case a motorist pays a flat fee at the ramp toll and another flat fee at the end of the toll road no ticket is necessary In addition with most systems motorists may pay tolls only with cash or change debit and credit cards are not accepted However some toll roads may have travel plazas with ATMs so motorists can stop and withdraw cash for the tolls The toll is calculated by the distance travelled on the toll road or the specific exit chosen In the United States for instance the Kansas Turnpike Ohio Turnpike New Jersey Turnpike most of the Indiana Toll Road New York State Thruway and Florida s Turnpike currently implement closed systems The Union Toll Plaza on the Garden State Parkway was the first ever to use an automated toll collection machine A plaque commemorating the event includes the first quarter collected at its toll booths 14 The first major deployment of an RFID electronic toll collection system in the United States was on the Dallas North Tollway in 1989 by Amtech see TollTag The Amtech RFID technology used on the Dallas North Tollway was originally developed at Sandia Labs for use in tagging and tracking livestock In the same year the Telepass active transponder RFID system was introduced across Italy Several US states now use mobile tolling platforms to facilitate use of payment via smartphones Highway 407 in the province of Ontario Canada has no toll booths and instead reads a transponder mounted on the windshields of each vehicle using the road the rear licence plates of vehicles lacking a transponder are photographed when they enter and exit the highway This made the highway the first all automated toll highway in the world A bill is mailed monthly for usage of the 407 Lower charges are levied on frequent 407 users who carry electronic transponders in their vehicles The approach has not been without controversy In 2003 the 407 ETR settled 15 a class action with a refund to users Throughout most of the East Coast of the United States E ZPass operated under the brand I Pass in Illinois is accepted on almost all toll roads Similar systems include SunPass in Florida FasTrak in California Good to Go in Washington state and ExpressToll in Colorado The systems use a small radio transponder mounted in or on a customer s vehicle to deduct toll fares from a pre paid account as the vehicle passes through the toll barrier This reduces manpower at toll booths and increases traffic flow and fuel efficiency by reducing the need for complete stops to pay tolls at these locations E ZPass lanes at a New Jersey Turnpike I 95 Toll Gate for Exit 8A in Monroe Township New Jersey United States By designing a toll gate specifically for electronic collection it is possible to carry out open road tolling where the customer does not need to slow at all when passing through the toll gate The U S state of Texas is using a system that has no toll booths Drivers without a TollTag have their license plate photographed automatically and the registered owner will receive a monthly bill at a higher rate than those vehicles with TollTags A similar variation of automatic collection is the Toll Roads in Orange County CA US wherein all entry or collection points are equipped with high speed cameras which read license plates and users will have 7 calendar days to pay online using their plate number or else set up an account for automatic debits The first all electronic toll road in the northeastern United States the InterCounty Connector Maryland Route 200 was partially opened to traffic in February 2011 16 and the final segment was completed in November 2014 17 The first section of another all electronic toll road the Triangle Expressway opened at the beginning of 2012 in North Carolina 18 Financing and management EditSome toll roads are managed under such systems as the Build Operate Transfer BOT system Private companies build the roads and are given a limited franchise Ownership is transferred to the government when the franchise expires This type of arrangement is prevalent in Australia Canada Hong Kong Indonesia India South Korea Japan and the Philippines The BOT system is a fairly new concept that is gaining ground colloquialism in the United States with California Delaware Florida Illinois Indiana Mississippi 19 Texas and Virginia already building and operating toll roads under this scheme Pennsylvania Massachusetts New Jersey and Tennessee are also considering the BOT methodology for future highway projects The more traditional means of managing toll roads in the United States is through semi autonomous public authorities Kansas Maryland Massachusetts New Hampshire New Jersey New York North Carolina Ohio Oklahoma Pennsylvania and West Virginia manage their toll roads in this manner While most of the toll roads in California Delaware Florida Texas and Virginia are operating under the BOT arrangement a few of the older toll roads in these states are still operated by public authorities In France some toll roads are operated by private or public companies with specific taxes collected by the state citation needed Arguments against toll roads EditToll roads have been criticised by whom as being inefficient clarification needed in various ways 20 They require vehicles to stop or slow down except open road tolling manual toll collection wastes time and raises vehicle operating costs citation needed Collection costs can reduce revenue by up to a third and revenue theft is considered by whom to be comparatively easy citation needed Where the tolled roads are less congested than the parallel free roads the traffic diversion resulting from the tolls increases congestion on the road system and reduces its usefulness citation needed There are concerns about government surveillance associated with both electronic tolls and some forms of classical toll collectionA number of additional criticisms are also directed at toll roads in general Toll roads are a form of regressive taxation that is compared to conventional taxes for funding roads they benefit wealthier citizens more than poor citizens 21 22 If toll roads are owned or managed by private for profit entities the citizens may lose money overall compared to conventional public funding because the private owners or operators of the toll system will naturally seek to profit from the roads 23 The managing entities whether public or private may not correctly account for the overall social costs particularly to the poor when setting pricing and thus may hurt the neediest segments of society 24 Arguments in favor of toll roads EditTolls help internalize some of the externalities of automobiles that is costs automobile traffic imposes on society that aren t borne by users 25 26 Through dynamic pricing trips that do not have to occur at rush hour can be moved to other times of the day or be avoided altogether This makes more efficient use of existing road capacity 27 28 As richer people on average own more cars 29 30 31 and drive more 32 33 using public funds especially those derived from regressive taxes like sales taxes represents wealth redistribution from poor households to rich ones In the case of toll roads those who drive more overwhelmingly richer people pay more and those who don t drive don t pay for road construction or maintenance Marginal roads whose traffic demand would never justify their construction are less likely to be built if their construction and maintenance have to be financed through tolls thus preventing an unsustainable suburban growth Ponzi scheme as described by Strong Towns 34 See also EditList of toll roads Automobile costs Barrier toll system High occupancy toll lane Private highway Shadow toll Shunpiking the practice of avoiding turnpikes Toll house Toll roads around the world Turnpike trusts England and Wales FreewayReferences Edit Road Pricing Defined Federal Highway Administration Archived from the original on July 2 2012 Retrieved May 23 2012 Gilliet Henri 1990 Toll roads the French experience Transrouts International Saint Quentin en Yvelines Toll Encyclopaedia Britannica Encyclopaedia Britannica Retrieved October 6 2020 Bernstein William J The Birth of Plenty How the Prosperity of the Modern World was Created p 245 6 McGraw Hill 2010 ISBN 978 0071747042 Herskovits Melville J 1967 Dahomey An Ancient West African Kingdom Volume I ed Evanston IL Northwestern University Press Jordi Philipp 2008 Institutional Aspects of Directive 2004 52 EC on the Interoperability of Electronic Road Toll Systems in the Community Europainstitut der Universitat Basel Parliamentary Papers 1840 Vol 280 xxvii Searle 1930 p 798 harvnb error no target CITEREFSearle1930 help Toronto ca Archived from the original on September 30 2007 Retrieved September 19 2014 Lostrivers ca Archived from the original on May 19 2014 Retrieved September 19 2014 Patton Phil October 12 2008 A 100 Year Old Dream A Road Just for Cars The New York Times Archived from the original on December 9 2008 Retrieved March 27 2010 BBS keyhole com Archived from the original on September 22 2009 Retrieved September 19 2014 Oehry Bernhard 2004 Tolling with Satellites a System Concept for Everybody in Jordi Philipp 2008 Institutional Aspects of Directive 2004 52 EC on the Interoperability of Electronic Road Toll Systems in the Community Europainstitut der Universitat Basel Union Watersphere lostinjersey wordpress com March 19 2009 Archived from the original on August 29 2013 Retrieved February 23 2012 407ETR com PDF Archived from the original PDF on January 1 2010 Michael Dresser February 7 2011 First phase of ICC to open Feb 22 Baltimore Sun Archived from the original on February 10 2011 Retrieved February 7 2011 Kevin Rector November 5 2014 Final section of ICC to Laurel new I 95 interchange to open this weekend Baltimore Sun Archived from the original on June 26 2015 Retrieved June 19 2015 Drivers roll on state s first toll road WRAL com January 31 2012 Retrieved April 7 2012 1 permanent dead link Roth Gabriel 1998 Roads in a market economy Ashgate Publishing Company p 122 ISBN 978 0 291 39814 7 Peters Jonathan R Kramer Jonathan K Summer 2003 The Inefficiency of Toll Collection as a Means of Taxation Evidence from the Garden State Parkway PDF Transportation Quarterly 57 26 Nakamura and Kockelman 2002 show that tolls are by nature regressive Robertson Christopher Charles Prozzi Jolanda Walton C Michael 2008 Who Uses Toll Roads An Analysis of Central Texas Turnpike Users Southwest Regional University Transportation Center Center for Transportation Research University of Texas at Austin p 30 Archived from the original on March 1 2018 Low income users unable to pay to use toll facilities however will not gain most of the benefits accessible to those with the ability to pay The study concludes that toll roads are a regressive form of funding road systems a href Template Cite book html title Template Cite book cite book a CS1 maint multiple names authors list link Kurtz David L Boone Louis E 2008 Contemporary Business p 17 ISBN 978 0324653847 Archived from the original on March 1 2018 a href Template Cite book html title Template Cite book cite book a CS1 maint multiple names authors list link von Hirschhausen Christian January 1 2002 Modernizing Infrastructure in Transformation Economies p 155 ISBN 9781781959787 Archived from the original on March 1 2018 Toll Roads and Externalities 18 August 2004 Yin Yafeng Lawphongpanich Siriphong 1 July 2006 Internalizing emission externality on road networks Transportation Research Part D Transport and Environment 11 4 292 301 doi 10 1016 j trd 2006 05 003 Dynamic Pricing on the Road How Managed Tolls Are Increasing Efficiency and Innovation 16 November 2015 Liu Louie Nan McDonald John F 1 November 1998 Efficient Congestion Tolls in the Presence of Unpriced Congestion A Peak and Off Peak Simulation Model Journal of Urban Economics 44 3 352 366 doi 10 1006 juec 1997 2073 Dargay Joyce M 1 November 2001 The effect of income on car ownership evidence of asymmetry Transportation Research Part A Policy and Practice 35 9 807 821 doi 10 1016 S0965 8564 00 00018 5 Getting Around or Just Getting By Where People Live with Fewer Cars Trulia com 16 May 2019 Household Individual and Vehicle Characteristics Bureau of Transportation Statistics Bts gov Rich versus Poor Near versus Far from Transit Who Travels More Transfers agazine org Low income households drive much less than high income households Bikeportland org 25 January 2016 The Growth Ponzi Scheme Strongtowns org External links Edit Wikimedia Commons has media related to Toll roads Turnpike Info Toll Tickets Official Website International Bridge Tunnel and Turnpike Association The International Bridge Tunnel and Turnpike Association IBTTA is the worldwide alliance of toll operators and associated industries that provides a forum for sharing knowledge and ideas to promote and enhance toll financed transportation services Toll Roads News from contractor perspective Turnpike Roads in England and Wales for background on toll roads during the turnpike era in England Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Toll road amp oldid 1117603767, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

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