Here's What's Hot On CBS11TV.COM:
Jun 16, 2009 10:51 pm US/Central
How Much Will You Pay To Drive On A Toll Road?
Reporting
Jack Fink
DALLAS (CBS 11 / TXA 21) ―
Poll
Would higher rates keep you from driving on North Texas toll roads?
You need the latest Flash player to view our Poll.
Click here to download.
Click here to
bypass this detection if you already
have the latest Flash Player.
Kerrie McCurdy said even if tolls go up, she'll keep taking the Dallas North Tollway to and from work in Addison, but she's not happy about it.
"Everything else is going up. You'd think they'd give us a break somehow," she said.
The North Texas Tollway Authority staff urged a board committee Tuesday to raise rates this September by 30 percent, from 11 cents a mile now to 14 and a half cents a mile.
The board's committee didn't take action, but its chairman, Paul Wageman says customers pay less here than the national average and haven't faced that many rate hikes. "Five toll increases in over half a century - the reality is we've been providing an exemplary public service and product to the region and we haven't been pricing it appropriately."
And regional transportation planners say studies they've conducted have shown drivers would actually be willing to pay a lot more than what the NTTA has proposed before they stopped taking area toll roads.
Michael Morris of the North Central Texas Council of Governments said, "The rates in the region are about half of what a true market or optimum revenue rate would be."
That threshold rate, he says, is 30 cents a mile.
So for example let's say John Doe drives around 16 miles from Parker Road in Plano to Wycliff plaza in Dallas. Right now, that costs him around $3.50 round trip each day.
The NTTA's proposed rate increase would have him paying more than $4.60 for a daily round trip.
But regional transportation planners say studies show he'd be willing to pay nearly $10 there and back every day. That's $192 a month and nearly $2,500 a year.
NTTA customer Don Barar believes the study's results. "I know I would continue to pay it. The reality is it takes if you try to take some of the surface streets, it's going to take considerably longer to do it."
But Kerrie McCurdy disagrees. "I would take another route definitely."
Despite the study, not one agency is proposing to raise tolls that high.
But the NTTA's full board could vote on the 30 percent toll hike next month.
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
Hollywood Hair
Click to enlarge
Stumble It!
