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(E-mail ALL the OCTA Board Members by clicking HERE.)
If you think the tolls on OC’s existing toll roads are outrageous, you will be scandalized by the projections for the proposed toll lanes on the 405.
A report prepared by toll road revenue consultant Stantec provides actual estimates for one segment, the most heavily-traveled segment between the 22 and the 605.
Just for this three mile section, the consultant’s 2010 report projects $2.95 as a peak hour toll during the heaviest afternoon traffic segment for their projection year of 2020.
That’s in 2006 dollars; inflation will push that number up between now and the projected conversion of the two free carpool lanes to toll lanes in 2018.
To be fair, this is the maximum you would pay under their projection between 5 PM and 6 PM. Leave a little earlier to catch the lower toll between 4 PM and 5 PM, and you only pay $2.55. Wait til 8 PM, and your toll drops to 35 cents. Of course by 8 PM, you will be able to cruise along in free-flowing free freeway lanes.
During the middle of the day the projected toll would only be about $.90 for this stretch of road.
If those projected tolls don’t make you angry, consider this. On this section of the 405, OCTA is already building the two carpool lanes that they plan to convert to toll lanes, paying for them with your sales tax dollars provided by the Measure M half cent sales tax on everything you buy.
They are not building a new Express Lane on this segment. Nope, they are just converting the two carpool lanes that are already under construction as part of the $277 million West County Connector Project.
Of course, vehicles with three or more passengers can still ride free, as long as you have a transponder and have set up an account with OCTA. But the conversion of these lanes and changing the rules will exclude over half a million vehicles per year who would ride free under the current two passenger rule. About 2/3 of the carpools that would currently be free would be charged as much as $1.95.
This would not be the most expensive toll facility in Orange County. As of yesterday, the maximum Fastrak toll on the 91 on Friday afternoon is $10.05 for ten miles. The insolvent 73 toll road is $5.50 for 12 miles, or 45 cents per mile.
But unlike these other toll roads, these two lanes on this section that would be converted to toll lanes were completely built with taxpayer funds
Our Coverage Thus Far:
- “Lexus Lanes” on the 405? Help Stop the Latest Toll Road Outrage!
- Perfect Circularity: A 405 Toll Lane for the Sole Purpose of Funding a 405 Toll Lane?
- OCTA’s Will Kempton to Betray OC Voters?
- Proposal Unites Enemies in Costa Mesa, against HB Mayor Don Hansen.
- 405 Toll-Gate For Dummies: How the proposed toll lanes are illegal.
- My Modest Proposal to build “Expensiveways” on the 405
- A Taxpayer Bailout for the Failed 73 San Joaquin Hills Toll Road?
- Seal Beach and Westminster to Join Costa Mesa in opposing 405 tolls
- OCTA expects BILLIONS in revenue from 405 Tolls!
- 405 Toll Projection – $2.95 for Three Miles!
- Cooking the Books with Two VERY different sets of numbers…
- How We Can Defeat the 405 Toll Lanes! And … Meet Your OCTA Board!
- Huntington Beach Mayor Hansen Rebuffed by his own City Council
AND NOW, somebody has created the excellent…
No 405 Tolls.Com!
E-mail ALL the OCTA Board Members by clicking HERE.
The free ride is coming to an end; the golden age of the automobile driven on hugely subsidized roads is soon going to end.
So you don’t half to do a “cold turkey” that some bus trips, ride the train, get a bike with a basket and lock for the short hop to the store. Or start easy and car pool often.
Or, alternatively, for now we can stop the “let the very rich avoid the masses so they never have to care about the free part of the 405 again in exchange for a Pulido-Amante slush fund” proposal. Having stopped it, one can still get a bike.
Shit, I bought a bike Saturday. Got a bike and a bus pass. I’m still gonna stop this toll lane cuz it pisses me off.
Well if they want a toll road, it should be seperate from the 405 and its carpool lanes.
Enjoy your bike, I been thinking of getting a electric motor so I can keep up with the grandkids.
*Yep…Bureaucrats get big eyes….everytime they start counting cars going by when they are sitting in the back seat. “Count the blue ones…..count the red ones…count the white ones…….Red White and Blue….millions and millions of dollars going into their pockets……Blahhhhhh…..
No Toll Roads….No Reason Foundation….get a horse! Or better yet by a hybrid golf cart and call it a day!