Tolls part of future

What we Westerners call a freeway goes by different names in the East. “Turnpike,” for example, or more to the point, “toll road.”

But “free” is going to be a limited concept on the region’s major highways in coming years. The traditional funding sources of the past can no longer cover the price of building and maintaining an adequate infrastructure.

The Washington state Transportation Commission has indicated tolls are not a promising source of local matching funds to build Spokane’s North-South Corridor between Interstate 90 and Wandermere, but in several parts of the state, tolling is seen as part of the funding solution for major bridge and highway needs known as “megaprojects.” And many Eastern Washingtonians will feel at least a part of the impact.

Replacing the State Route 520 bridge between Seattle and Bellevue, for example, is a high-priority need in that populous region, and tolling is expected to play a role, not only in paying for it but also in managing congestion through the use of variable rates. Lest savvy motorists try to evade the toll by using I-90 a few miles south, you may have to pay a toll as you cross Lake Washington on the most used east-west route in and out of Seattle. Even Snoqualmie Pass is a candidate for tolling, as is a proposed Interstate 5 bridge between Vancouver and Portland.

In Idaho, legislation was introduced this year to allow local toll roads as a means of paying for needed routes. The measure failed, but even some of those who voted no – Republican Sen. Jim Hammond, of Post Falls, for one – admitted that the concept merits further discussion.

In areas where new construction is not planned, tolls can encourage drivers to avoid the most congested hours. Variable rates are being tested on Highway 167 near Renton, and the Puget Sound region has experimented with a concept known as cordon pricing, which involves a fee for entering a heavy-traffic area.

These strategies have promise if they can improve highway capacity by using it more efficiently rather than building more of it.

The days of the feds picking up 90 percent of the Interstate system are over, and what dollars Congress does generate may no longer be distributed as evenly across the country as they used to be. An article in the current issue of the Atlantic argues that federal transportation funding should be concentrated in the metropolitan chokepoints where lost productivity totals in the billions. Seattle, with all its traffic nightmares, didn’t appear among the 14 worst bottlenecks.

The message for Spokane-area motorists who are kept busy dodging potholes or kept waiting behind Canadian-bound semis? Don’t count on the solutions of the past – namely state and federal checkbooks. And ranting about tolls will be a waste of time.

Attention needs to be turned instead to a variety of strategies, from carpooling and transit to telecommuting and flexible work schedules. And, at times, tolls.