The toll lanes are a proven failure. They haven’t improved traffic flow, they don’t generate a massive income and the public overwhelmingly disapprove of them.
Did the politicians and bureaucrats learn anything from this failed experiment? No. Instead of learning from their mistakes, they are doubling down on them.
They have increased the minimum toll from $0.75 to $1 and increased the maximum toll from $10 to $15. They also reduced the window when the lanes are free.
Their logic: If charging money to have the freeway flow doesn’t make it work then we aren’t charging enough. As you can clearly see from the Seattle Times photo above, charging more for the toll lane won’t make the toll lane go faster.
Rather than solving the problem by building a freeway to handle the growth of our community, they are attempting to use a stick to punish us for going to work. Drivers are given the choice of sticks to be beaten with: either being stuck in traffic or paying to be stuck in traffic.
The failure in the logic of tolling 1 or 2 lanes of the freeway is that it doesn’t address the real problem. The capacity doesn’t meet the demand. The theory is that increasing the price to use the freeway will decrease demand enough to make traffic flow. But getting to work is not some choice we can optionally go or stay home. Sure, some people may have an employer that gives them the choice, but that option has gone away along with COVID.
Speaking of COVID, the only time the freeway has performed properly was during the pandemic and during that time, the state had to take money from the general budget to pay the tolling company because the toll lanes cost more to operate than the revenue they generated. Yes, by about $10 million in one year. And WSDOT reports that it would have lost even more money, but that the tolling company gave the state a deferral on the payments. The financial statements can all be found here: https://wsdot.wa.gov/about/accountability/tolling-reports-policy
Oddly enough, if you drive I-405 on the weekend, you don’t see those backups because the toll lanes are free and traffic flows. When the toll lanes were first installed, they were operating 24×7 and we saw gridlock even on the weekends. But when they were made free at night and weekends, the traffic suddenly got better at those times. Now that the tolls are extended by an hour (from 7pm to 8pm), we will see congestion persist later into the evening.
The only thing that tolling does is sort out the people with money from the people without. It does not increase carpooling or use of mass transit. In fact, it discourages carpooling because they eliminated the benefit of being a 2-person carpool which made up more than 90% of all carpools. When the toll lanes were started they required 3+ to use the lanes for free and as a result carpooling dropped dramatically. It turns out that while making a 2 person carpool is not much effort, making a 3 person carpool has many logistical challenges that make it impractical for nearly everyone. Once again, WSDOT fails to understand the concept of carpooling. The goal is not to get everyone into one vehicle. It is simply to get someone out of their own car and into someone else’s. Whether that driver gets into another car with only one other person or with 2 or more other people doesn’t matter. As long as they aren’t driving, they are reducing traffic. In fact the best, easiest, cheapest solution to reducing traffic after not going somewhere is to make a 2 person carpool. Our mass transit system sucks and will never be a good alternative for the vast majority of people. (how many legislators do you think ride the bus?)
I was busy living my life when WSDOT and the WSTC (Washington State Tolling Commission) was considering raising the tolls again over the past few months. Fighting Tolling takes a toll on anyone and you can fix many things, but you can’t fix stupid.
The reality is that the tolling commission needs to justify its existence. When the only tool you have is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail and when all they can do to try to fix traffic is charge a toll, all they can do is charge more, even if tolling fails to address the problem. I assure you that if traffic in the toll lanes failed to flow at $10 per toll, it isn’t going to be any better when they are charging $15. Why? Because there are 2 types of drivers in those lanes at that price: People who have so much money that a $15 toll is meaningless to them and people who are driving a carpool and are free. In either case, raising toll prices isn’t going to get them out of the toll lanes, not matter what the toll price is. Welcome to the “velvet rope economy”. What is that? Read this book by NY Times reporter Nelson Schwartz. It is the separation of the wealthy from the rest of us, living side-by-side, but separately.
Perhaps it is time to start another petition to demonstrate to the politicians we won’t stand for it? If you want to support that idea, click the donate button and invest a toll fare there and we can get another movement going.
Stop405Tolls 
You cannot fix stupid. And that is what we have representing us in District 45…Actually they do NOT represent us, just to be clear. Roger (NO)Goodman…Jerry Springer…and Manka Dhingra are dolts who are addicted to the citizens wallets and purses. And they simply do NOT care, as long as they get their drug of choice…your and my money.
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I so agree with everything you’ve said here. Thank you for articulating this.
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I’m sure the loss in revenue from gas tax with all the electric cars is also affecting the decision to increase the tolls. I agree with this article that the tolls are not helping. I am sad that they are also now building a toll lane from Bellevue to Renton. I live in Bothell, so don’t drive that section of 405 very often, but have friends that do. Once they open that toll lane, that will get far worse too. It is already very bad at rush hour. I dread the state opening toll lanes on I5, and I suspect that will happen too.
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Thank you Marsha. And they are not losing any revenue on gas taxes due to EVs. Electric vehicles pay their equivalent of an average annual gas tax in their registration fees every year. Fuel consumption per car may go down as fuel economy goes up, but overall mileage and consumption of fuel isn’t dropping. Check out the previous blog article on this topic: https://stop405tolls.org/2021/04/19/why-gas-taxes-are-the-holy-grail-for-highway-funding/
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Dave,
I have been a member of your blog for 10 years now and am a huge supporter of your initiatives. I was against tolling I-405 throughout Bellevue to Bothell before it became tolled 🛣 and now we are here. I hope everyone gets more upset as to what’s happening to I-405 from Bellevue to Renton and more broadly from 167 all the way down to I-5.
I have shared your excellent analysis on NextDoor. I hope you’ll opine further.
https://nextdoor.com/p/xyMMxyGCwy9z?utm_source=share&extras=MjYyMTg1NDU%3D&utm_campaign=1710311548106
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David…
I saw that you were quoted in today’s Times regarding the 520 tolling debacle.
REALLY? Charging for that one segment. Does that mean all of the streets leading to I-5 from Montlake will be gridlocked to avoid the toll? Brilliant! Sure glad I don’t have to do a daily commute these days.
Susan (Gardner) __________
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the price of the toll was always going to go up from the beginning, The toll pricing was always intended to go up to $15. When it was voted on years ago, There were built-in ramps of the price stopping at one dollar minimum and $15 maximum. This is not new.
the part you should be bitching and moaning about, and complaining and being pissed off is that most of the money collected from the tolls goes to some toll company in Texas to the tune of 75% of money is collected. Why don’t you write about that in your article.
maybe you should do your research a little better before you write stupid ass articles that are incorrect and not giving the public what is actually true. we have enough disinformation in this day and age you don’t need to add to it.
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I’ve several times written to our brain-dead legislators, Roger Goodman, Jerry Springer, and Manka Dhingra. However they all lack a moral and ethical compass…and they are a big part of the problem. They vote with herd-mentality-group-think and against the wishes of the majority of their constituents. So as I have said for years, we have no representation in District 45…we have lemmings, yet no leaders. David Aamodt, Redmond, WA.
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Sparky, gaslighting with a nonsensical reply doesn’t make you smarter or correct. Maybe you weren’t around when this all started and I was asked by the committee chair to give a 20 minute presentation to the House Transportation Committee that resulted in them deciding to make them free at night and weekends and making many safety changes I proposed. They also implemented my suggestion to use hard shoulder running north of 527 which the had not even considered, greatly reducing congestion.
I have covered the issue of the extreme cost to operate toll lanes over other methods of collecting revenue. You might like to go back through the history of blog articles. Ultimately, tolling to reduce congestion at any price simply doesn’t address the issue. This is a snake-oil solution sold to uninformed legislators by private companies who stand to profit and by WSDOT personnel looking for ways to pad their jobs.
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It’s sad with elected officials and bureaucrats at WSDOT who lack a moral or ethical compass. We’re paying to drive on roads are HIGH gas tax is paying for. Talk about double-dipping? I’m tired of one-party rule in Washington State that does not benefit what’s left of us middle-class earners.
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