Pennsylvania Turnpike has smooth introduction of its first highway speed electronic tolling

Twin gantries carry open road toll gear, smart loops in pavement View west with 8 traditional pay lanes on right side, ORT lanes center, and 5 ticket pickup lanes left Penn Pike is I-76, Pittsburgh is to the immediate south

The Pennsylvania Turnpike has had a smooth entry into open road tolling (ORT) with the opening of the central highway speed lanes through the center of the new Warrendale Toll Plaza, now the western end of the mainline's ticket system. Warrendale is due north of Pittsburgh and just east of the junction with I-79.

America's oldest major tollroad of the automobile era and a leader in high technology in the 1960s and 1970s has tended to lag behind in the electronic toll era. But its staff have taken advantage of the experience of others to achieve very smooth introductions. In the case of Warrendale they studied closely the New Jersey Turnpike's introduction last year of highway speed electronic tolling at its Exit 18E plaza, the northern gateway plaza.

"That's very similar to the set up we have at Warrendale. We got a lot of valuable tips from there which helped us," said Jeff White one of the Turnpike engineers managing the project. There was a lot of signage and publicity discouraging motorists from stopping to pay, and backing up if realized they had made a mistake. These dangerous 'uh-oh' maneuvers frequently plague the first days of open road tolling.

"Just keep going and call customer service later. Do NOT under any circumstances stop or attempt to deal with a mistake at the toll plaza," was a publicity theme.

Bill Capone, spokesman said of the Warrendale startup: "We haven't had big issues, no complaints, no incidents. Violations haven't been out of the ordinary."

On other tollroads introducing open road tolling violations have usually been 10% to 25% in the first weeks. Not at Warrendale say the Penn Pike officials, but so far they haven't gotten us figures. They think careful attention to signage, plus a major informational campaign paid off. And they had a state trooper in his car there.

As for the open road tolling systems they are "going great," says White.

The stop-to-pay part of the toll plaza opened June last year as part of an elaborate set of changes to toll arrangements at the western end of the mainline. It used to be all ticket system. Now there is point tolling, and some free trips, west of Warrendale which has become the western end of the ticket system.

ORT is two 40-foot roadways

The ORT portion in the middle of the plaza is designed for 2 x 3.65m (12ft) travel lanes each direction with a 3.65m (12ft) breakdown lane rightside and a 1.2m (4ft) shoulder leftside or 12.2m (40ft) kerb to kerb - very similar to a section of modern 2x2 lane motorway. It has three concrete barriers, the central one dividing the directions of open road traffic and the side ones to segregate the highspeed traffic from stopping traffic. Staff have to use a tunnel to move from one side to the other.

The open road toll lanes 'read' differently to approaching motorists because they have relatively light looking tubular equipment gantries over them versus the deep fascia to the canopy over the toll collection lanes. Traffic is separated before the belly-out.

There are five traditional toll lanes eastbound where patrons stop and pick a magstriped ticket from a ticket dispensing machine or use their E-ZPass transponder to enter the ticket portion of the pike. Westbound where motorists are exiting the ticket portion tolls are collected in eight toll lanes. One of these is dedicated for transponder tolling, and others can also deal with E-ZPass - for times when the express lanes are closed, or just to handle motorists who choose not to use the express lanes.

The Turnpike people say there is a proportion of motorists who like to get the feedback from the patron display acknowledging their toll. Others may want directions from a toll collector, or turnpike map.

In the open road lanes there is no feedback.

At present there is only a single open road lane striped each direction (see picture). That's temporary because bridges beyond the toll plaza need to be widened before two lanes each direction can safely be operated through the plaza area. But all the equipment is in place for multi-lane highspeed toll operations in four lanes plus coverage of the shoulders

A first here for the Pennsylvania Turnpike in the highspeed lanes is the deployment of Idris smart loops for vehicle tracking and classification. They are visible as a series of rectangular sawcut-and-caulk fills in the pavement through the toll zone. A pair of 27m (90ft) tubular section gantries carry DSRC readers, and violation cameras and lights. The VES cameras take both frontal and rear pictures.

The civil works for the toll plaza including the four open road lanes cost some $21.7m in a construction contract and were completed June 2003. The open road toll system was a separate contract performed by TransCore for a total cost including allocated Turnpike staff time of $1.4m.

Eastbound open road tolling - called by the Turnpike "Express E-ZPass" - began June 2, 2004 in a ceremony with Turnpike CEO Joseph Brimmeier driving a circa 1940 Dodge pickup as the first vehicle to have its toll taken at highway speed. (1940 was the year the Turnpike first opened for business.)

Westbound open road operations began June 26.

In the traditional toll lanes maximum speed is signed for 5mph, and in the open road lanes for 55mph.

BACKGROUND: E-ZPass started on the Turnpike three and a half years ago and the Turnpike has issued about 500k transponders. Those and transponders of other E-ZPass toll agencies are currently doing about 180k toll transactions daily, or 42% of the total 435k tolls/day.

18 additional E-ZPass entry lanes are being added in the next several months. Longer term the Turnpike will go to open road tolling at other mainline toll plazas including Gateway #2, M52 on the Mon/Fayette Expressway, the proposed I-95 interchange, Delaware River Bridge #359, Mid-County #20, and Wyoming Valley #115 on the Northeastern Extension. TOLLROADSnews 2004-07-09