mta

July 1 last year (2010) the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge saw a pair of radical changes in the toll structure: (1) a $4.00 to $6.00 increase in the peakhours' toll rate for cars while the offpeak toll remained the same (2) a $2.50 toll on previously free carpool vehicles (HOV3) in peakhours.

MTA Bridges and Tunnels in New York City is beginning a swap-out of 1.2 million E-ZPass transponders. They're sending out new transponders (also known as tags) and a postage-paid envelop for customers to return their old transponders that are judged to be nearing end of battery life. The 1.2m being taken out of service represent 35% of the 3.4m transponders MTAB&T had on issue at the end of January - attached to 2.1m accounts.

It's unspectacular work everyone tends to take for granted but it can make a big difference to the life of roads and bridges - fixing winter's potholes and breakup of pavement, and repairing floods' scouring around the top of bridge piles.

A new report to customers by New York's Metropolitan Transportation Authority (NYMTA) is mostly devoted to what's being done to make the subways and buses run better but there are couple of pages embracing all-electronic tolling at the City's bridges and tunnels. The report is titled "Making every dollar count" Agenda 2011." There's a link to the full report at the bottom.

New York's MTA Bridges and Tunnels (MTAB&T) are doing a "pilot project" with all-electronic toll (AET) collection at the Henry Hudson Bridge plaza on the far northern tip of Manhattan island.  A staff presentation to the MTA board says the benefits of all-electronic are: less stopping and reduced travel times for motorists, reduced operating costs for MTAB&T and reduced capital cost in the future.

Telvent has formally requested that MTA Bridges and Tunnels (MTAB&T) bring forward an audit of their E-ZPass maintenance contract and associated accounts in response to sensational allegations of "fraud"  by Phil Leshinsky, former senior officer of Telvent and further back at MTAB&T itself. In a separate development we have the first reaction from MTAB&T whom we have hit with a number of questions.

Phillip S Leshinsky a toll industry veteran has sued his former employer Telvent in US District Court in Manhattan for $875k in lost wages and damages, claiming he had legal privilege as a whistleblower against Telvent on what his suit says was "unethical, dishonest and probably illegal" behavior at the expense of the big New York City toller MTA Bridges and Tunnels (MTAB&T).

The most common toll on Triborough Bridge & Tunnel Authority facilities in New York City, the E-ZPass transponder toll for cars will rise by 23.7% from $4.15 to $5.26 in July after a 12/1 vote of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (NYMTA) board today. The toll hikes were part of a crisis package of higher charges and service cuts designed to close a looming $1.2b deficit in a $11b New York area public transportation budget.

New York City's Metro Transport Authority (we abbreviate) is playing a bargaining game of political poker with the state legislature - gimme subsidies or we'll hike tolls and transit. The poker game has been played in Boston for months now, public transit and toll officials proposing toll and fare increases, then playing off the negative public reaction to pressure the pols to cough up subsidies. Pols beating up on the authority, demanding reforms... on and on.

New York's Triborough Bridge and Tunnel Authority (TBTA) has dropped TransCore in favor of Telvent Caseta for a longstanding electronic toll (ET) system hardware maintenance contract. The board of directors of the MTA, the Triborough's parent state authority which also runs major rail and bus services in New York approved the contract award to Telvent Caseta at their meeting Thursday July 24.