I really haven’t made up my mind about tolling I-70. However, if tolls are the only way that it will ever be widened, then I’m for them and will pay it. I’ll say the same about I-44, too. The drags on both 70 and 44 in rural Missouri are getting more and more like restrictor plate racing.
P-D:
Ron Leone, executive director of the Missouri Petroleum Marketers & Convenience Store Association, said that his group opposes tolls on I-70 and that they should be subject to a public vote.
As you know, I was the manager of a small chain of gas stations through most of 2010. One of those stations was in Columbia close to an I-70 exit, and another was in Rolla close to I-44. I can’t figure out what particular grind the Association has against tolls — I don’t see highway exit gas stations being hurt or helped whether there are or aren’t tolls. Maybe they figure that some people will steam at Missouri having tolls on 70, and boycott Missouri gas until they get to Illinois or Kansas. Problem is, both states’ pump prices are more expensive than Missouri, so that strategy is only cutting off one’s nose to spite one’s face. If 44 in Missouri is ever tolled, then that argument wouldn’t hold water because 44 in Oklahoma is also toll.
Here’s an interesting nugget:
St. Charles County Executive Steve Ehlmann, through a representative, urged the panel to end the tolled section of I-70 west of Wentzville — and possibly outside that county altogether.
How Machiavellian of him. Put the first westbound tollbooth at the St. Charles-Warren county line, so that 70 is free in all of St. Charles County, but the tolls start in Warren County to serve as a de facto barrier to urban sprawl, thereby containing as much of it as possible in St. Charles County.
Really, if there are going to be tolls on 70, the first WB booth should be west of Warrenton, and on the other side of the state, the first EB booth should be in far eastern Jackson County.
The down side? If the statewide toll is $10, as some speculate, and your car gets 25 highway miles to the gallon, it would be an effective $1.31/gallon gas tax to drive from I-470 in Independence to I-64 in Wentzville, if that is indeed the tolled section. Ironically, the more fuel efficient is your vehicle, the higher an effective per-gallon gas tax would be this toll.
I don’t know the interstates though the area that well but …..
Tolls are bad because they are just a tax. Illinois tolls were supposed to go away when the bonds were paid off (I was told), they didn’t, and then the tolls got raised eventually.
That being said, I would support half cent or cent increase in the gas and diesel tax as that distrubutes the burden more evenly. Tolls hammer the people that live just on the other side of the booth and people always inside or outside get a free ride. Also, a toll system requires more gub’mint employees …. that in itself ought to be enough of a deterrent.
I imagine that if tolls happen, it would be an automated transponder tag system. At that point, the virtual toolbooths would be at far many more places than manned cash-and-coin toolbooths would be, because both 70 and 44 have almost continuous outer roads, and it would be easy for someone to ditch past the toolbooth by getting off at the exit before the booth, using the outer road, then get back on the highway at the next interchange. If there are, say, 10 virtual booths as opposed to 3 real booths between STL and KC, then the outer road trick would be too much of a hassle. I would also anticipate that the outer roads between the exits where there are booths on the mainline would be made discontinuous, cut apart and cul-de-saced to eliminate that trick.