Turnpike dials down toll hike plan

This is better?

Raise the gas tax!!!!!!!! Evenly distribute the cost of the Big Dig to ALL RESIDENTS of MA, not just us commuters of the pike. This is still BS. I call shenanigans.

Where is the equity? Those hikes should be reversed. $5.50 to come from the North Shore and $1.50 from the West? Where is the fairness?

a monthly fee for the transponder is rediculous, no matter how small the dollar amount

um... and for all of those who already bought a transponder are we now getting the fee on top of our purchase

So let me get this straight... if i already paid my $25.95 transponder fee, I still have to pay $0.50/mo?!? Isn't that double taxation? I'm returning my transponder as of Feb 1st.. screw the Mass Pike

great...only $5 for the ted williams. whew...that is MUCH more fair for us on the North Shore. Good to know we've got such intelligent people serving on this farce of a board.

Keep enjoying the free ride all of you folks along Rt 93 (you know,,,Rt 93, the road that gets the most benefit from the Big Dig.)

I guess the gas tax just made too much sense for our state government.

I said it from the beginning! If they start with a higher number a smaller number won't seem as bad!

They blew their chance with that stunt with the transponders. NO TOLL HIKE AT ALL!!! The Turnpike Authority has shown that they are nothing more than a bunch of petty thieves and need to be shut down. The Legislature has to sprout a backbone and start working for the taxpayers/voters instead of special interest If they chose to go against the taxpayers/voters, then the taxpayers/voters need to show them the door.

So not only did I have to pay the @25.95 for my transponder, but now I have to pay $.50 per month to have it. How is that fair...It is going to be cheaper to pay cash than have the transponders.

I'm guessing that I'm now going to pay 50 cents per month per transponder despite the fact that I purchased them for $25 several years ago. I think they are free through the state of New York.

What about cost cutting and reform?
Join Stop the Pike Hike and let your voice be heard!
www.stopthepikehike.org

LIES!!! ALL LIES!!!!!!!

The Bay of Pigs had better management than both the Turnpike Authority and the T.

$5 is still a ridiculous amount of money just to go between 2 sections of the city. The fact remains that people north and east of the city are being asked to shoulder a huge portion of the 93 Tunnel, which they aren't even necessarily using (for those who are unaware, the lions' share of the Big Dig's $18B cost came from building the I-93 tunnel, not the TW/Sumner/Calahan tunnels where the tolls are being raised).

I hope the outrage does not subside simply because they're now proposing a slight reduction in the tolls.

And an increase in the gas tax too? This would be no break for those of us who pay tolls. The tolls have to come down.

another situation were those who wait get the deal....i buy mine ahead of time and now must also pay.....those who didn't get one for free....the theifpike makes another $5.4m a year to fund their bloated salaries....the legal theft never stops....how about costs cutting like the rest of the world....tools

This is probably waht they planned from the beginning. Scare everyone with the crazy amounts and then seem like they are giving in by "settling" for the smaller increases. $2.00 at the tunnels is still a 67% increase!!!

So now they're just going to ignore the fact that 1 million people recently bought these transponders for $26, and now those of us who shelled out that money have to pay the $.50/month fee. Typical...

This is probably waht they planned from the beginning. Scare everyone with the crazy amounts and then seem like they are giving in by "settling" for the smaller increases. $2.00 at the tunnels is still a 67% increase!!!

raise the gas tax and eliminate all tolls. all they do is cause traffic and encourage the overuse of adjacent local roads!!!

I disagree. The Pike is saddled with debt that doesn't belong to it. Remove all tolls and increase the gas tax. I'm also unclear on the transponder fee. Does this mean I paid for my transponder and now have to pay .50 a month in addition, where new users get the device free.

So, the annual increase for tunnel commuters will only be $520 for a workday user, plus the new transponder fee of $ 6 per year?
Rt. 99, a snack , some music ahdn a long commute still looks better.
Count on gridlock for Rt. 16 and Rt. 99.
Of course, Boston could consider waiting cars 'parked' and hand out tickets.
But if I have to take the T to/from my job, that will cancel any evening volunteer work in Boston.

I ordered my transponder from Maryland. It is free with no monthly fee. Screw MA...

Agree with the raising of the gas tax. We're all in this together!
And, of course, a good time to check expenses.

The tolls need to come down. The turnpike users are saddled with debt that does not belong to them. This debt was unfairly placed on turnpike commuters. The debt belongs to those that use all roads within the state. I think the boycott should go forward. Our representatives are not listening. Raise the gas tax and REMOVE ALL TOLLS

The tolls on the masspike have to be paid both ways but only one way on the tunnels. It still is not as high as the TW tunnel but if you go further than Weston there are additional tolls on the Masspike. I drive every day and never use the Big Dig roads (get off at The Pru) and pay more for it than the people who actually benefit coming from the south shore.

Saw this coming a mile away. There should be a cap for increases.

Instead of hosing the tunnel users for $3.50 more, let's only stick it to them for $2.00. Did you think this would just breeze by?

And why are new users getting a break? How about sending me a check for the $25 I dished out years ago, then I'll pay you the $.50 monthly tab.

Are there any intelligent people on this board or are we doomed dealing with mental midgets? I guess if you throw enough crap against the wall, some of it will stick. They just don't get it.

So now that they are going to charge 50 cents a month for my transponders, are they going to refund the $26 for the transponders? Or, are they going to waive the fee for existing transponder owners?

Or, do I now have the privelege, as one of the first wave of drivers to join Fastlane, of paying for my transponders and paying a fee each month? I think I know the answer.

how about me make present and past lawmakers each cough up $50,000 for the mess they put us in with the mismanagement of the Big Crap?

barco1, how does one go about getting a free transponder?

Raise the tolls and pay the debt.. Put a toll booth on southeast distray, toll both on 95 and 93 and inprove the roads.

REASONABLE toll increases are to be expected. And the increases should be capped by amount and freqency to eliminate this "bargaining" nonsense. People will still avoid the tolls at $5.50. The State needs another source of revenue such as the gas tax. Why should one part of the population be required to pick up this burden? We still pay a toll for using the tunnels but it's the overruns that we won't pay.

It's time to put intelligence into the Board. Or why don't we start savings by removing their salaries?

What a bunch of winers on here. Have any of you ever visited another state? The tolls we pay here in Massachusetts are below the average paid in other states. Its really simple, we need more revenue.

If your going to drive the backroads just to save 50 cents a month you obviously were not a math major .. huh? Ever here of the phrase "time is money" ? Anyway everyone just has to get used to paying more for everything.

When I started driving I was paying 18.9 cents a gallon. The dollar is worth about 30 cents now, compared to what it used to be. Of course tolls will go up. Can we stop the wining now?

NOT ACCEPTABLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! What kind of fools do they think we are?!?

The Toll Avoider:
There is _one_ person on the board who seems to be treating the issue with some thought: Mary Connaughton has repeatedly voted against the toll hike and advocated looking for a more equitable solution. I have no idea why, though, since board members are appointed and have no incentive to take the public's feelings into consideration. You see, the problem isn't with the people on the board, it's systematic. The board members are just doing what's logical from their perspective. The problem isn't the with the board members themselves, the problem is that their jobs... and the Turnpike Authority itself... exist. The solution, therefore, is to get rid of the Authority (and all of the patronidge jobs that go with it).

RAISE THE TOLLS, IF YOU DON'T LIKE THEM MOVE.................

I'd like to know why the Globe took down the other story and comments about the Pike bilking us .50 cents a transponder so that we can keep the $70,000 a year toll collectors.

GET YOUR TRANSPONDER from NY or NH for FREE and don't let the thieves do this to us.

I commute from Plymouth to Watertown and use both I-93 and the Mass Pike. Believe me - there is no "Big Dig" advantage on the southern end of I-93. Traffic is backed-up to the Braintree split every day, nearly all day. The Big Dig break kicks-in after Mass Ave exit and I get off at the Pike exit, so no advantage for me. Because I sit in crawling traffic, I'm burning gas and my car needs maintenance more often. So while I can appreciate the concerns of those North and West of the city, there is no "free pass" anywhere. Roads are in disrepair all over the state. Highway improvement and maintenance is a state responsibility and we all need to pay for it. So I say hike the gas tax - even though we will be climbing back to $4.00+ soon - this is the fairest solution.

Why aren't they crediting the $26.00 fee that 720,000 people paid when they first got a transponder. The Mass PIke could refund it up front and then recollect it at $0.50/month or they can credit it at $0.50/month for 52 months. However, in no case should these early adopters who have been saving the Mass Pike money be charged twice. Also, why wasn't this mentioned before today's board vote? Shouldn't this be something that is discussed in an open meeting and reported on by the media.

And what do you pay, FFED?

paul:
Let me guess... you're a lifelong MA resident (probably one of the ones who voted for many of the yahoos who got us into the $18B Big Dig mess) who doesn't understand this issue at all. At least that's what your comment would indicate.
Most of the people here aren't just "whining about the price of the tolls", but rather are outraged by the fact that people who utilize the road that is the main reason for their high cost (i.e. the 93 section of the central artery tunnel) don't pay any tolls at all. Please become more informed before speaking your mind.

Funny how the tolls provoke such a reaction yet when the citizens had a chance to make a real impact last November they declined to eliminate the state income tax.
WUSSES!!
You told these idiots last November you will tolerate their excesses. You blew it. Learn from your mistakes and vote for such a repeal next time.

Why am I paying $.50 a month for my Fastlane which I use once a month? This state is a ripoff.

Are we to buy this?
First they scare the bejesus out of us with outrageaous proposals of toll hikes, then they get us to "agree" to a gas tax instead now they get to the real toll hike that they wanted and then we'll get a tax on gas too.
What a great state.

My cable bill has increased many, many times more than the tolls and gas tax I pay. Of all the costs I pay for my car, including parking and insurance, this is absolute peanuts. (Not to mention my first car in 1976 cost $2900 including tax - a brand new Datsun with no options). And yet we fight among ourselves something as small as 50 cents to cover the costs of providing transponders. As a person frequently stuck waiting in long lines along the Turnpike trying to get to the Fast Lanes because so many cars paying cash are blocking access, I wish transponders would be required - or in the very least, deeply discount the Fast Lane use and significantly raise the cash tolls for those drivers to pay for the toll-takers salaries.

I got a idea, how about CHANGE the way pensions work for city and towns?? How about CHANGE the amount of people on the state payroll or reduce the wages most of them make??? Both Weld and Romney tried to do but they were fought every step of the way.....This guy is a phoney and is still trying to "sneak" a tax increase through...He can taste a tax increase, he's got soooooo many plans to do things with his new money....

Side streets it is!

Screw these charlatans. Let's see how well the suburbs can manage pike traffic.

Return your Fast Lane transponder and get an E-ZPass from New York, New Hampshire, or Delaware!!! They don't charge monthly fees!!!

Absolutely ridiculous. These toll increases are going to push moderate income households out of the boston/metro area. If the state isn't careful they are going to see a significant loss of residents who are raising families. I know that I am considering moving out of state.

I have NY EZ Pass transponders in my vehicles... I wonder if I'll have to pay this monthly fee too.. I've had my NY account for 10 years.

NY EZPASS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Free and easy!

Oh great. There goes the $0.50 discount for having a transponder. Now that I don't use the transponder as much as I used to, the monthly fees will be more than I save in discounts.

One silver lining maybe, and that's a big maybe. The batteries in these things tend to last 3-4 mayyybe 5 years. When the program first started we were not responsible for replacement costs, but they changed that not to long ago so that we DID have to pay for replacements. So now they get rid of the replacement cost and make us pay every month instead. Ugh. Maybe we should jsut fry the batteries every year somehow to make a point and cause them to have to get us more free replacements.

It just never ends. Without fail, every 3-6 months is an increase in the tolls. I am just looking for a shred of future planning that tells me somewhere, someone is thinking about next year and the year after because these hikes are unsustainable.

Can all of these board members/the governor really be this stupid?

The toll/gas tax solution is simple; finding the political will to make it happen is another issue. Sound well maintained infrastructure is a public benefit and this asset must be paid for. The fair and equitable method of payment is the governmental challenge, that must be managed by our political leaders. The state needs to manage these resources for the benefit of all its residents, even when the benefits aren't directly understood by all. Highway systems are much simpler (cheaper) outside of the 128 belt and should be handled differently then more urban complex highways (more expensive) approaching the Boston urban core. The most expensive highways are within the urban core (Big Dig, Sumner/Callahan and Tobin Bridge).

The first dividing line is the 128 Belt and these roadways should be free and unimpeded by tolls for efficient and safe operation, and managed and maintained with the use of the state wide gas tax and matching federal funds for capital improvements.

The next dividing line is the area between the 128 Belt and the Boston urban core and once again, these roadways should be free and unimpeded by tolls for efficient and safe operation, and managed and maintained with the use of the state wide gas tax and matching federal funds for capital improvements. The exception would be the Alston Brighton extension into Boston which really is more like an urban core highway. A fair toll (barrier free) should be in place to ensure a strong maintenance for this portion of the road, capital costs for improvements should be paid from state gas tax revenues.

The final area is the Boston urban core the Big Dig, Sumner/Callahan Tunnels and the Tobin Bridge. These complex heavily used highways need an additional user fee participation above the state gas tax for maintenance. The current tolls plaza's for the Ted Williams and Sumner Callahan Tunnels and Tobin Bridge need to be replaced by barrier free open road tolling technology. This technology allows unimpeded flow of traffic (no toll both slow down) but does toll the user through a transponder (fast-lane/ez-pass) or through plate recognition technology. The transponder user would get a discount because the plate recognition technology has a higher administrative cost. The Big Dig construction capital bonds of $2.2B need to be removed from the MTA debt so that the tolls are only dealing with the highways more intensive maintenance costs which are paid by the users through tolls. In addition, the I-93 portion of the Big Dig should be tolled with barrier free tolling as you enter the project limits; from the south just before the Mass Ave exit and from the North just before the Storrow/Leverett Circle exit.

In order to prevent significant driver diversion to local roads to access Boston the tolls need to stay at or below the current level of $2-3 with the transponder discount. One last point the local resident discounts frozen at 40 cents must go away.

In order to implement this plan you would have to increase the gas tax by about 15-20 cents as it hasn't been raised since 1992. When last raised in 1992 costs where must lower and the average fuel economy of vehicles was must lower. The gas tax needs to be indexed to inflation to ensure the value of the tax stays steady with the costs it pays for. There is a position to be made for a tiered gas tax; the highest inside the 128 Belt at an additional 20 cents and a lower tax outside the 128 Belt an additional 15 cents, but that starts to split hairs.

I'm so ordering a transponder from another state now. There is absolutely zero financial incentive to keep the one from MA.

Traveling through other states with transponder systems, the Massachusetts system is stone age in comparison. NY accepts the transponder in all lanes, as do other states like NJ and Delaware. Other states have high-speed lanes where you have to only slow to 55 MPH. Other states offer discounts to transponder owners, or some sort of priority scheme to allow those with transponders some advantage.

Not to mention the asinine configuration of the toll booths in Western MA where you have to cut all the way over with limited visibility to make the toll booth.

Perhaps we could outsource the running of the tolls to a state like NY or NJ, which seem to have largely figured out this really difficult problem years ago.

How about NO? Enough is enough; those of us that paid that fee, should be grandfathered into that, not taken out the 'back door' through our 'back pockets'. When will it end? I, as well, will be returning BOTH my transponders.....maybe, when the Turnpike Authority has a ROOMFUL of these, they will realize, yet, another mistake they've made.

gotta pay those high useless salaries somehow. This state sucks

When is Deval 150K per year hack neighbor getting his pink slip????

the only way to fix anything is to let the state go bankrupt and into receivership.

I'll be returning my Fastlane transponder and cancelling my account. I'll then get an EZ PASS transponder from NH and avoid paying the 50 cents a month. If enough Mass. residents do this the schmucks who manage the Pike will suddenly find themselves even further behind on their revenue.

I can't wait to vote this bum out of office.

Moderate Joe, The Tobin bridge has high maintenance costs? What a joke! Have you driven on the thing? It hasn't been maintained for ten years.

I love you lemmings talking about how the state needs more money. Please! The state needs to stop spending like a drunken sailor on shore leave in Miami. Problem solved.

This governor, Cadillac Devall, has to go. He's horrible. Why doesn't he stop spending. That's what the working joe has to do. Instead of doing that, he continues to come of new ways to tax. TYPICAL DEMOCRAT!!!! SPEND, SPEND, SPEND!!! Stop spending and stop taxing!!! There's a disconnect when it comes to common sense with him.

Yes We Can ... have the ultimate in Taxation Without Representation by taxing our neighbors that work here and pay the 5.3% Massachusetts Income Tax for absolutely no benefit except for using the roads. As for the governor stating NY tolls Mass drivers, the NY Thruway is tolled through the entire state. The same applies to Interstates 95 and 93 and Route 3 in NH. VT and CT have no tolls on Interstate 91 but that isn't stopping the governor from adding toll booths there. These other states don't single out Massachusetts drivers but Massachusetts is going to try to do this so it might possibly - possibly- remove internal tolls in the state. This is lunacy of the highest order as those in the State House will add the border tolls and never get around to the possible elimination of the internal tolls. Further, these roads were built with funds from the federal gas taxes and they should be non-tolled or Massachusetts should pay back all of the federal money used to construct Interstates 91, 93, and 95 (including the federal contribution to the Big Dig) and the latest reconstruction of Route 3.

Do you really want to discourage people from out of state from coming into Mass? And what is this deal about cash customers paying more than transponder users... I come to Mass for business about 2 month out of the year-- cant get a transponder because I rent cars.... Maybe I should take my business to VT??????

they need to raise all the revenue they can...this way next year all the senators and reps can get a 10% raise instead of the paultry one they got this year...Thank you all on beacon hill

I don't understand, no one seems to be in favor of this toll increase. And it's not like Mass. residents are dumb when it comes to revenues, we voted to keep the income tax.

So what gives? And more importantly, why are you letting them get away with it?

Chris - Renting cars isn't a barrier to owning a transponder...you can pack it in your suitcase and use the transponder with any car you want!