New 2/2/03

Waste, waste, and more waste
Written by CAT's webmaster Jim Padykula, who doesn't use toll roads, but fights tolls because of the amount of money wasted collecting them.

Every time I see an E-ZPass transponder behind a windshield, I see a waste of $25. Every time someone receives or sends an E-ZPass bill, I see a wasted stamp, envelope, and letter. Every time I hear of them chasing, prosecuting, and especially wrongly prosecuting toll cheats, I think of a wasted who knows how much. The list goes on and on (see our Toll Costs page).

And that doesn't begin to scratch the surface. So far the cost of E-ZPass is up to $750 million. And that's on top of the old collection system, and under the threat of an even newer E-ZPass system. Every salary paid, from the hundreds of 24/7 toll collectors making $40,000 (to over $70,000 with overtime), to the army needed to run E-ZPass and maintain the accounts, to the11 politically appointed GSP executives making over $1,500,000 annually between them (see Salary page). And even the $24 million spent chasing toll cheats (to collect $13 million).

All of these expenses are not needed, and NJ has 35,000 miles of toll-free roads to prove it.

Then there are hidden costs, like the wasted gas, or the additional wear and tear on our cars from stopping or slowing to pay tolls. Millions of extra stops translates into wearing out several sets of brake pads each day just to pay tolls. Then there's the money spent on fixing fenders, mending bones, or funerals from the hundreds of accidents caused by toll plazas (see Safety page), not to mention the increased insurance costs incurred. And what kind of toll does the added pollution from all these needless stops extract from us?

Last but not least, there is the wasted time, not only waiting in line to pay tolls, but also maintaining E-ZPass accounts. If everyone lost only one minute of their time to pay each 35¢ toll, the value of the time lost on the Parkway even calculated at minimum wage comes out to over $50 million annually.

I am angry and ashamed by how much is wasted collecting tolls on a mere 400 miles of roads in NJ!

"It just 35¢"

It burns me up when a toll sympathizer say "It's only 35¢ - why bother fighting it"? And these are the same people that go through the roof when you suggest a 3¢ gas tax hike. My reply to them is "Hey, 3¢ is less than 35¢ - and we can easily remove Parkway tolls with a 3¢ gas tax increase". Plus very little of that 3¢ is wasted collecting it.

It's not just 35¢, it's billions of dollars - WASTED.

Every time I hear of a worthy government program that can't find funding, I think of all that money wasted on collecting tolls. Just think of all the senior prescription medication we could buy with that. Or we could free the beaches. Or buy that ethanol plant. Or school construction, rebuild the World Trade Center, disaster aid, DMV, DYFS - name your favorite cause because...

ANYTHING would be better than wasting it on toll collection.

Tolls are hardly a necessary evil. Quite the contrary - the overwhelming majority of our roads run quite nicely without tolls thank you very much. True, our politicians would have to find a way to replace the lost toll revenue (...only what's needed for the actual road, of course). And that would make the Parkway just as fair as any other toll-free road. The Parkway would still get paid for without tolls, and the citizens of NJ would save $billions.

Removing the tolls would be the best money N.J. ever SAVED!

- Jim Padykula
CAT webmaster
& non-toll road user.

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