Sticker tags infiltrate heart of E-ZPass - Niagara bridges NY-Ont (REVISED)

Victor Montalbo of the Niagara Falls Bridge Commission (NFBC) says that almost 70% of the trucks crossing their Queenston-Lewiston Bridge, the most northerly of the three Ontario Canada to New York State bridges in the Niagara area carry E-ZPass transponders on their windshields. But the Commission has chosen to go to electronic tolling with TransCore's eGo sticker tags instead.

"We looked very carefully at doing E-ZPass but it just isn't cost effective," says Montalbo, Director of Finance and Administration, and he reels off the membership costs, the service charges, the rules and regulations, and equipment costs.

Service and credit card charges alone were going to be between $800k and $1m a year.

The transponders are nearly three times the price of sticker tags and the tags don't have batteries that eventually expire.

"It's just too expensive and too large," Montalbo says of E-ZPass IAG.

They haven 't closed off any E-ZPass options however.

"We can read the E-ZPass transponders going through."

They've bought multimode TransCore readers which can read E-ZPass as well as the eGo sticker tags. But because of the costs of belonging to the IAG for now they are doing electronic tolling without dealing with E-ZPass transponder accounts.

Many customers will probably carry both ExpressPass and E-ZPass devices. The two work together without interference.

E-ZPass is used heavily on the New York State Thruway with toll points on I-190 on Grand Island just a few miles away from the NFBC bridges. The Peace Bridge a bit upriver above the falls in Buffalo is part of E-ZPass, but no other border crossings are members of the IAG. Several use proximity cards which the motorist must hold to within about 500mm (20inches) of a reader located convenient to the driver window.

Monday October 15th the NFBC began taking tolls with eGo tags under the brand ExpressPass for private commuters. Rolls of tokens previous sold at a discount (20 for $44 for cash tolls of $3 each) for regulars are no longer being sold, though for now they are still being accepted in payment.

15% of transactions at the Rainbow and 7% at the Lewiston Queenston Bridge were by token. 100% of Whirlpool Bridge motorists used tokens. (CORRECTION 2007-10-25)
ExpressPass cards or tags are the replacement.

New mounting method - hang tag

ExpressPass is using a new-for-tolling mounting method for private motorists. Instead of being stuck to the windshield like the sticker tags in use in Puerto Rico, Houston, Atlanta and Tacoma WA the eGo transponders are built into a plastic card and clipped into a light plastic hangtag frame and hung from the arm of the rear vision mirror.

NFBC's Montalbo tells us he thinks customers prefer this to fixing the tag permanently to the windshield. Customers can move them between cars the way they move velcro attached hardcased transponders like E-ZPass.

At the Queenston Lewiston and Whirlpool bridges ExpressCards are being sold by toll collectors out of toll booths for cash.

At this point ExpressPasses are being used as stored value cards and are not associated with an account. Motorists pay a minimum $20 to start ExpressPass - comprising a $10 refundable deposit for the card and $10 of prepaid toll money. They can replenish the value in the card in increments of $5.

Nexus cards now used for tolling too

Starting Feb 2007 Nexus cards were enrolled into the Bridge Commission toll system. Nexus cards are border clearance "trusted traveler" cards issued by US and Canadian border control to frequent border crossers who have gained security clearance. They are identical physically to eGo tags - a spinoff of IBM manufacturing - but sold by Intermec with whom TransCore has licensing agreements.

6,000 Nexus cards issued for gaining priority in border crossing priority are now set up to be read by the toll system readers.

NFBC which tolls eastbound only has these toll lanes:

Rainbow 6 lanes

Lewiston-Queenston 4 lanes

Whirlpool 1 lane

$2.7m spent - nine readers and 2 gantries, 15k tags, system software

Work was performed under a $1.7m contract with InTrans which supplied the electronic toll hardware, laser profilers for vehicle classification, and lane software. Another $1m was spent by the Commission on gantries, 15,000 tags, and other costs. Montalbo says his own IT staff did a lot of work alongside InTrans helping to keep software development outlays down. (CORRECTION here 2007-10-23 14:50)

Nine lanes are equipped for electronic tolling.

Eight readers are the multimode TransCore 4110A readers mounted on gantries, while one at the slowspeed single toll lane on the Whirlpool Bridge is an Intermec reader - a kind of extended range proximity card good for 2m (7ft).

They are looking at the Encompass 6 readers for a new toll plaza due to open Dec 2008.

"It's working really well," Montalbo told us after several days of operation with about 125 ExpressPass tags in use.

In a highspeed environment the hang tag won't be as reliable as a windshield mounted tag, but these border crossings are gated and slow speed because of the customs and immigration control adjacent to toll collection.

Trucks to get windshield mounted tags

Next development will be taking ExpressPass to commercial vehicles. Here the Commission may go for permanent sticker tags or a pouch stuck on the windshield in which the tag is inserted.

ExpressPass and Nexus tolls are discounted 15% at $2.55 versus $3.00 cash.

Coin machines previously in use for tokens have been removed and remaining tokens are being handled by toll collectors.

BACKGROUND: The Commission is a financially self-supporting 68 year old binational outfit governed by a broad of directors appointed equally by the state of New York and the province of Ontario. The first bridges it acquired were built as private toll bridges, the Whirlpool going back to 1897.

The Rainbow Bridge the nearest to the great Falls is mostly used by tourists. It has four 3.3m (11ft) lanes is restricted to cars and buses. It does 9k/day. The steel arch has a span of 290m (951ft).

The Whirlpool Bridge built in 1897 and bought from a private operator by the Commission in 1959 is closest to the downtowns of the two Niagaras. A passenger cars crossing too it is open 7am to 11pm. It is a Nexus Only bridge and the main commuter bridge. It has a rail line on an upper deck and consists of an arch span of 168m (550ft).

Queenston-Lewiston opened in 1962 is the Commission's longdistance mixed traffic bridge with expressway standard connections on both sides. It links H405 in Ontario to I-190 in New York state. Of five lanes it does about 9k cars and 3k trucks/day.

The Commission has invested large sums in improving the toll/border clearance plaza and approaches to the Lewiston-Queenston Bridge. On the Canadian side there is a dedicated truck lane approach for about a mile before the bridge.

The three bridges are all of similar steel arch construction anchored into the steep cliffs of the unusual Niagara gorge.

Traffic on the bridges has still not recovered from the 9/11 2001 Islamist attacks and heightened security scrutiny at the border.

The Commission collects about $16m/yr in tolls.

see http://www.niagarafallsbridges.com

TOLLROADSnews 2007-10-22 CORRECTION 2007-10-23 14:50 MORE CORRECTION 2007-10-25