Mass Pike exec LeBovidge revives idea of card accepting transponder (TECHNOLOGY)
Posted Wed, 2008-02-27 00:00
Alan LeBovidge, exective director of the Massachusetts Turnpike Authority has revived the idea of using card accepting transponders (CATs) in
the US. He has been telling local reporters he'd like to see one device that would pay for tolls, transit fares, and parking at government facilities. But he says he isn't sure about the availability of the technology.
There is no single transponder that can do both high speed toll collection and transit fare payment. Engineers say they are inherently different devices. The first has to work within milliseconds at speeds up to 160km/hr (100mph) and at 3m to 10m (10ft to 35ft) range and is usually fixed to the vehicle windshield, while the second
has to be portable and it must not work beyond a range of half a meter (2ft) or it won't know whether it is charging the person at the turnstile or someone else in line.
One costs $8 to $30 while the other costs cents to $1.00 maximum per unit.
However since the beginning of electronic toll collection manufacturers of toll transponders have been offering card accepting transponders (CATs)Â - magstripe cards first and later contact 'smart cards' inserted in a slot in the transponder.
Foothill Eastern 1994
One of the first CATs was used on the first stretch of Foothill Eastern Toll Road opened by the Transportation Corridors Agencies in Orange County California in 1994. It was a short-lived AT&T transponder that accepted a magstripe card - short-lived because it was a customer service nightmare with such a high incidence of complaints and non-reads that the toll authority within months dumped the cards, switched to customer accounts and a simple but reliable Texas Instruments transponder tht became the state standard.
Mark IV offering of CAT early this decade
Mark IV several years ago offered a slotted transponder that would take a bank card or transit card. They showed it at their exhibition booth at an IBTTA conference. Mark IV is the sole supplier to the E-ZPass Inter Agency Group of toll authorities including the Massachusetts Turnpike.
Mark IV were hopeful of making sales in the New York/New Jersey, and Chicago areas where there were a number of places where tollroad users park their cars and hop on trains.
In the New York area two toll agencies also run transit lines:
 - PANYNJ which as well as deploying E-ZPass on the NY-NJ bridges and tunnels runs the PATH subway line from Newark and Hoboken to lower and midtown Manhattan
- New York's Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) which does nearly 80% of its toll transactions via E-ZPass on the toll bridges and tunnels of the City and runs the subway and commuter rail systems of New York City and suburbs
Having transponders and transit fare cards issued within the same agency would seem to make it easy to manage card accepting transponders (CATs). But officials there explain they passed on the Mark IV's CATs for several reasons:
- there aren't enough people who commute by a combination of tollroad and rail transit to warrant stocking CATs as well as regular transponders
- it complicates billing and customer service
- people are liable to forget to insert their card in the transponder slot when they drive and therefore incur a lot of violation charges
CATs tend not to accept transit cards overseas
But they love CATs in some countries.
Singapore's ubiquitous electronic road pricing (ERP) has relied entirely on CATs since Sept 1998 when it went live. Every vehicle registered in Singapore must have a slotted transponder or IU (In vehicle Unit) as they call it. A stored value card called a CashCard is inserted in the slot of the IU to allow an electronic funds transfer between the stored value card and the readers of the Singapore toll system on the fly. But to overcome the forgetfulness of motorists CashCards are not usable on the transit system.
The Singapore transit system has its own EZ-LINK cards. Â
CATs allow the Singapore toll system to work without customer accounts. Customers can top up the value of the CashCards at bank automatic teller machines.
Japan's electronic toll system which began in 1999 also uses CATs. These slotted technology transponders accept a variety of cards, but business relationships have yet to provide widespread interoperability in practice.
Massachusetts
In 2006 the Boston transit system (called the 'T') got rid of tokens at their turnstiles and introduced a mix of magstripe cards named Charlie Tickets and proximity cards called CharlieCards. (Charlie is a character in a 1948 folk song who wandered endlessly in the Boston subways because he didn't have the nickel needed for the exit fare.)
CharlieCards are contactless proximity cards. Most CATs use a contact card which sits in the slot and makes contact.
Only one of about twenty transit lines in the Boston area runs by the Massachusetts Turnpike and seems likely to get a lot of CharlieCard carrying commuters - the Worcester-Framingham commuter line.
And so far the procurement by the Mass Turnpike Authority of a new toll system doesn't seem to specify any CAT.
see http://www.masspike.com/user-cgi/contracts.cgi?dbkey=113
TOLLROADSnews 2008-02-26
Â
the US. He has been telling local reporters he'd like to see one device that would pay for tolls, transit fares, and parking at government facilities. But he says he isn't sure about the availability of the technology.There is no single transponder that can do both high speed toll collection and transit fare payment. Engineers say they are inherently different devices. The first has to work within milliseconds at speeds up to 160km/hr (100mph) and at 3m to 10m (10ft to 35ft) range and is usually fixed to the vehicle windshield, while the second
has to be portable and it must not work beyond a range of half a meter (2ft) or it won't know whether it is charging the person at the turnstile or someone else in line. One costs $8 to $30 while the other costs cents to $1.00 maximum per unit.
However since the beginning of electronic toll collection manufacturers of toll transponders have been offering card accepting transponders (CATs)Â - magstripe cards first and later contact 'smart cards' inserted in a slot in the transponder.
Foothill Eastern 1994
One of the first CATs was used on the first stretch of Foothill Eastern Toll Road opened by the Transportation Corridors Agencies in Orange County California in 1994. It was a short-lived AT&T transponder that accepted a magstripe card - short-lived because it was a customer service nightmare with such a high incidence of complaints and non-reads that the toll authority within months dumped the cards, switched to customer accounts and a simple but reliable Texas Instruments transponder tht became the state standard.
Mark IV offering of CAT early this decade
Mark IV several years ago offered a slotted transponder that would take a bank card or transit card. They showed it at their exhibition booth at an IBTTA conference. Mark IV is the sole supplier to the E-ZPass Inter Agency Group of toll authorities including the Massachusetts Turnpike.
Mark IV were hopeful of making sales in the New York/New Jersey, and Chicago areas where there were a number of places where tollroad users park their cars and hop on trains.
In the New York area two toll agencies also run transit lines:Â - PANYNJ which as well as deploying E-ZPass on the NY-NJ bridges and tunnels runs the PATH subway line from Newark and Hoboken to lower and midtown Manhattan
- New York's Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) which does nearly 80% of its toll transactions via E-ZPass on the toll bridges and tunnels of the City and runs the subway and commuter rail systems of New York City and suburbs
Having transponders and transit fare cards issued within the same agency would seem to make it easy to manage card accepting transponders (CATs). But officials there explain they passed on the Mark IV's CATs for several reasons:
- there aren't enough people who commute by a combination of tollroad and rail transit to warrant stocking CATs as well as regular transponders
- it complicates billing and customer service
- people are liable to forget to insert their card in the transponder slot when they drive and therefore incur a lot of violation charges
CATs tend not to accept transit cards overseas
But they love CATs in some countries.
Singapore's ubiquitous electronic road pricing (ERP) has relied entirely on CATs since Sept 1998 when it went live. Every vehicle registered in Singapore must have a slotted transponder or IU (In vehicle Unit) as they call it. A stored value card called a CashCard is inserted in the slot of the IU to allow an electronic funds transfer between the stored value card and the readers of the Singapore toll system on the fly. But to overcome the forgetfulness of motorists CashCards are not usable on the transit system.
The Singapore transit system has its own EZ-LINK cards. Â
CATs allow the Singapore toll system to work without customer accounts. Customers can top up the value of the CashCards at bank automatic teller machines.
Japan's electronic toll system which began in 1999 also uses CATs. These slotted technology transponders accept a variety of cards, but business relationships have yet to provide widespread interoperability in practice.
Massachusetts
In 2006 the Boston transit system (called the 'T') got rid of tokens at their turnstiles and introduced a mix of magstripe cards named Charlie Tickets and proximity cards called CharlieCards. (Charlie is a character in a 1948 folk song who wandered endlessly in the Boston subways because he didn't have the nickel needed for the exit fare.)CharlieCards are contactless proximity cards. Most CATs use a contact card which sits in the slot and makes contact.
Only one of about twenty transit lines in the Boston area runs by the Massachusetts Turnpike and seems likely to get a lot of CharlieCard carrying commuters - the Worcester-Framingham commuter line.
And so far the procurement by the Mass Turnpike Authority of a new toll system doesn't seem to specify any CAT.
see http://www.masspike.com/user-cgi/contracts.cgi?dbkey=113
TOLLROADSnews 2008-02-26
Â