Maryland Proposes Raising Tolls on 7 Major Highways, Bridges, Tunnels
This story appears in the June 13 print edition of Transport Topics.
The Maryland Transportation Authority on June 2 proposed significantly increasing tolls over the next two years on seven highways, bridges and tunnels in the state.
If the plan is approved after a 60-day comment period, a 5-axle truck traveling on Interstate 95 — the largest north-south route along the East Coast — will pay $48 by July 2013, compared with $30 today.
In addition, by the same date the 5-axle toll on I-95’s Fort McHenry Tunnel in Baltimore will be $24, up from the current $12.
MTA also proposed raising the truck roll rate on the Bay Bridge to $48 by 2013. The current toll is $15 on that span, the William Preston Lane Jr. Memorial Bridge, which carries U.S. 50 and 301 traffic between Annapolis and the Eastern Shore of the Chesapeake Bay.
Despite the plan to increase tolls, the state’s trucking association said it was pleased MTA’s proposal would not raise tolls on trucks until January, rather than Oct. 1.
Carriers with annual contracts that include toll costs would have been hard hit by an original plan to begin increasing all tolls in October, said Louis Campion, president of the Maryland Motor Truck Association.
“So carriers operating on a calendar-year contract will have an opportunity to, hopefully, attempt to recoup some of their costs associated with this increase when they renegotiate their contracts,” Campion said.
The second toll increase for both trucks and cars would kick in July 2013.
Overall, the new toll rates would raise an estimated $77 million in revenue during the first fiscal year, MTA estimated. The authority said it needs the money to pay for long-overdue maintenance and upgrades.
Nine public hearings will be held between June 9 and June 27 so authority members can hear comments on the proposed toll plan. A final authority vote will be scheduled later this summer.
The hearing schedule, as well as the proposed toll rates for trucks, can be found on the Maryland Motor Truck Association’s website, www.mmtanet.com.
Around Baltimore, the current $12 rate for a 5-axle truck at the three tolled MTA facilities would rise to $18 in January and $24 in July 2013 if the toll proposal is passed.
Besides the Fort McHenry Tunnel, the MTA facilities around Baltimore are the Harbor Tunnel, which carries Interstate 895, and the Francis Scott Key Bridge, which carries Interstate 695.
Other affected toll facilities would include the Thomas J. Hatem Memorial Bridge, which carries U.S. 40 traffic across the Susquehanna River between Havre de Grace and Perryville in northeast Maryland. The current $30 toll for a 5-axle truck would rise to $36 in January and to $48 in 2013.
MTA also said the toll on the Harry W. Nice Memorial Bridge, which carries U.S. 301 across the Potomac River near Morgantown, Md., to Dahlgren, Va., would rise in January to $30 from $15 and to $48 in 2013.
However, tolls on the MTA’s new Intercounty Connector would not be affected by the new rate schedule. Only one leg of the new highway is open.
MTA said its eight facilities are supported solely by tolls and that it does not receive money from the state’s transportation trust fund.
It said the proposed increases are dramatic because it has been decades since rates have been raised — for cars, anyway.
While car tolls stagnated or were reduced in recent years, truckers have had to absorb three rate increases in six years — in 2001, 2003 and 2009, Campion said.
