Gerald Baliles Proposes Interstate Tolling

Virginia could reap about $1 billion a year if it set up a network of tolling stations on the state's interstate highways, says former Gov. Gerald Baliles in an Aug. 23 letter to state Sen. John Chichester.

Baliles' proposal is directed at Chichester's Statewide Transportation Analysis and Recommendation Task Force (START), which holds its first meeting next month.

Writes Baliles: "When you dig into the statistics on vehicle miles traveled in Virginia, one fact jumps out. The vast majority of the growth is on the interstate highway system." Setting up 38 tolling locations would raise $1 billion a year, and tolls are indisputably a user fee, which has more political support than a tax increase, he says. "A billion dollars of new money annually, sustained over 12 to 15 years, for example, would give Virginia resources to address a long list of significant projects."

Among the projects are the Third Crossing in Hampton Roads, widening Interstate 81 in the Shenandoah Valley and a "long list" of road improvements in Northern Virginia, and some key rail projects.

The tolls - collected electronically - would average 85 cents, but could vary, such as lower tolls for commuter routes and higher tolls at border crossings, or different tolls for trucks, etc. Plus, tolls could be lowered across the board if another funding source were found for the $1 billion, Baliles says.

Baliles also proposes creating Port District Transportation Funds, tax districts that would use the revenues collected to build key infrastructure. Baliles uses as an example the $130 million Virginia spent in 1989 to upgrade Route 28 next to Washington Dulles International Airport, an investment that, a decade later, produced $6 billion in economic activity a year and $1 billion increase in property values, he says.