New I-540 being de-interstated to NC540 before opening to allow later tolling
Posted Thu, 2007-07-05 18:18
The red white and blue interstate 540 signs on a new 11km (7 mile) section of I-540 in Raleigh are being hurriedly taken down this week and replaced in two segments by black and white 540 state route signs before the 2x3 lane expressway opens. The hurried sign changes are to avoid future entanglement in federal interstate tolling rules, says Kevin Lacy, an engineer at NCDOT.
Any day now North Carolina Department of Transportation (NCDOT) is opening I/NC540 from I-40 to NC55, labeled 1, 2 and 3 in the map nearby. Segment 1 to NC54 will remain untolled and is retaining the I-540 signs. However when
North Carolina Turnpike Authority opens the Triangle Parkway (aka as Triangle Expressway) labeled 4 above, and the Western Wake Expressway labeled 5 the plan is to collect tolls on sections 2 and 3.
But the beginning of tolling is about four years away. If segments 2 and 3 are opened as interstate, Lacy says, the Turnpike fears it will run into congressional laws preventing tolling an existing free interstate. That complication is avoided if this stretch of road opens as a state route.
There isn't any legal problem in a tollroad BEING or BECOMING an interstate. Half the tollroads in the US are interstates. The Greenville Southern Connector in South Carolina obtained interstate designation (I-185) after it opened. Illinois is about to open another long segment of I-355 as tollway southwest of Chicago.
It is the CONVERSION of a previously free interstate to a tollroad that is tricky. Three "pilot programs" do allow it, but only under onerous conditions.
So to be safe the red white and blue interstate 540 signs have been coming down in favor of the safer black and white diamond signs.
The road is being, shall we say: 'de-interstated.'
Another way might have been to sign sections 2 and 3 "I-540 TOLL" with the North Carolina Turnpike logo there on opening while declaring an extended opening toll-free period in effect until the connecting tollroads 4 and 5 were built. That way it would be a tollroad on opening, but a tollroad without tolls collected yet.
Such is the nonsense required by federal bars on conversion of freeways to tollroads.
TOLLROADSnews 2007-07-05–
The red white and blue interstate 540 signs on a new 11km (7 mile) section of I-540 in Raleigh are being hurriedly taken down this week and replaced in two segments by black and white 540 state route signs before the 2x3 lane expressway opens. The hurried sign changes are to avoid future entanglement in federal interstate tolling rules, says Kevin Lacy, an engineer at NCDOT.Any day now North Carolina Department of Transportation (NCDOT) is opening I/NC540 from I-40 to NC55, labeled 1, 2 and 3 in the map nearby. Segment 1 to NC54 will remain untolled and is retaining the I-540 signs. However when
North Carolina Turnpike Authority opens the Triangle Parkway (aka as Triangle Expressway) labeled 4 above, and the Western Wake Expressway labeled 5 the plan is to collect tolls on sections 2 and 3. But the beginning of tolling is about four years away. If segments 2 and 3 are opened as interstate, Lacy says, the Turnpike fears it will run into congressional laws preventing tolling an existing free interstate. That complication is avoided if this stretch of road opens as a state route.
There isn't any legal problem in a tollroad BEING or BECOMING an interstate. Half the tollroads in the US are interstates. The Greenville Southern Connector in South Carolina obtained interstate designation (I-185) after it opened. Illinois is about to open another long segment of I-355 as tollway southwest of Chicago.
It is the CONVERSION of a previously free interstate to a tollroad that is tricky. Three "pilot programs" do allow it, but only under onerous conditions.
So to be safe the red white and blue interstate 540 signs have been coming down in favor of the safer black and white diamond signs.
The road is being, shall we say: 'de-interstated.'
Another way might have been to sign sections 2 and 3 "I-540 TOLL" with the North Carolina Turnpike logo there on opening while declaring an extended opening toll-free period in effect until the connecting tollroads 4 and 5 were built. That way it would be a tollroad on opening, but a tollroad without tolls collected yet.
Such is the nonsense required by federal bars on conversion of freeways to tollroads.
TOLLROADSnews 2007-07-05–