Proponents note that virtually every toll road or HOT lane project in the pipeline allows buses or high-occupancy vehicles to use the express lanes for free - giving commuters a potent incentive to choose mass transit or share rides.
Currently, with the exclusion of tunnels and bridges, there are few toll roads in the Baltimore-Washington region.
The John F. Kennedy Memorial Highway, the formal name of I-95 northeast of Baltimore, is a conventional fixed-rate toll road. The Dulles Toll Road gives Washington travelers the choice of a faster ride to the airport. The privately owned Dulles Greenway connects the airport with Leesburg, Va.
But opening in the next few years are a flurry of toll-financed projects:
* The ICC, an 18-mile east-west highway between U.S. 1 and Interstate 270 that will be tolled based on congestion levels in all six lanes. That is, it will be more expensive to drive on the highway when it's crowded than when it's not. Its first section is scheduled to open in 2011, and completion is expected in 2012.
* The I-95 Express Lane project in Maryland northeast of Baltimore, which will add four congestion-priced lanes to the existing roadway and pour traffic onto the Beltway at a monumental interchange now under construction southeast of White Marsh. That project is also expected to open in 2012.
* The Northern Virginia Capital Beltway HOT lane project, which will add four tolled express lanes to a 14-mile segment of Interstate 495 to the west and south of Washington. The new lanes will be tolled based on congestion, but vehicles with three or more occupants would travel free. Completion is scheduled for 2013.
* The I-95/395 HOT lane project in Northern Virginia running from Arlington to just south of Fredericksburg in the fast-growing outer suburbs of Washington. The first phase of the 56-mile project, which has received preliminary approval, will expand the existing high-occupancy vehicle lanes from two to three and convert them into tolled high-occupancy lanes. The work is to be done in two phases, with the first opening about 2012.
That may not be where it ends.
The National Capital Region Transportation Planning Board has conducted a study that includes a scenario under which nine existing bridges leading into Washington would be converted to toll facilities. Under that scenario, parts of New York Avenue - one of the main gateways into Washington from Baltimore - would be tolled, along with other streets in the District of Columbia.
