Ask not for whom the toll tolls, it tolls for you, Virginia

In the words of the old Monty Python’s Flying Circus gambit, “and now for something completely different” we bring to the citizens of Virginia a novel idea, tolls on Interstate 95.

Twenty years after the citizenry hailed the extinction of tolls on the busiest East Coast Interstate highway, we find ourselves on the verge of installing them again. This time, however, instead of having the toll booths marking the former Richmond-Petersburg Turnpike, the toll booths will sit like a Rottweiler’s collar on the edge of North Carolina.

It’s hard to make an argument that something isn’t needed to offset the road repair and construction costs generated by the traffic flow.  Just take a drive on I-95, or I-64, or I-81, well you get the point, repair needs far exceed repair funds. But is turning back the clock to 1992 the right approach?

As it stands, the state expects to extract $4 per car and a monstrous $12 for large trucks, in booths located along the North Carolina border.  I suppose the road situation around Lake Gaston, not to mention the lake itself, will present enough of an obstacle that the truckers would happily pay the $12 just to be on their merry way. And, hey what the heck, with the cost of fuel coming down to nearly $3 per gallon what difference does it make to tack on another $12 per load?

Who knows, the truckers may even opt to pick up an EZ-Pass device so they can pay an extra $1 per month in addition to the cost of the tolls. Works for me, but then I don’t have much north-south driving exposure, so the tolls are no big deal to me.  Besides, I know most of the back streets and byways and can simply take a mini-detour near Roanoke Rapids and get back on the Interstate at Emporia, or vice versa as the case may be.

Take that, Virginia.

But my cheapnicity (sic) aside, something absolutely needs to be done to offset the enormous and mounting costs of highway maintenance.  VDOT estimates the cost of maintaining all 178 miles of I-95 over the next 25 years at $12.1 billion, and by today’s estimation only $2.5 billion, or 20 percent, will be available to do so.  What’s a transportation department to do?

Since by VDOT’s estimate, 40 percent of the state’s Interstate traffic rambles along on I-95, it seems some sort of fee or tariff would be in order.

In his essay, Civil Disobedience, Henry David Thoreau said he didn’t have a problem paying road taxes or local taxes in general, but he did not want his taxes to support government mechanisms, such as slavery, so he opted to become a tax rebel and refused to pay his taxes. That landed him in jail in 1848.  The state probably would have been better off just letting it go had they known then how Civil Disobedience would affect the country in the 1960s when wielded at the hands of Dr. Martin Luther King.  But that’s another story for another day.

If we think of some other way to generate that kind of money, the only other resource might be some kind of road tax tacked onto our annual state taxes.  That may indeed be an option, but it leaves one thinking that there are a great many “freeloaders” plying their trade on I-95, and other Interstate highways across the state.  So how does VDOT get into their pockets?

Hark, did someone out there say:  “user fee?” Yes, user fee. For my part, I try not to use I-95 as much as possible. If there’s another way to get where I want to go, I take it. But sometimes, the nature of my business leaves little choice and I end up picking up I-95 from the Temple Avenue entrances.

But I would argue that my Buick doesn’t do near the damage to the highway that those 18-wheelers do.  The big trucks scallop the road surface, making driving seem like some sort of carnival ride. Not that I am complaining, mind you, I like fresh vegetables, fuel at the gas station, and all those other goodies the truckers haul all around the US.  But I typically pay for any additional costs incurred due to fuel, salaries, or tolls, so any increase on the highway has a net effect on my family budget anyway.

So what’s a Virginian to do? Whether the state opts to put up new toll booths just south of its Welcome Center or not, somehow or someway, we Virginians will end up footing this bill. Maybe a toll isn’t such a bad deal after all.

Yeah, right.