traffic

Fitch Ratings say that all the US toll operators they cover showed improved toll revenue in 2012 compared to 2011. Traffic was up modestly at most, exceptions being the New Jersey Turnpike and Garden State Parkway where there were 50% toll hikes. Their traffic dipped 4.1% and 2.9%.

2013-02-04: Transurban, principal shareholder and operator of the 495 toll express lanes on the Capital Beltway has told shareholders in Melbourne Australia that initial traffic is below expectations and that adjustment to traffic patterns and motorist preferences will be required.

2013-01-11: Operators of the 495 Express Lanes on the Capital Beltway in the Washington DC area - a Transurban/Fluor subsidiary - report  traffic has been building steadily since they opened November 17 and that they are getting "great feedback" from customers via twitter, emails, and calls to the customer service center.

2012/12/07: Phil Andrews' Montgomery County district of Rockville and Gaithersburg lies squarely athwart the western end of the MD200 tollroad also known as the Inter County Connector (ICC.) The year old tollroad (it began tolling Dec 5 2011) is a boon for Andrews constituents but he caught some headlines this week echoing pretty well many of

2012-09-24: Full year estimates of vehicle-miles traveled nationwide in 2011 suggest traffic in continuing decline. For the calendar year 2011 the estimate was 2.93 trillion vehicle miles traveled (TVMT) vs 2.97 TVMT in 2010, 1.2% down. We're 3.3% below traffic levels of the last boom year 2007.

2012-09-18: Based on the first eight months' numbers traffic on the Dulles Greenway is up just a tad - about one percent - over 2011. That's good news since 2012 might be the first year in which total traffic matched the year before since the pike peaked in 2005. The last six years have all seen traffic decline from the previous year. And this on the supposedly developing fringe of the Washington DC metro area.

July was a dull month for traffic at the US-Canada toll crossings, according to partial data from the Public Border Operators Association (PBOA.)

Ambassador Bridge traffic was down12.2k or 2.4% with the lucrative trucks down the most - 12.2k or 6.6% to 172,875 or 5,577 daily average.  NOTE: The obsessive Moroun-bashing/new bridge boosting press corps in Detroit/Windsor usually cite the daily truck traffic at the Ambassador Bridge at 10,000 or 8,000 - a rehash of numbers from some years ago.

Again and again you'll read that the Ambassador Bridge handles 10,000 trucks per day. The Detroit-Windsor media report the "ten thousand daily" almost, well, daily. Wikipedia has it too.

The bridge company itself is partly at fault. They say on their website the bridge "carries more than 10,000 commercial vehicles on a typical weekday."

Oklahoma Turnpike reports strong traffic first quarter of the year - 37.35m transactions in the first quarter of the year up 9.6% on the first quarter of 2011's 34.08m. Vehicle miles traveled on the network were 734.47m vs 677.28m, 8.4% up. Revenue at $54.37m is 8.7% up on the same quarter last year.

2012-05-21 21:30: 2011 saw a dramatic drop in traffic congestion in the US - 30% fewer hours wasted in congested traffic according to INRIX, the nation's leading provider of traffic data. The 2011 improvement is only outmatched in the years since INRIX has been measuring congestion by the financial crisis year of 2008, when congestion dropped 34%. In 2009 congestion was up 1% and 2010 saw a 10% regrowth of congestion.