Scary Internet called me an “entitled Luddite.” Fred reminded me of the Mass Pike drivers who “get stuck two times, every day in toll booth bottlenecks.” These were just two of the online responses to my nostalgic farewell last year to toll booths. Another person with the online moniker Rushthis also let me know that my appreciative recognition of toll collectors left him or her cold. Recalling a collector with a bad attitude, Rushthis said, “I’m okay with him being out of a job.”
My sentimental musings and their sharp comments came in the days just before the toll booths on 1-90 came down and the computerized gantries went up. In the six months since the gantries have been in place, MassDOT reports 86 percent of transactions are now paid by E-ZPass transponders. According to the department this is, “one of the highest levels of toll transponder use of any state in the U.S.” That number should tick up even higher because the grace period to pick up an E-ZPass ended last week. Now a driver without an E-ZPass can be charged more than double the toll charges, and an additional 60 cent processing fee for each charge. Yikes!
MASSDot says the extra fees go toward identifying and contacting non-transponder drivers, so-called Pay-by-Plate customers. The state gets paid either way, so Republican State Representative Geoff Diehl told the Boston Herald, “I don’t think they should be fining drivers for having a license plate instead of an E-ZPass.” You won’t get any argument from me since I still don’t have a transponder and have no plans to get one.
But, nearly 600,000 Bay State drivers have gotten an E-ZPass during the last year. By that measure, electronic tolling is a success. Unfortunately, it’s not the better deal Bay Staters were told it would be. As the Boston Globe reported, some transponder owners, Newton area commuters especially, found out after they got their bills that their fees went up. In February, a Fox 25 investigation pinpointed evidence documenting glitches causing “misidentified plates, old E-ZPass accounts reopened, and as many as 3,800 former E-ZPass customers” getting charged for money they don’t owe. Customers who tried to complain couldn’t get through on the customer service line. A follow-up Fox 25 investigation this month found that a lot of the cameras on the roads were “not operational.” Fox 25 combed the public records to show that “more than 125,000 unusable images were listed under lane equipment failure.” What’s more, Fox reports the state has quietly paid another $10 million to Raytheon presumably to fix the system problems. Remember how we were promised this new system would save money?
Meanwhile, since I still don’t have a transponder, I’ve gone out of my way to avoid toll roads. I realize that is a luxury regular Mass Pike commuters don’t have. And I know my small group of anti-transponder stalwarts continues to shrink ever smaller. But, I’m still not moved to get an E-ZPass. Scary Internet, I’ll wait until you work through all the bugs in the system.
RELATED: Boston Globe: Not everyone is happy about all-electronic tolling
