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I-80 tolls: Up to 10 booths in three years

A first look at Pa.'s plan emerged in papers filed last week. It would cost motorists $25 to drive across the state.

Pennsylvania's plan for tolls on Interstate 80 envisions as many as 10 toll booths between New Jersey and Ohio, and an initial cost of about $25 for motorists to drive the entire 311-mile highway.

The state hopes to have the tolls in place within three years.

The first details of the state's plan emerged in an application submitted by the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission and the state Department of Transportation. The "expression of interest" was filed on Friday with the Federal Highway Administration, which must authorize any tolls because the highway was built largely with federal funding as part of the free interstate system.

Tolls on I-80 are a linchpin of the state's new transportation-funding law. The plan to provide about $950 million a year in added funding for highways and mass transit depends on toll increases on the Pennsylvania Turnpike, the new tolls on I-80, and the allocation of 4.4 percent of the revenue from the state sales tax.

The turnpike commission would operate and maintain I-80, under a 50-year lease from PennDot.

The I-80 tolls would be set at the turnpike's rate, the application said, noting it is anticipated to be about eight cents per mile in three years. That would represent a 33 percent increase from the current turnpike toll rate, which now averages about six cents per mile.

The tolls "would generate revenues allowing a dramatic increase in capital investment along I-80," the application said, "with an additional $1 billion being spent over the next decade, above and beyond PennDot's historic 'baseline' funding" of about $80 million a year.

The revenue from tolls on I-80 could be $15 million per month, said Joseph G. Brimmeier, chief executive officer of the turnpike commission.

The application noted what has been an annual embarrassment for PennDot: I-80's regular selection as "worst interstate" by the trucking magazine Overdrive.

With tolls, the application said, I-80 would be upgraded, repaved and rebuilt, with "enhanced maintenance coverage for winter weather events."

Winter maintenance is a sore spot for PennDot after thousands of motorists were stranded in a winter storm last February, primarily on I-78, but also on I-80 and I-81.

The turnpike commission has hired Wilbur Smith Associates, a transportation consulting firm headquartered in Columbia, S.C., to study the potential revenue from tolls on I-80 and the possible shift of traffic to other roads to avoid paying tolls.

Brimmeier said in a recent interview that he hoped Pennsylvania could receive conditional approval of its application in a matter of weeks. Then, he said, the turnpike commission would conduct an environmental study of the impacts of building toll plazas before seeking final federal approval in about a year.

The state's efforts to place tolls on I-80 ran into opposition last month from U.S. Reps. John E. Peterson and Phil English, both Republicans from northwestern Pennsylvania. They said the tolls would be costly to their constituents who use I-80 for local travel.

Peterson and English amended a transportation appropriations bill in Congress to prohibit the use of federal funding to install tolls on I-80. The House approved the bill and sent it to the Senate. Gov. Rendell, a Democrat, said last week he had been assured the amendment would be deleted in the Senate. Rendell said efforts would be made to minimize the impact of tolls on local residents.