toll bridge

The new owner of the Swinford toll bridge near Oxford England won't be officially revealed until financial close, according to the auctioneer Neil Mackilligin.   All Mackilligan will say is that the buyer is a UK-based individual, who is not local to the area.

Bidding with a crowd of 700 people at Alsop's auction house in London December 3 began at pd800k ($1.28m) and the high bid was pd1.08m ($1.73m).

The Swinford toll bridge in Oxfordshire England sold today at auction in London for about $1.8m (1,080,000 pounds). The charming old stone arch bridge over the upper Thames located just west of the university city of Oxford is heavily used for its two narrow lanes  - over 10,000 vehicles average per day, so there is a good potential toll revenue stream. But the bridge's legal setting is an embodiment of English Eccentricity.

North Texas Tollway Authority (NTTA) are due to open their sixth toll facility, Lewisville Lake Toll Bridge August 1. The bridge is part of a 22km (14 mile) east-west surface arterial route between I-35E on its western end and Dallas North Tollway on its eastern end. Apart from the bridge the route is untolled and is being built by TxDOT Denton County and local cities, Frisco and Little Elm.

Andrew Terhune who vacationed recently in Belize passes on this account and accompanying pictures of a modest city owned toll bridge in San Pedro. Called the Boca del Rio Bridge in english and Nuestro Puente Boca del Rio in spanish it is built just stoutly enough to carry pedestrians, bicycles, golf carts and golf carts with trailers - no full motor vehicles.

Margate Bridge Company in Margate NJ raised its tolls today. Frequent users who buy a proximity card with credits for 100 car trips will now pay $1.00 a trip compared to 80c previously, and cash payers will fork over $1.50 compared to $1.00 before. An official statement (see in full at end) cites high costs of maintenance of the near 80 year old bridge as rationale for the toll increases.

Cape May County New Jersey took over the Beesley's Point Bridge today (2008-12-30) paying a token one dollar in a transaction to acquire title to the private toll bridge which has been closed to traffic since June 23 2004. As part of the transaction the bridge company repaid a $900k loan from the NJDOT from 1997.

Nothing stimulates local self-help like a "No, sorry, we can't help" from on high. After Florida's Turnpike Enterprise (FTE) recently told Manatee County on the west coast that it can't build the Fort Hamer Bridge the county commissioners only took days to decide to go it alone. A decade of lobbying for FDOT and the feds to fund a bridge had gone nowhere. The state Turnpike was the last hope of help from higher levels of government.

There's lots of publicity in Sweden over advertising which uses the name of the Oresund Bridge-Tunnel to describe a sex position. Following the old adage that sex sells, Liten Butik (Littlies Boutique?) a children's clothing store chain based in Stockholm produced an advertising spread with sketches of some 24 sex positions.

The risque ad for children's gear has the tagline: "You make the customers, we'll make the clothes."