Toll hike looms on Phila.-N.J. bridges

Tolls are likely to increase on the Benjamin Franklin, Walt Whitman, Betsy Ross and Commodore Barry bridges early next year, officials said today.

The amount of any increase hasn't been determined. Some officials of the Delaware River Port Authority, which runs the Philadelphia region's four biggest bridges, have suggested that a $1 increase, to $4, is likely. Others want a $2 raise, to $5.

The last toll increase on the DRPA bridges was in January 2000, when the tolls were increased from $2 to $3. Tolls are paid only by westbound motorists, and E-Z Pass users who make 18 or more trips a month get an $18 discount.

The prospect of a toll increase comes as other transportation agencies in the region and around the nation are increasing their rates. SEPTA and New Jersey Transit raised fares earlier this year, and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey is contemplating raising the toll on the George Washington Bridge and Lincoln and Holland Tunnels to $8, from the current $6.

"It does seem apparent, based on what we've been told, that [a toll hike] is a necessary thing we're going to have to do," said Robert W. Bogle, one of the Pennsylvania commissioners on the DRPA board. "We have to maintain and secure the bridges."

Bogle said the Port Authority, which will adopt its operating and capital budgets next month, wants to avoid the kind of calamity that occurred in Minnesota in August, when a highway bridge collapsed, killing 13.

"We're trying to look forward, to prevent that kind of thing," Bogle said.

Jeffrey Nash, vice chairman of the DRPA, said discussion of a toll hike was "premature," but he also invoked the Minnesota calamity.

"We're not going to let what happened there, happen in our region," he said.

John H. Estey, the chairman of the Philadelphia Regional Port Authority who chairs the DRPA as Gov. Rendell's stand-in, said talk of a toll hike would have to wait until the ongoing budget talks to culminate next month.

"Obviously, we have an aging infrastructure.  ... And these things don't take care of themselves," Estey said after today's DRPA monthly meeting. "We're going to have to take a hard look at the budget."

The DRPA owns the four bridges, which are its main source of income, and also the PATCO commuter rail line from Lindenwold to Philadelphia, the RiverLink ferry that operates between Philadelphia and Camden and the Philadelphia Cruise Terminal.

The agency also has expanded its mission to an economic-development authority, investing heavily in projects aimed at helping revive the Camden waterfront.

The agency's current operating budget is $222.5 million, and its capital budget is $47.1 million.

Talk of toll increases came on the same day that the DRPA board approved a raise and a new three-year contract for the agency's chief executive officer, John Matheussen.

Matheussen is to receive $213,076 a year, including car allowance and other benefits. That's up from $195,000 a year.