Illinois Tollway OKs 87 percent toll increase The Illinois Tollway board on Thursday approved a 87 percent toll increase to pay for a massive $12 billion plan to rebuild, widen, expand and overhaul much of the systemâs 286 miles of highways. The plan means tolls for I-PASS users will nearly double for most passenger cars, increasing to a range of 30 cents to $1.90 â up from the current 15 cents to $1 most drivers now pay. Most likely Pat Quinn goes down as worst governer in history when all is said and done I would imagine. He will have lost millions of jobs, companies moving out, while bankrupting the state.
In an AP report by Leslie Miller, roads and bridges built by American taxpayers are being sold off, âand so far foreign-owned companies are doing the buying.â But in the next paragraph of the report it states that companies are leasing, not purchasing roads. In June, an Australian-Spanish partnership paid $3.8 billion to lease the Indiana Toll Road. An Australian company bought a 99-year lease on Virginiaâs Pocahontas Parkway, and Texas officials allowed the Spanish-American partnership build and run a toll road from Austin to Seguin for 50 years. The toll on the American side of the tunnel that runs between Detroit and Windsor, Canada is a subsidiary of an Australian company who owns a bridge in Alabama. âRobert Poole, transportation director for the conservative think tank Reason Foundation, said private investors can raise more money than politicians to build new roads because these kind of owners are willing to raise tolls.â Yet, it wasnât too long ago that President Bush signed a bill that Congress passed that will spend taxpayer money on roads. What is going on here, and is this sort of thing constitutional? Will taxpayers get levied less because of the sale? Of course there are protests in Washington and other places concerning a foreign company managing US ports, but according to AP â little has been said concerning this unusual leasing of highways. Chicago is used as an example: âLast year, the city sold a 99-year lease on the eight-mile Chicago Skyway for $1.83 billion. The buyer was the same consortium that leased the Indiana Toll Road â Macquarie Infrastructure Group of Sydney, Australia, and Cinta Conseioners de Infreastructuras de Transporte of Madrid, Spain. Chicago used the money to pay off debt and fund road projects. Skyway tolls rose 50 cents to $2.50; by 2017, they will reach $5.â Does all of this sound fishy? First of all, the people of Chicago and the state of Illinois will not be able to write to their state legislators and complain because now the toll way is owned by a private entity, who can charge anything they want to charge. What is so great about all of this? Who is really benefiting here? Certainly not Chicagoâs citizens who did pay 50 cents and now pay $2.50 to use the Skyway. According to the article, half of the 50 states are letting companies lease, build and operate roads. Many changed theirs state laws in order to do this. Presently, Illinois legislators are looking into privatizing the Illinois Tollway â which will raise those costs to use as well.