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Mon, May. 19, 2008
Spanish firm offers $12.8 billion to lease Pa. Turnpike
By Paul Nussbaum INQUIRER STAFF WRITER
A Spanish toll-road operator won the bidding war to operate the Pennsylvania Turnpike, offering $12.8 billion for a 75-year lease, Gov. Rendell said today. The proposal by Abertis Infraestructuras, of Barcelona, must be approved by the Pennsylvania legislature, and legislative leaders in Harrisburg have said the plan faces tough sledding with lawmakers.
I-80 toll plans moving forward
The Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission will take over operation of I-80 and turn the freeway into a toll road under terms of a 50-year lease signed late Monday.The lease with the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation was signed just before a midnight deadline set by the legislature. Tolls could be in place by 2010 if permission is obtained from the Federal Highway Administration.
The state's two highway agencies made formal application for that approval on Saturday. In the application, the turnpike agency said it planned to double the money available for I-80 repairs and upgrades over the next decade to $2 billion.
The state's plan envisions as many as 10 toll booths between New Jersey and Ohio, with an initial cost of about $25 for motorists to drive the entire 311-mile highway.
The I-80 tolls would be set at the turnpike's rate, which is anticipated to be about 8 cents per mile in three years, for cars. That would represent a 33 percent increase from the current turnpike toll rate, which now averages about 6 cents per mile. (Tolls would be 23 cents per mile for trucks weighing 30,001 to 45,000 pounds.)
Tolls on I-80 are part of a plan created last July by the legislature to raise about $965 million more per year over the next 10 years for highways, bridges and mass transit. The new law, Act 44, has been under fire from northern Pennsylvanians along the I-80 corridor who fear it will hurt the economy of the region.
State Route 91 Value-Priced Express Lanes: Updated Observations
Transportation Research Record
Issue Volume 1812 / 2002
DOI 10.3141/1812-05
Pages 37-42
Abstract: Recently over 5 years of field observations were concluded of the value-priced express lanes that opened December 27, 1995, in the median of State Route 91, in Orange County, California. Data collection, covering about a year and a half of observations to establish baseline conditions before opening day, included traffic measurements, vehicle occupancy counts, transit ridership, and comprehensive travel surveys of current and former commuters. The corresponding data analysis included the calibration of choice models of route, occupancy, transponder acquisition, and time-of-day behavior of commuters and the estimation of air pollution emissions. Findings are presented on traffic trends, toll lane use, travelers' responses to changing congestion and tolls, shifts in ridesharing and transit use, shifts in trip purpose, differences associated with income and other demographics, public opinion, collision experience, and the results of choice and emissions modeling. As the first practical application of value pricing in the United States, the State Route 91 express lanes provide many important insights, both technical and institutional, some of which are relevant to the implementation of value-pricing projects in other locations.
Option to Rent: Great New Jersey Views, Many Lanes, Tollbooths Included
By KEN BELSON
TRENTON, Jan. 24 - The New Jersey Turnpike has long been the subject of song and an object of scorn. And now Gov. Jon S. Corzine, who earned a reputation as a shrewd negotiator on Wall Street, is thinking seriously about leasing it out, banking on the hope that it and two other toll roads could fetch as much as $30 billion and hold the key to solving some of the state's nagging fiscal difficulties.
Mr. Corzine's need to secure a fiscal Hail Mary pass is evident: budget talks are looming, and other states, including neighboring Pennsylvania, are interested in leasing their own toll roads, which could create stiff competition for investors' dollars in this emerging market. He is also mindful that any deal will have to be sold to wary voters.
Following recent leases of toll roads in Chicago and in Indiana, New Jersey is among two dozen states that have either formed partnerships with private groups or passed legislation paving the way for such agreements. But as lawmakers from California to Virginia have discovered, efforts to take toll roads, prisons, lotteries and other state assets private can quickly become mired in political quicksand.
Polls show that voters in New Jersey oppose the idea, and powerful lobbying groups, from commuters and trucking companies to environmentalists and public employee unions, are also skeptical.