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Location: Living near our Nation's Capitol since 2010
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I sometimes drive from DC to Philadelphia. There is an easy way to avoid some of the Delaware tolls (expensive!!!) and it only takes maybe 10 minutes longer. There is a coffee shop just before I get back on 95N....I consider my coffee free.
I saw an inquiry here where someone was asking about traveling cross-country and avoiding tollroads. Being from California, I don't have a lot of experience with toll roads (only bridge tolls), but when we drove to NYC three or four years ago, we hit a lot of toll roads in Ohio and I didn't think they were terribly expensive or disruptive, or worth finding another route.
Is avoiding toll roads something a lot of people do? Aren't the toll roads better maintained than the others? Appreciate your thoughts!
I know someone who had a cash flow problem (due to irregular employment issues) and therefore avoided toll roads simply to save money.
I know someone who had a cash flow problem (due to irregular employment issues) and therefore avoided toll roads simply to save money.
I don't have a cash flow problem but I still avoid them to save money. Toll roads are a rip-off. Residents of our great state already pay a LOT of taxes (and don't let the lack of state income tax fool you; they get us in other ways). The government claims because of our huge population, they can't afford to build new roads, so all the new highways they are building in the future will be tolled. My response to that is, since we have a huge population, we have more taxpayers, and since we have no state income taxes, we actually have a greater proportion of taxpayers than other states since everyone gets dinged with a steep sales tax when they buy anything. Secondly, I'm a proponent for raising the gas tax. If it's actually true that we can't afford to fix the roads, charge us $0.02 or $0.03/gallon in gas taxes and fix the roads. A gas tax charges everyone who drives, but it's very small, not a huge repeated overcharge like tolls are. After all, we also need to fix roads other than highways.
Living in CT and on the 95 corridor is pretty difficult to get anywhere WITHOUT paying a toll.
To get into anywhere in New York, Queens or Brooklyn you are going to have to pay a toll. To get to Long Island you either need to pay a toll or pay like $40 for the ferry. To get down to DC I can cut across the Tappan Zee on 287 or across the Beacon Bridge on 84 and take that to 81, but there's tolls on each bridge on the return so I have to pay it once. I can avoid tolls traveling to Boston by taking 95, but from where I live in Connecticut it's easier & faster for me to take the tolled road Mass Pike.
Yep!!! I'm used to tolls and have found to try to avoid them I'm going over the river and through the woods, not worth it.
There is no way to get into the 5 boroughs of NY without paying a toll, numerous tolls depending on where you are going.
I remember Kansas City used to have a toll bridge, and they actually removed the tolls around 1990. I'll bet you never see that again. Kansas has a long-standing turnpike. It's about .05-.08 per mile ($2 now for me to drive from Kansas City to Lawrence). The turnpike paid for itself in the 1960s. I don't mind driving the turnpike, but I'm not a daily user either.
I certainly try to avoid toll roads on vacation. My family got caught in one of those "exact change only" turnpikes in Oklahoma one year and we had to ask the car behind us for the correct change.
Living in CT and on the 95 corridor is pretty difficult to get anywhere WITHOUT paying a toll.
To get into anywhere in New York, Queens or Brooklyn you are going to have to pay a toll. To get to Long Island you either need to pay a toll or pay like $40 for the ferry. To get down to DC I can cut across the Tappan Zee on 287 or across the Beacon Bridge on 84 and take that to 81, but there's tolls on each bridge on the return so I have to pay it once. I can avoid tolls traveling to Boston by taking 95, but from where I live in Connecticut it's easier & faster for me to take the tolled road Mass Pike.
I can get from anywhere in Connecticut to Manhattan without paying a toll. I-95 to the last exit before the GWB to New Jersey and then down the west side on 9A. Northbound, you take the Hutch/Merrit Parkway to avoid the toll on the New England Thruway part of I-95 in New York. You can also take one of the free bridges between Harlem and the Bronx.
You can also get to LaGuardia or anywhere on Long Island from Connecticut without paying tolls by taking a toll-free route to Manhattan and then crossing over to Queens on the Queensboro Bridge.
What you can't do is go from Connecticut to New Jersey and back without paying a toll to cross the Hudson. You'd have to drive to Albany to find a bridge without a toll.
Me? I just pay the tolls using EZPass and let Waze pick the fastest drive time. If it's equivalent drive time, I'll take the toll-free road.
In my local area, yes I avoid them. I know surface streets and other freeways that are of no cost to me and I will take them, however traveling out of town or in a strange city or town, No I dont avoid them, I just go where the GSP tells me.
I also object to toll roads these days as more and more governments sell their toll business to corporations, who then hike the toll fees to make a profit. The tolls are no longer just to recoup what it cost to build the toll. Once a toll business gets it, it's a for-profit business that will collect tolls for eternity....not to recoup the cost of the build, which is what the reason was initially (or at least what was promised to the voters).
If that were true, then governments would cease tolling roads once have generated enough revenue to cover the cost of building the road. But that has never happened once to my knowledge. Once the cost of construction has been recouped, do they lower the tolls so that the road will only generate enough revenue to cover its maintenance and operational costs? No, in fact, the tolls are hiked periodically.
Quote:
Originally Posted by bpollen
It's greed, pure and simple. ("We've got a popular route here...let's charge every car several dollars each way to use it...wadda country!")
This is true, regardless of whether the greedy party is a government agency or a "public / private partnership." It's just one more way they get your money.
Residents of our great state already pay a LOT of taxes (and don't let the lack of state income tax fool you; they get us in other ways).
Namely our property taxes (which includes at least one line item for road and bridge) and our sales taxes.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Scooby Snacks
The government claims because of our huge population, they can't afford to build new roads, so all the new highways they are building in the future will be tolled. My response to that is, since we have a huge population, we have more taxpayers, and since we have no state income taxes, we actually have a greater proportion of taxpayers than other states since everyone gets dinged with a steep sales tax when they buy anything. Secondly, I'm a proponent for raising the gas tax. If it's actually true that we can't afford to fix the roads, charge us $0.02 or $0.03/gallon in gas taxes and fix the roads. A gas tax charges everyone who drives, but it's very small, not a huge repeated overcharge like tolls are. After all, we also need to fix roads other than highways.
How about ending the diversion of fuel tax revenues away from highways?
I disagree completely with raising the fuel tax, especially since some of that money is diverted away from highway funding. We already pay 20 cents per gallon in state fuel tax. Along with that, there is federal fuel tax of 18.4 cents and 24.4 cents per gallon for gasoline and diesel, respectively. Thus, we pay a total of 38.4 cpg for gasoline and 44.4cpg for diesel.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Scooby Snacks
If it's actually true that we can't afford to fix the roads
It's not true at all. They never say "we can't afford to build toll lanes" or "we can't afford to build a new soccer stadium" or "we can't afford to increase welfare benefits" or "we can't afford to buy more land for a greenbelt or a park." When they say "we can't afford to ___," what they're really saying is "we don't want to fund ____, because we'd rather spend that money on something else."
I never avoid them. The toll roads around here are high speed, are in great condition and save a huge amount of time. Why would I avoid them?
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