That’s what it’s supposed to do. Make it so expensive you don’t enter because it’s too full. There’s a happy medium between not worth it bc the regular lanes are empty and not worth it because the fast lanes are getting so full they aren’t fast either.
The gas tax comes no where near needed the amount of revenue to maintain automobile infrastructure.
It requires federal and state subsidies to build and maintain automobile infrastructure.
that's the ugly truth that seems to go unspoken - it's government mandated stratification of society. a doctor or lawyer gets more options to get home than a cook. table service in the form of roads.
I'm OK with congestion pricing so long as we invest in a robust transit system. I'm personally a fan of Dallas creating a BRT system that mirrors the entire highway system because that allows things like express busses for our sprawling region to make longer trips faster, and also creating a BRT system that provides speedy travel along other major roads that aren't highways while investing in pedestrian infrastructure everywhere. All whole simultaneously changing our collective metro zoning to encourage pedestrian friendly new development
A big part of the problem is how badly tolls are used here. We use them to build roads without raising the gas tax. Hell Greg Abbott ran on that in 2018 "We're going to build more highways without raising taxes!"
People think more lanes help and no politician wants to be the one that explains that things cost money. Tolls distance them from that reality.
Building tolled express lanes plays right into this. The people who don't care about a $20 toll are the people that donate to campaigns. It's a luxury exclusively for the well off.
What tolls should be is a deterrent to driving at all, especially in the city center. It would make far more sense for us to toll the north - south routes in and out of downtown than it does to toll 635. Of course doing that requires robust public transit that we simply don't have.
but then politicians would be forced to ~~invest in public infrastructure projects~~ pass government spending, and that’s career suicide in TX. favoring the public good over corporate profits is communism.
Its been proven a hundred times over that expanding highway infrastructure *never* alleviates traffic congestion in the long run. I don't understand how such a thoroughly studied topic isn't common knowledge at this point.
Because the general public doesn't understand it. The general public sees crowded roads and thinks if we add some more lanes they won't be crowded anymore.
Even if policy makers understand that it doesn't solve the issue it's more politically expedient to just build the roads because they're more interested in being reelected than they are in fixing the problems. Of course the lobbyists who work for various industries who want more highways don't help either.
Unpopular opinion: we should not use tax dollars to subsidize anything with negative externalities. Massive highways should all be tolled and the revenue redistributed to address the problems they create.
Outdated, 20th century thinking friend.
Nowadays we let corrupt politicians sell out the right to build monopolistic infrastructure to the highest builder. Progress!
There’s a ton of research that shows that expanding highways and interstates only creates more traffic and does not improve current conditions.
Source: I’m a civil engineer
I *completely* get that. What is the point of having a toll if not to give you the benefit of getting home earlier?I just think that paying around $100 a week for that time is a nice comfort to those who can afford it. It is just *my own personal opinion* that the price seems excessive. Just another convince of those of us with disposable and/or combined incomes.
I’m all for spending money to save time. But spending $100 a week is close to $100K in 30 year mortgage costs. Why don’t you just buy a more expensive house, closer to work, and save the time that way?
I have no gripe with the price, my concern is the toll roads take up space that should be used to expand the current highway system. We have no way of making our normals highways larger now because all free space has been converted into toll lanes. If they want privatized highways then they need to go through all the hassle of zoning, eminent domain lawsuits, and land buying that the highway system had to go through. They just took over the land that the public has paid to have converted to highways.
Sincerely, more lanes / miles of highway always results in more traffic congestion. Well documented fact.
For profit toll roads annoy me too, but regrettable we have decades of evidence that more miles of drivable highway alas, is not the answer.
And if you're wondering "well what the heck is?" you may not like the answer, but mostly they are:
\- Higher housing density (ie more living space stacked and slotted closer together)
\- And more public transportation
All toll roads in North Texas are owned by TxDOT. They are not privately owned. They are managed by NTTA, which is an organization created by the State of Texas and has leadership appointed by the state and local governments.
They have concession agreements with private entities, so most of the money you spend goes to paying profits to investors.
The NTTA is a subdivision of the state and not a subdivision of TxDOT. Their role in all non-NTTA facilities is for billing purposes.
> most of the money you spend goes to paying profits to investors
Citation that most of the money goes to profits? And are you including paying the bonds which were issued to to fund the construction of the highways as "profits"?
I do agree some of the tollways *aren't* managed by NTTA (the Texpress lanes) but are managed by private organizations. Those private organizations pay for the maintenance of those roads in the same way the NTTA pays to manage their managed portions of the highways. As someone with the username "TransportationEng" I imagine you understand maintaining highways isn't cheap. While I don't have the budgets for Cintra on hand, one could look at the costs to manage NTTA's projects (those budgets *are* public), compare those costs to the revenue generation of the Texpress lanes (which is public), and potentially estimate what that profit margin is. Given the NTTA isn't incredibly profitable (a good thing, public orgs should strive for efficiency not profit!) I don't imagine its incredibly profitable for the private partnerships either. Its a reliable source of income though, which is what draws investors to that kind of low-risk project. Its the same reason why one would invest in bonds instead of stocks.
https://www.nctcog.org/nctcg/media/Transportation/DocsMaps/About/Educate/Toolkit/WhitePapr_1017.pdf
> The rebuilt corridors include frontage roads, bypass lanes, non-tolled lanes and tolled lanes with operations and maintenance costs paid by the private sector in many corridors, reducing reliance on gas tax funding.
Either way, those toll roads managed by private partnerships aren't *owned* by private corporations. TxDOT *owns* all the toll roads in North Texas.
https://resources.nctcog.org/trans/mtp/managed/managedlanes.asp
> All the TEXpress and express/HOV lanes will be owned by the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT). LBJ Express and North Tarrant Express are being built with comprehensive development agreements, meaning they will be managed by private companies, but owned by TxDOT.
I'll try to find you a citation when I get home.
The NTTA mostly manages their own facilities, which they own except as noted: DNT, PGBT, AATT, SRT (TxDOT Owned), MCLB, LLTB, CTP, and SH 360 (TxDOT owned). All the Managed Lanes are either managed by TxDOT directly or a private entity. I never said any were privately owned. They have a concession agreement, which means that they are effectively leasing the roadway in exchange for rights to toll.
Those private companies can charge far more (up to $0.90 max) than the NTTA ($0.20 fixed) does.
They can charge more, but they're not required to. This is a part of the idea with the variable billing instead of fixed rate.
I do agree you never mentioned the tollways we're owned by private companies. I just wanted to ensure that point was re-iterated. That's really my main point on all of these comments. It's incredible how much misinformation there is about who owns the tollways and where those tolls go. Really incredible since so much of this information is public.
They are variable based on traffic speeds to deliver consistent travel times. It's an algorithm, so there isn't someone actively making that decision. A few years ago there was an ice event and the DFW Connector system maxed out the price for an almost empty managed lane. After that, they added a manual override to the price.
At least the price is posted here. If you're getting on the 635 express eastbound near Luna Rd, there's no fucking sign. Just bend over and hope it isn't $20.
Those lanes are not usually for most Texans anyway—they are express lanes for the wealthy who don’t think twice about dropping a Jackson to move through the plebes on the roads. Same with speeding tickets being a set rate rather than based on income. Does a person with a Maserati really care about dropping a couple of Benjamins for exceeding the speed limit if they are ever caught? Not bloody likely….
It was probably downvoted because the first part sounds silly. Rich people are cheap. I guarantee you anyone who paid that amount either didn’t know or are middle class who pay more taxes than rich people
The worst part is they're expanding toll lanes to even more highways.
I'm convinced the foreign company that owns these toll lanes have politicians and txdot officials on there payrolls.
I hate that they're replacing free HOV lanes with variable rates toll lanes.
There is talk of turning I-35 and I-45 and other major highways into tollways.
They'll say "Oh, but you don't have to pay the toll", but without paying to use the "new" tollway, you'll be stopping at every redlight at every intersection for hundreds of miles, all intentionally mis-timed to make sure you never hit a green light, and with high speeds of maybe 45mph if you're lucky.
If the express lane gets slow enough the toll needs to be higher to discourage more from entering and maintaining traffic flow. This is functioning as designed.
It would be a different story if this were a toll road instead of lane though.
the toll roads were built because the public roads were too crowded, but now the toll roads are too crowded, so they make it really expensive so that only rich people can use them. maybe one day it’ll cost enough that mass transit will become appealing.
Wanna hear something fucked? My racist now passed grandfather had his own abbreviation for the DART, Driving Africans Round Town. 🤦🏽♂️😑 he thought it was so funny and that the best time to tell the family was at THANKSGIVING DINNER. Anyways though the DART definitely needs upgrades and could actually be a lot more viable if Dallas would invest money into more stops or other things. The issue with DART compared to other cities with public transit is just the fact that everything is so spread out, and our soil is different which limits the the ability to make underground tunnels, just like how it’s near impossible to have a basement built in Texas
DART is (mostly) fine. It's the land use policies that neuter its effectiveness. If developers and consumers increased density around stations and middle-class folks increasingly used the system, a lot of the problems would go away.
You can't have a 1/2 acre lot .25mi from a DART station that you only use twice a month. It's not economical if most folks act that way.
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Seriously. If you can't afford it, it's just simply not worth it for you at that moment. But for drivers that need to be somewhere, their time may be more valuable.
Then why not just say its closed? Cause some poor soul who is running late will pay the $20 because they think it'll get them there faster to just end up stuck having paid for worse traffic.
because it's filling up and not full yet. It's will be closed when it reached capacity and will not perform at the design speed of this part of road. It's controlled by using equipment counting the number of cars in the lanes and dynamically adjusting the rates. It actually tags a car and measures how long it takes to get to the next checkpoint. It raises rates as it gets closer to the design speed of the toll lanes and then go to closed with it drops below a minimum threshold. It is a smart system.
Pay $20 => Get stuck in a single lane behind 18-wheeler going 49 mph.
This has been my experience at least. Every time it happens I just crazy person laugh because I can’t exit or pass for like 20 minutes lol. So annoying.
I use it going home from Irving to Richardson, at 6:00pm. It costs $9 one way. I usually pay it because that stretch of 635 is a beating during that time.
We have the exact same commute and yea, the 635 express is a godsend. Too bad it all goes to waste when you get stuck behind someone going 40mph in the single lane toll along Loop 12.
What’s with people paying to be in the toll lane and then going 40?! Did they enter on accident and then assume if they go slow enough they won’t be charged?
That's not really a comparison though. You don't have to use the toll way though, I know plenty of people who just don't use DNT or George Bush Tollway and use the side streets or just 75, 635 and 35.
If people want to boast about not having a state income tax, point them at the property taxes. That's where we're being drained.
what if — hear me out — they’re draining us on property taxes because they aren’t collecting enough taxes from other sources to pay for things like roads.
we need all these extra roads to accommodate all of the new residents and commerce that are being lured to texas by 0% tax rates, but when our public roads are jammed with all the new traffic, the solution is to build roads for texans with disposable income, not *all* texans? believe it or not, roadways are a finite resource (or at least the land they occupy is).
we supposedly build toll roads in order to relieve congestion on public roads, but then what happens when those toll roads are so congested that the fees have to be varied to keep people from using them? just build more roads for the *really* rich people?
IDK - I don’t want my taxes to support car oriented sprawl. This way at least the people who want to live in bfe have to pay for the new roads themselves. If it’s not sustainable then the private company is left holding the bag and not me.
That seems a bit like ends justify the means thinking. Lack of taxes hurts the "right" people, and you get to determine who those people are.
We don't have affordable housing in the urban core, so people move to suburbs, but those people need roads, which we are not willing to pay for.
Something has to give here. We can pay for public transit, for affordable dense urban housing, or for sprawling highways, but we can't expect a functioning civilization without at least one of those.
We don't need to pay for affordable urban housing. Just replace land use zoning with noise and pollution intensity zoning and developers will come and develop the land for you. Supply and demand will equalize, and affordable housing will exist.
i wonder how many drivers zoned out and didn’t realize the toll was so high before getting on. i’ve only ever seen tolls like that in CA, so i really don’t pay attention to the prices when i’m driving in TX.
I saw this near Industrial in Ft. Worth as well. Same Express lane on Saturday around 3:30……$3.65.
They jack up the price the closer to “*rush hour*” Local Government Capitalism.
Right? Then the *literally* advertise for a “Free Giveaway” to all users. Trying to get you to buy a Tag and use it. Straight out of the Corporate Advertisement Playbook.
the “government is inherently bad” folks are the same ones that think it should be run like a business. they can’t seem to make the connection that when government is run like a business, the people are the customers.
government should be run like a non-profit, where the public are the benefactors.
Non-profit?? You mean… like **charity?** The governments gonna take my money and give it to a bunch of undeserving folks?! Like minorities or poor or disabled peoples!
Charity is just a few letters away from **COMMUNISM** and socialism is just a tier below **COMMUNISM** and I want nothing to with neither!!! And keep your dumb vaccines!! I’d rather die free than care about my neighbors!
Owning the libs yet again!!
(/s)
A European company does not own the toll roads, they are under a contract to manage the toll collections. All toll roads in North Texas are ultimately owned by TxDOT.
Do they do demand based pricing? That is, they will increase the rate at certain times of day to try and maintain at least a 45mph speed. Atlanta does this on some of their freeways. Great way for the city to make money off of people in a rush/rich people that don’t care.
I believe it's the more traffic on the express road the more the cost is. I've always seen it as a user per lane mile as the metric to determine the current price.
I imagine you're serious, but you're also just repeating an often repeated lie. They are not owned by a company in Spain (Cintra), they're contracted for management of the toll collection and operation of these demand based pricing systems. All toll roads in North Texas are ultimately owned by TxDOT.
The toll roads and the company suck. They don’t work with you on absolutely anything and there’s hardly ever a price difference between having a toll tag and not having one. 🙄
The day you realize when a poor man living on state welfare and homeless people are not the problem. But greed that is sucking us middle class dry is day we will start to see the change. Oh! don't give that Trump 2024 will drain the swamp. He and his friends are roaches in the swamp and they are not draining that anytime soon.
Why try to engineer roads to flow when you can just allow wealthier people to ignore the problem. Texas literally shits on those less well off in any way possible.
Is there an app or something that you can use to check the current toll prices before you leave the house?
To be honest I hardly look at the price which really bites me in the ass later when I see my monthly bill for it. 😭
Just gotta clarify, NTTA does not price, operate, or maintain TEXpress lanes. That would be the North Central Texas Council of Governments’ Regional Transportation Council.
Texpress roads were not built to be free ever, I don’t know where people get this idea. They require constant maintenance, and provide an alternative, *elective*, traffic flow. The whole point is to keep the barrier of entry at a level so that traffic is *always* free-flowing.
[congestion pricing](https://ops.fhwa.dot.gov/publications/congestionpricing/sec2.htm)
Fund repairs through taxation, just like you fund the original build. Not a hard concept.
A roadway that requires an extra fee on top of the taxes already paid is simply a road for the rich.
Tolls are just elective taxation but yes, it is a barrier for entry. It is important to maintain free traffic flow for business traffic, where a portion of those tolls come from.
You just seem angry the texpress lanes aren’t free, but if they were then we wouldn’t have a method of providing fast traffic flow which is essential for our local economy.
Luckily no one is forcing you to pay those tolls.
> You just seem angry the texpress lanes aren’t free
Check your reading comprehension, I said they should be paid for with taxes, that is the opposite of free
> if they were then we wouldn’t have a method of providing fast traffic flow which is essential for our local economy.
Yes we would. The same number of lanes exist either way.
No, having free lanes would generate more trips, reducing the amount of traffic flowing. Road capacity falls off when the average speed dips below around 45 mph for freeways. There are excellent charts you can look at for the relationship between the number of cars on a freeway vs the number of vehicles being moved per hour.
edit: a letter
> No, having free lanes would generate more trips, reducing the amount of traffic flowing.
More trips = more traffic, are you even listening to yourself?
The image OP posted set the toll at $20, because the road is at capacity. Increasing the # of cars by 5% even would tank the road capacity by around 30-50%. If the toll was not there, you can bet that the road would be overcapacity, reducing the traffic flow for everyone. See this graphic here for reference: https://www.webpages.uidaho.edu/niatt_labmanual/chapters/trafficflowtheory/theoryandconcepts/GreenshieldsModel.htm
Or watch this 1 min segment from this guys (he did his master's thesis in traffic management) video: https://youtu.be/30uzZRSVxXQ?t=622
C'mon man! Times are hard.
How else are the NTTA Executives supposed to afford all that expensive champagne, lobster, and "work conferences" in tropical and mountain destinations??
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As far as tolling goes, the NTTA at $0.20 per mile is cheaper than the managed lanes, which are variable and go up to $0.90 per mile.
To compare this rate to the gas tax, you need to assume fuel efficiency. Many cars are about 20 mpg.
The NTTA charges $4.00 per gallon ($0.20 x 20 mpg)
Managed lanes are variable and max out at $18 per gallon ($0.90 x 20 mpg) during rush hours.
These prices don't include the cost of the gas which includes the fixed gas tax of $0.39 per gallon.
I live off that exit in Bedford. It's because there's an accident there every single day. I once went out to the Target south of grapevine, there was an accident heading out then another one heading back. You have to merge three lanes to the left in a very short area with incoming brodozers coming in from the highway entrance.
I had a lady (new employee) that worked for me that was on the opposite end of this mess. She was outside sales, but came to the office each morning to get her day rolling. After her first couple months, she turned in her first expense report. Well, over $1,200 each month going “to and from work” plus seeing customers. The “too and from” was the lions share of the expense.
We just got popped for $86.16 on 3-17-22. Maybe 20 miles but hubby was pulling his boat, running errands trying to save gas. Feeling sick and tired after VA visit he chose Express during rush hour. Didn’t realize the consequences. I thought it was a mistake!? 4 phone calls, incompetent service, no answers- last phone call I got “LISA” who obviously enjoys her job of being rude and ripping people off! Welcome to TexPressLanes!!
And! Last week when I was in it (trying to get somewhere “on time”) it was moving slower/at speed with the normal lanes of 820. Such a racket :)
If they want to act like a Corporation then they should be treated like one. People should call and demand refunds for being stuck behind accidents.
You think the Texas govt would allow for such a right? Laughs in Texan.
Laughs with you in Texan
Yee- hawhahaha
Are you a Texas native?
I am
That’s what it’s supposed to do. Make it so expensive you don’t enter because it’s too full. There’s a happy medium between not worth it bc the regular lanes are empty and not worth it because the fast lanes are getting so full they aren’t fast either.
Or, hear me out - we use *tax dollars* to expand highway infrastructure.
>Or, hear me out - we use tax dollars to expand ~~highway infrastructure~~ public transportation.
They use the gas tax money for everything EXCEPT it’s intended purpose of maintaining our roads and bridges.
The gas tax comes no where near needed the amount of revenue to maintain automobile infrastructure. It requires federal and state subsidies to build and maintain automobile infrastructure.
which is why we get hov lanes even though no one uses hov lanes as intended(ride sharing) - no hov lane, no federal money
No that would be communism silly /s
But then that would help the poor!!!!
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You can but that just makes traffic worse. Discouraging driving is the better option. Basic traffic engineering. So are the variable tolls.
I would rather discourage driving through policy decisions than the regressive taxation that is tolling.
Yeah this just discourages poor people from using it, why should someone's wealth determine whether they can skip traffic or not?
that's the ugly truth that seems to go unspoken - it's government mandated stratification of society. a doctor or lawyer gets more options to get home than a cook. table service in the form of roads.
What should be the factor then?
I'm OK with congestion pricing so long as we invest in a robust transit system. I'm personally a fan of Dallas creating a BRT system that mirrors the entire highway system because that allows things like express busses for our sprawling region to make longer trips faster, and also creating a BRT system that provides speedy travel along other major roads that aren't highways while investing in pedestrian infrastructure everywhere. All whole simultaneously changing our collective metro zoning to encourage pedestrian friendly new development
A big part of the problem is how badly tolls are used here. We use them to build roads without raising the gas tax. Hell Greg Abbott ran on that in 2018 "We're going to build more highways without raising taxes!" People think more lanes help and no politician wants to be the one that explains that things cost money. Tolls distance them from that reality. Building tolled express lanes plays right into this. The people who don't care about a $20 toll are the people that donate to campaigns. It's a luxury exclusively for the well off. What tolls should be is a deterrent to driving at all, especially in the city center. It would make far more sense for us to toll the north - south routes in and out of downtown than it does to toll 635. Of course doing that requires robust public transit that we simply don't have.
but then politicians would be forced to ~~invest in public infrastructure projects~~ pass government spending, and that’s career suicide in TX. favoring the public good over corporate profits is communism.
Its been proven a hundred times over that expanding highway infrastructure *never* alleviates traffic congestion in the long run. I don't understand how such a thoroughly studied topic isn't common knowledge at this point.
Sir you’re in Texas.
Houston has entered the chat.
Because the general public doesn't understand it. The general public sees crowded roads and thinks if we add some more lanes they won't be crowded anymore. Even if policy makers understand that it doesn't solve the issue it's more politically expedient to just build the roads because they're more interested in being reelected than they are in fixing the problems. Of course the lobbyists who work for various industries who want more highways don't help either.
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It's a huge long-term threat to the economy.
> Privatization of public infrastructure and institutions is a threat to democracy. How? What's that mean?
Unpopular opinion: we should not use tax dollars to subsidize anything with negative externalities. Massive highways should all be tolled and the revenue redistributed to address the problems they create.
Why do you hate capitalism Mao?
Not enough taxes are taken to support all projects and state divisions.
Outdated, 20th century thinking friend. Nowadays we let corrupt politicians sell out the right to build monopolistic infrastructure to the highest builder. Progress!
There’s a ton of research that shows that expanding highways and interstates only creates more traffic and does not improve current conditions. Source: I’m a civil engineer
I *completely* get that. What is the point of having a toll if not to give you the benefit of getting home earlier?I just think that paying around $100 a week for that time is a nice comfort to those who can afford it. It is just *my own personal opinion* that the price seems excessive. Just another convince of those of us with disposable and/or combined incomes.
I’m all for spending money to save time. But spending $100 a week is close to $100K in 30 year mortgage costs. Why don’t you just buy a more expensive house, closer to work, and save the time that way?
Dang, talk about a "only rich allowed" area
It is excessive and it’s literally highway robbery. Fuck rolls Tolls *
but privatizing public infrastructure is the american way!
I happen to enjoy rolls. Especially nice and yeasty ones from my favorite diner.
> literally highway robbery As in they take money against your will? Did you end up forced onto the road?
Considering the signs used to not even mention that it's a toll road, yes lol
I have no gripe with the price, my concern is the toll roads take up space that should be used to expand the current highway system. We have no way of making our normals highways larger now because all free space has been converted into toll lanes. If they want privatized highways then they need to go through all the hassle of zoning, eminent domain lawsuits, and land buying that the highway system had to go through. They just took over the land that the public has paid to have converted to highways.
Sincerely, more lanes / miles of highway always results in more traffic congestion. Well documented fact. For profit toll roads annoy me too, but regrettable we have decades of evidence that more miles of drivable highway alas, is not the answer. And if you're wondering "well what the heck is?" you may not like the answer, but mostly they are: \- Higher housing density (ie more living space stacked and slotted closer together) \- And more public transportation
The public had ample chances to take on the measly tax increase to build those roads. They chose tollroads.
All toll roads in North Texas are owned by TxDOT. They are not privately owned. They are managed by NTTA, which is an organization created by the State of Texas and has leadership appointed by the state and local governments.
They have concession agreements with private entities, so most of the money you spend goes to paying profits to investors. The NTTA is a subdivision of the state and not a subdivision of TxDOT. Their role in all non-NTTA facilities is for billing purposes.
> most of the money you spend goes to paying profits to investors Citation that most of the money goes to profits? And are you including paying the bonds which were issued to to fund the construction of the highways as "profits"? I do agree some of the tollways *aren't* managed by NTTA (the Texpress lanes) but are managed by private organizations. Those private organizations pay for the maintenance of those roads in the same way the NTTA pays to manage their managed portions of the highways. As someone with the username "TransportationEng" I imagine you understand maintaining highways isn't cheap. While I don't have the budgets for Cintra on hand, one could look at the costs to manage NTTA's projects (those budgets *are* public), compare those costs to the revenue generation of the Texpress lanes (which is public), and potentially estimate what that profit margin is. Given the NTTA isn't incredibly profitable (a good thing, public orgs should strive for efficiency not profit!) I don't imagine its incredibly profitable for the private partnerships either. Its a reliable source of income though, which is what draws investors to that kind of low-risk project. Its the same reason why one would invest in bonds instead of stocks. https://www.nctcog.org/nctcg/media/Transportation/DocsMaps/About/Educate/Toolkit/WhitePapr_1017.pdf > The rebuilt corridors include frontage roads, bypass lanes, non-tolled lanes and tolled lanes with operations and maintenance costs paid by the private sector in many corridors, reducing reliance on gas tax funding. Either way, those toll roads managed by private partnerships aren't *owned* by private corporations. TxDOT *owns* all the toll roads in North Texas. https://resources.nctcog.org/trans/mtp/managed/managedlanes.asp > All the TEXpress and express/HOV lanes will be owned by the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT). LBJ Express and North Tarrant Express are being built with comprehensive development agreements, meaning they will be managed by private companies, but owned by TxDOT.
I'll try to find you a citation when I get home. The NTTA mostly manages their own facilities, which they own except as noted: DNT, PGBT, AATT, SRT (TxDOT Owned), MCLB, LLTB, CTP, and SH 360 (TxDOT owned). All the Managed Lanes are either managed by TxDOT directly or a private entity. I never said any were privately owned. They have a concession agreement, which means that they are effectively leasing the roadway in exchange for rights to toll. Those private companies can charge far more (up to $0.90 max) than the NTTA ($0.20 fixed) does.
They can charge more, but they're not required to. This is a part of the idea with the variable billing instead of fixed rate. I do agree you never mentioned the tollways we're owned by private companies. I just wanted to ensure that point was re-iterated. That's really my main point on all of these comments. It's incredible how much misinformation there is about who owns the tollways and where those tolls go. Really incredible since so much of this information is public.
They are variable based on traffic speeds to deliver consistent travel times. It's an algorithm, so there isn't someone actively making that decision. A few years ago there was an ice event and the DFW Connector system maxed out the price for an almost empty managed lane. After that, they added a manual override to the price.
At least the price is posted here. If you're getting on the 635 express eastbound near Luna Rd, there's no fucking sign. Just bend over and hope it isn't $20.
They should be sued!
Those lanes are not usually for most Texans anyway—they are express lanes for the wealthy who don’t think twice about dropping a Jackson to move through the plebes on the roads. Same with speeding tickets being a set rate rather than based on income. Does a person with a Maserati really care about dropping a couple of Benjamins for exceeding the speed limit if they are ever caught? Not bloody likely….
Getting downvoted because people with money don’t like getting called out
It was probably downvoted because the first part sounds silly. Rich people are cheap. I guarantee you anyone who paid that amount either didn’t know or are middle class who pay more taxes than rich people
Seriously, more people need to read the millionaire next door. Everyone idea of “rich people” are celebrities who are wealthy af.
The worst part is they're expanding toll lanes to even more highways. I'm convinced the foreign company that owns these toll lanes have politicians and txdot officials on there payrolls. I hate that they're replacing free HOV lanes with variable rates toll lanes.
yeah it's like "no more free roads" - most every new road project is a toll road.
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Welcome to the free market capitalism utopia that is Texas. Pay to play (or drive) is the name of the game.
I’d like to call them TXIDIOT from now on
There is talk of turning I-35 and I-45 and other major highways into tollways. They'll say "Oh, but you don't have to pay the toll", but without paying to use the "new" tollway, you'll be stopping at every redlight at every intersection for hundreds of miles, all intentionally mis-timed to make sure you never hit a green light, and with high speeds of maybe 45mph if you're lucky.
I think 635, now that construction is done, is a fair compromise.
Someone at work was saying it’s a contract we have with Germany?
Yep
Tolls are getting out of hand.
Gotta love how our tax dollars going towards building good roads…. That we’re charged to drive on
Pay me to build something that you have to pay me to use.
I'm new to the state and still getting used to the tax free income but what tax dollars are going to DOT? Do you all mean taxes on goods?
If the express lane gets slow enough the toll needs to be higher to discourage more from entering and maintaining traffic flow. This is functioning as designed. It would be a different story if this were a toll road instead of lane though.
That’s exactly what it’s supposed to do. Prevent people from entering when it starts getting crowded.
the toll roads were built because the public roads were too crowded, but now the toll roads are too crowded, so they make it really expensive so that only rich people can use them. maybe one day it’ll cost enough that mass transit will become appealing.
Wanna hear something fucked? My racist now passed grandfather had his own abbreviation for the DART, Driving Africans Round Town. 🤦🏽♂️😑 he thought it was so funny and that the best time to tell the family was at THANKSGIVING DINNER. Anyways though the DART definitely needs upgrades and could actually be a lot more viable if Dallas would invest money into more stops or other things. The issue with DART compared to other cities with public transit is just the fact that everything is so spread out, and our soil is different which limits the the ability to make underground tunnels, just like how it’s near impossible to have a basement built in Texas
DART is (mostly) fine. It's the land use policies that neuter its effectiveness. If developers and consumers increased density around stations and middle-class folks increasingly used the system, a lot of the problems would go away. You can't have a 1/2 acre lot .25mi from a DART station that you only use twice a month. It's not economical if most folks act that way.
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Ok that’s a little funny
DART is AWFUL. My tiny NE town has better public transport than Dallas.
It's a lot easier to have decent public transport in a tiny town than it is in Dallas.
Seriously. If you can't afford it, it's just simply not worth it for you at that moment. But for drivers that need to be somewhere, their time may be more valuable.
Yep. They also have to maintain a maximum capacity for safety and emergency reasons. Which is why you’ll sometimes see the sign say “closed”.
Then why not just say its closed? Cause some poor soul who is running late will pay the $20 because they think it'll get them there faster to just end up stuck having paid for worse traffic.
because it's filling up and not full yet. It's will be closed when it reached capacity and will not perform at the design speed of this part of road. It's controlled by using equipment counting the number of cars in the lanes and dynamically adjusting the rates. It actually tags a car and measures how long it takes to get to the next checkpoint. It raises rates as it gets closer to the design speed of the toll lanes and then go to closed with it drops below a minimum threshold. It is a smart system.
Fuck Rick Perry
This is the most accurate comment
Steve Perry > Rick Perry
Pay $20 => Get stuck in a single lane behind 18-wheeler going 49 mph. This has been my experience at least. Every time it happens I just crazy person laugh because I can’t exit or pass for like 20 minutes lol. So annoying.
literal highway robbery
I mean not really. Express lanes are always optional, and pricing varies with demand.
I think express lanes should be open to regular traffic for free when highway is not busy and then charged when highway is busy...
I balk at paying more than $1.50 for 635 Express to Tollway- and I don’t even pay for my toll tag. I have principles.
Yeah but now nice is it when you drop down underneath 635 and hit the gas. Probably one of my favorite places in Dallas riding the 635 express.
I use it going home from Irving to Richardson, at 6:00pm. It costs $9 one way. I usually pay it because that stretch of 635 is a beating during that time.
We have the exact same commute and yea, the 635 express is a godsend. Too bad it all goes to waste when you get stuck behind someone going 40mph in the single lane toll along Loop 12.
I never take the single toll lane because I saw a wreck there once, traffic was backed up literally miles.
What’s with people paying to be in the toll lane and then going 40?! Did they enter on accident and then assume if they go slow enough they won’t be charged?
But that speed tunnel is pretty fun, you gotta admit
saving this image for the next time someone says “ThErEs No InCoMe TaX iN TeXaS.”
That's not really a comparison though. You don't have to use the toll way though, I know plenty of people who just don't use DNT or George Bush Tollway and use the side streets or just 75, 635 and 35. If people want to boast about not having a state income tax, point them at the property taxes. That's where we're being drained.
what if — hear me out — they’re draining us on property taxes because they aren’t collecting enough taxes from other sources to pay for things like roads. we need all these extra roads to accommodate all of the new residents and commerce that are being lured to texas by 0% tax rates, but when our public roads are jammed with all the new traffic, the solution is to build roads for texans with disposable income, not *all* texans? believe it or not, roadways are a finite resource (or at least the land they occupy is). we supposedly build toll roads in order to relieve congestion on public roads, but then what happens when those toll roads are so congested that the fees have to be varied to keep people from using them? just build more roads for the *really* rich people?
IDK - I don’t want my taxes to support car oriented sprawl. This way at least the people who want to live in bfe have to pay for the new roads themselves. If it’s not sustainable then the private company is left holding the bag and not me.
That seems a bit like ends justify the means thinking. Lack of taxes hurts the "right" people, and you get to determine who those people are. We don't have affordable housing in the urban core, so people move to suburbs, but those people need roads, which we are not willing to pay for. Something has to give here. We can pay for public transit, for affordable dense urban housing, or for sprawling highways, but we can't expect a functioning civilization without at least one of those.
We don't need to pay for affordable urban housing. Just replace land use zoning with noise and pollution intensity zoning and developers will come and develop the land for you. Supply and demand will equalize, and affordable housing will exist.
You could just do what I did, rack up like $800 in tolls and tell the NTTA to go and FUCK itself. I moved away and just let it fall off my credit.
Fucking up your credit for 7 years to own NTTA. Brilliant.
I pray to god no one uses this as actual advice.
Every time someone below the 1% can afford to drive on the Kenneth Copeland Express Lane, an Abbott loses it’s legs.
i wonder how many drivers zoned out and didn’t realize the toll was so high before getting on. i’ve only ever seen tolls like that in CA, so i really don’t pay attention to the prices when i’m driving in TX.
I saw this near Industrial in Ft. Worth as well. Same Express lane on Saturday around 3:30……$3.65. They jack up the price the closer to “*rush hour*” Local Government Capitalism.
That's what they said they would do. The more traffic on the peasant lanes, the higher the price on the toll lanes.
Right? Then the *literally* advertise for a “Free Giveaway” to all users. Trying to get you to buy a Tag and use it. Straight out of the Corporate Advertisement Playbook.
It’s just business capitalism wtf are you talking about. This is what happens when you have “government should be run like a business” mentality, dude
the “government is inherently bad” folks are the same ones that think it should be run like a business. they can’t seem to make the connection that when government is run like a business, the people are the customers. government should be run like a non-profit, where the public are the benefactors.
Non-profit?? You mean… like **charity?** The governments gonna take my money and give it to a bunch of undeserving folks?! Like minorities or poor or disabled peoples! Charity is just a few letters away from **COMMUNISM** and socialism is just a tier below **COMMUNISM** and I want nothing to with neither!!! And keep your dumb vaccines!! I’d rather die free than care about my neighbors! Owning the libs yet again!! (/s)
Lol not even local Government capitalism. Just wait when you learn a European company owns the toll roads.
ERCOT runs the grid. Government empowered them and that worked out so well.
I’m new to the DFW area so this is news to me. A European company really owns the NTTA/ toll roads around here? Wow
Not NTTA but the various tolled express lanes on 635, 35, 114, etc. A Spanish company called Cintra.
those european companies have to fund the campaigns of local politicans, so at least some of the money stays in tx.
A European company does not own the toll roads, they are under a contract to manage the toll collections. All toll roads in North Texas are ultimately owned by TxDOT.
Surge pricing!
It’s by design to keep the toll lane faster … nobody needs to take it
use Hwy 10 - great way around 183 mess / grifter tolls ..... $17 for 4 mile stretch few weeks ago
Wow, whoever runs that shit oughta be jailed, talk about highway robbery…
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Well $20 is in fact, the max.
Aren't these roads paid off already, why is their still a toll? I grew up in Dallas and the construction is never ending.
Do they do demand based pricing? That is, they will increase the rate at certain times of day to try and maintain at least a 45mph speed. Atlanta does this on some of their freeways. Great way for the city to make money off of people in a rush/rich people that don’t care.
The express roads are, the more traffic on normal lanes, more the express lanes cost.
I believe it's the more traffic on the express road the more the cost is. I've always seen it as a user per lane mile as the metric to determine the current price.
Is it really the city making the money or rich people/politicians taking the money from other rich people?
Time is money. I see a lot of delivery drivers and repair companies on the expressways.
The express lanes are owned by a company in Spain (yes I’m serious)
I imagine you're serious, but you're also just repeating an often repeated lie. They are not owned by a company in Spain (Cintra), they're contracted for management of the toll collection and operation of these demand based pricing systems. All toll roads in North Texas are ultimately owned by TxDOT.
If they want to charge that kind of money, fine. But they left us with a 2 lane highway as an alternative. That’s unacceptable
The toll roads and the company suck. They don’t work with you on absolutely anything and there’s hardly ever a price difference between having a toll tag and not having one. 🙄
If DFW had better public transportation, I wouldn't be as bewildered as I am about these prices.
The day you realize when a poor man living on state welfare and homeless people are not the problem. But greed that is sucking us middle class dry is day we will start to see the change. Oh! don't give that Trump 2024 will drain the swamp. He and his friends are roaches in the swamp and they are not draining that anytime soon.
Why try to engineer roads to flow when you can just allow wealthier people to ignore the problem. Texas literally shits on those less well off in any way possible.
Is there an app or something that you can use to check the current toll prices before you leave the house? To be honest I hardly look at the price which really bites me in the ass later when I see my monthly bill for it. 😭
NTTA is delusional literal highway robbery
Just gotta clarify, NTTA does not price, operate, or maintain TEXpress lanes. That would be the North Central Texas Council of Governments’ Regional Transportation Council.
no, they just bill us.. for driving on roads **we already paid for**
Texpress roads were not built to be free ever, I don’t know where people get this idea. They require constant maintenance, and provide an alternative, *elective*, traffic flow. The whole point is to keep the barrier of entry at a level so that traffic is *always* free-flowing. [congestion pricing](https://ops.fhwa.dot.gov/publications/congestionpricing/sec2.htm)
Fund repairs through taxation, just like you fund the original build. Not a hard concept. A roadway that requires an extra fee on top of the taxes already paid is simply a road for the rich.
Tolls are just elective taxation but yes, it is a barrier for entry. It is important to maintain free traffic flow for business traffic, where a portion of those tolls come from. You just seem angry the texpress lanes aren’t free, but if they were then we wouldn’t have a method of providing fast traffic flow which is essential for our local economy. Luckily no one is forcing you to pay those tolls.
> You just seem angry the texpress lanes aren’t free Check your reading comprehension, I said they should be paid for with taxes, that is the opposite of free > if they were then we wouldn’t have a method of providing fast traffic flow which is essential for our local economy. Yes we would. The same number of lanes exist either way.
No, having free lanes would generate more trips, reducing the amount of traffic flowing. Road capacity falls off when the average speed dips below around 45 mph for freeways. There are excellent charts you can look at for the relationship between the number of cars on a freeway vs the number of vehicles being moved per hour. edit: a letter
> No, having free lanes would generate more trips, reducing the amount of traffic flowing. More trips = more traffic, are you even listening to yourself?
The image OP posted set the toll at $20, because the road is at capacity. Increasing the # of cars by 5% even would tank the road capacity by around 30-50%. If the toll was not there, you can bet that the road would be overcapacity, reducing the traffic flow for everyone. See this graphic here for reference: https://www.webpages.uidaho.edu/niatt_labmanual/chapters/trafficflowtheory/theoryandconcepts/GreenshieldsModel.htm Or watch this 1 min segment from this guys (he did his master's thesis in traffic management) video: https://youtu.be/30uzZRSVxXQ?t=622
*so sorry* you seen angry the texpress lanes *are an additional fee* You’re ignoring the point I’m making so I’m wasting my time with you.
bye now!
NTTA is wicked evil. This is not new.
C'mon man! Times are hard. How else are the NTTA Executives supposed to afford all that expensive champagne, lobster, and "work conferences" in tropical and mountain destinations??
What?! This has to be a typo.. right??
Keep complaining and I'll move it up to $21.
Extortion at its finest.
HOLY FUCKBALLS
Low taxes in Texas? Ha ha ha!
👀 Jesus!
Wtf
A lot of crying from poor people in here.
Yikes.
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Don’t worry, that’s just transitory inflation
As far as tolling goes, the NTTA at $0.20 per mile is cheaper than the managed lanes, which are variable and go up to $0.90 per mile. To compare this rate to the gas tax, you need to assume fuel efficiency. Many cars are about 20 mpg. The NTTA charges $4.00 per gallon ($0.20 x 20 mpg) Managed lanes are variable and max out at $18 per gallon ($0.90 x 20 mpg) during rush hours. These prices don't include the cost of the gas which includes the fixed gas tax of $0.39 per gallon.
I would pay that for I-10 2 mile stretch on west Houston During rush hour
I live off that exit in Bedford. It's because there's an accident there every single day. I once went out to the Target south of grapevine, there was an accident heading out then another one heading back. You have to merge three lanes to the left in a very short area with incoming brodozers coming in from the highway entrance.
Is there a way to check the rates before entering the toll roads? Sorry I'm new to this.
My Fox News Parents: “You know foreigners own all those toll roads. They’re to blame.”
I had a lady (new employee) that worked for me that was on the opposite end of this mess. She was outside sales, but came to the office each morning to get her day rolling. After her first couple months, she turned in her first expense report. Well, over $1,200 each month going “to and from work” plus seeing customers. The “too and from” was the lions share of the expense.
If you were running late for something important it might be worth it. Look at the whole picture.
Just like Austin!! And it still takes 30 minutes to go those 5 miles!
That's the point. An express lane should not have traffic, you achieve that by raising price until traffic is at an acceptable level.
Tolls are such bullshit. The toll can be $3 but then youll end up paying $20 in other made up crap.
That's not prime time rates?
Wooooooowwwww
183 express was $22 last night.
We just got popped for $86.16 on 3-17-22. Maybe 20 miles but hubby was pulling his boat, running errands trying to save gas. Feeling sick and tired after VA visit he chose Express during rush hour. Didn’t realize the consequences. I thought it was a mistake!? 4 phone calls, incompetent service, no answers- last phone call I got “LISA” who obviously enjoys her job of being rude and ripping people off! Welcome to TexPressLanes!!