California 125 South Bay Expressway Toll Rates Decreasing

[andy3175]

http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2012/may/25/toll-road-prices-lowered/

The board of the San Diego Association of Governments, which bought the toll road in December, voted to lower the tolls to 50 cents to $2.75 for FasTrak account holders and $2 to $3.50 for cash and credit card users. Tolls currently range from 85 cents to $3.85 for those with a FasTrak users and $2.50 to $4 for everyone else.

The private operator of the 10-mile highway that stretches from state Route 54 to the Mexican border did not reduce tolls despite lower traffic levels than planned after opening in 2007. The operator filed for bankruptcy and SANDAG swooped in to purchase the road for $351.7 million. It cost $847.3 to build initially.

The staff report estimates that revenue from the lowered tolls would be more than enough to pay for the $20.2 million annual operating costs. It projects traffic would increase about 935,000 trips in the short term once the tolls are lowered, with half of those drivers potentially being diverted from I-805.

Fees will be collected until 2042, when the road will become free to use, but until then, tolls for the road could decrease further in the future depending on how often the road is used.

[Chris]

Tell this to the Dulles Toll Road operators, where tolls are going to skyrocket in the coming years to finance a D.C. metro line.

Maximizing revenues of toll roads is a mix of modelling and guesswork. Sometimes a lower toll can increase revenue, because more people will use it. On the other hand toll increases can be extremely risky because traffic volumes can drop considerably if there are alternative routes, especially if the toll facility is not a bridge or tunnel. Several Spanish toll road operators are currently on the verge of bankruptcy because they overestimated the traffic volumes. Some Spanish toll roads carry less than 3,000 vehicles per day. The real estate bust played a major role in this as well, I've read this is also the case with the South Bay Expressway. Chula Vista apparently had one of the highest foreclosure rates in California. There are also at least 3 major arterials that lead to the toll-free I-805, undermining the use of the South Bay Expressway.

[jrouse]

SANDAG had plans to do a major widening of the I-805 corridor, similar to what they did on I-15 north of San Diego.  When they purchased the SBX project, they decided to try and promote the toll road as an alternative to I-805, and lowering tolls was the first way to get this to happen.  For now, they have shelved their plans for the 805 managed lanes, at least on the southern half of that route, while they wait and see how the SBX performs.

Another problem with SBX is that it doesn't really tie into anything at its southern end, especially now that the new State Route 905 (future I-905) freeway has been built.  It has always ended at Otay Mesa Road, which was part of State Route 905.  But with the realignment of 905 onto the new freeway, you must use local streets to get between 905 and the toll road.  A freeway-to-freeway connection is planned between 905 and SBX, which will also tie in with the new State Route 11 toll road (also to be operated by SANDAG) that will serve a new border crossing east of the Otay Mesa crossing.