Well, it is just so handy to zip onto some of these nifty new North Texas toll roads where you can legally shift up to 75 mph and actually drive that speed without getting stuck in parking lotlike congestion or logjammed at pay booths behind the drivers who inevitably can't find their wallets.
It's become so handy, in fact, that thousands of drivers apparently believe they can use fee roads for free.The North Texas Tollway Authority wants to make it clear that ripping off taxpayers and law-abiding drivers by not paying your toll bills is a form of highway robbery, too.The NTTA plans to start posting a "Top Violators" page on ntta.org, listing drivers owing 100 or more tolls they haven't paid. The idea is to "put them on notice that they may be subject to collections lawsuits and other enforcement action," a news release said.An estimated 26,000 vehicle owners owe about $12.5 million for tolls on North Texas roads, Star-Telegram transportation writer Gordon Dickson reported Thursday. Officials said they were targeting those who've had plenty of chances but ignore repeated collection attempts.Some 92 percent of toll road users pay their bills on time. NTTA spokesman Michael Rey said in an e-mail to the Editorial Board that the $12.5 million represents a group with 100-plus delinquent tolls from 2010-11. These motorists would have received at least 16 mailed invoices, from their original bill to a third notice of nonpayment, within 180 days, Rey said, but they continue driving the toll roads "seemingly with no intention to pay."Any modernization comes at a price. The old tollbooth way of collecting user fees helped finance new roadways but cost drivers in time spent waiting their turn. Under the electronic system, a driver can buy a frequent-user vehicle toll tag, or a roadway camera will snap a license plate photo and eventually a bill will be mailed.Motorists with a TollTag through NTTA pay 15.3 cents a mile in North Texas; it costs 50 percent more without a tag.Methods for collecting unpaid tolls set the public to grumbling not long after electronic systems started becoming the norm a few years ago. Complaints about billing mistakes and excessive fines prompted the Legislature in 2011 to reduce administrative fees to $25 per unpaid toll, capped at a total of $200.The boothless system is bound to result in some bills never paid, but scofflaws and deliberate violators can't be allowed to free-ride at the expense of other users without reasonable attempts to collect what is rightly owed. (Infrequent users aren't the problem: they don't receive a bill until after their fifth transaction.)Tolls are a significant source of revenue for maintaining and improving this region's vast and growing highway network.An average of 1.6 million vehicles travel North Texas tollways daily, NTTA reported, and that generates an average of $1.5 million a day in tolls.NTTA's current budget projects $450.6 million in toll income for the year, but collections were well above expectations through March, according to the most recent monthly financial report available online. (See bit.ly/PJGwth)The number of pay-to-drive lanes will increase with completion of the DFW Connector and North Tarrant Express in Northeast Tarrant County, the Chisholm Trail Parkway from Cleburne to downtown Fort Worth and the Interstate 35W expansion, not to mention projects in Dallas and Denton counties.Drivers who don't want to pay their fair share for a quicker commute can always stay in the free lanes.Have more to add? News tip? Tell us
