GOVERNMENT HUCKSTERS:FHWA Claims Credit For E-ZPass

Of the various new technologies that get encompassed in the term Intelligent Transp Systems (ITS) which the FHWA is promoting in a $-billion+/year program the outstanding (some say the ONLY) success story is electronic tolling (ET). But the federal government has nothing whatsoever to do with ET. It was invented by scientists and engineers in the aerospace business, developed by investor-financed companies, designed by consultants and financed, installed, maintained, promoted and operated by state toll agencies and their contractors, without any federal money at all. The users, motorists, pay for it. Fully, and they love it.

The only federal involvement in ET has been a belated and slow effort to get agreement on a technical standard for the next generation of ET equipment expected to hit the market somewhere in the 2005 to 2010 timeframe.

Everything for ET now on the windshields of motorists and attached to gantries at toll plazas is there without the spending of a single cent of US Government money and without the help of an hour of the time of a single US govt official.

Those small facts however don’t stop US govt hucksters from claiming credit for ET at every opportunity. For example Kenneth Wykle the top guy at FHWA in a speech reproduced in PUBLIC ROADS, the FHWA journal (Nov/Dec 98), cites “EZ Pass and Fast Toll” as examples of the ITS projects of the US govt’s ITS program. A caption to a picture of the E-ZPass signage on the New York State Thruway says that “the FHWA is deploying... systems such as EZ Pass and Fast Toll.” (see at top of page)

We are told in black and white “the FHWA is deploying...”!!! Pray where exactly?

What a bald-faced lie! What outrageous poppycock! Foul fraud! Preposteropus pretenders! Shameless...

Ah heck, calm down. As the sergeant said to his squad: “Those friendly incoming rounds, they’re more likely to be a damned fool mistake, than the guys you peed off tryin to getcha.” So s’pose it’s just innocent sloppiness, some ignorant hack writing the speeches for Wykle and doing the captions for his mag without troubling to check his facts. And how would a lofty guy like Wykle know about the truth of what someone gave him to read at a microphone? After all most highway programs have had fed-$s at some point. So, we generously surmise, their research consisted of this conversation at a coffee dispenser: “Those smart toll gizmos. Wadda they call’em? Easypath is it? Ah Easy Pass. We must have put some money into that sucker somehow, some time, eh? So we can claim the credit for it...Err, guess so.”

Well ya didn’t, see! The toll agencies dun it on their ownsome.

And hey it’s “E-ZPass” not “EZ Pass.” And what’s this “Fast Toll”? There was a logo called “Fastoll” out there signing the ET on the Dulles Toll Road and Greenway from 1995 thru 1997. But for over a year now the Virginia logo has been “Smart Tag.” So next time the limo drives you to Dulles airport, guys, how about glancing out the window?