Maryland, Virginia Plan Toll Roads to Avoid Gridlock

Click here to write a Letter to the Editor.

xpress toll roads with prices of as high as a dollar a mile in high-volume traveled areas in peak hours are part of a potential travel plan around the nation’s capital, the Washington Post reported Monday.

The possibilities are the result of efforts in Virginia and Maryland to build a network of express toll lanes, on which tolls increase when traffic levels rise, the paper said. Existing routes would remain free, and heavy with traffic.

Maryland plans to begin construction on its first express lanes next year, while Virginia plans to build them on a 14-mile stretch of the Capital Beltway — Interstates 495 and 95 encircling the capital — within five years, the paper reported in a front-page story.

Shifting road construction to the private sector and to express toll roads mirrors efforts across the country to find new ways to pay for roads and manage traffic as congestion, the Post said.

Texas has launched an ambitious private-sector plan to lay 4,000 miles of new toll roads, while several other states, from Utah to Kansas to Georgia, are considering express toll lanes and other private-sector proposals, it reported.

(Click here for previous coverage.)