Funding Failed, Tolls Imposed To Pay for Garden State Parkway

(ED. NOTE: This is the fourth of a multi-part series on toll roads in New Jersey. The author was raised and educated in New York City, spent three years in the Army, and retired after a 34-year career with AT&T. In 2000, Bob joined an ad-hoc commit-tee called Citizens Against Tolls, whose primary goal was the elimination of tolls on the Garden State Parkway.)
Construction of the Garden State Parkway started in 1947 as a toll-free road in Union and Middlesex counties and was designed to alleviate congestion en route to the Jersey Shore. However, problems with funding led to the introduction of tolls, as construction continued in the early 1950s.
It’s easy to understand why drivers did not mind paying a toll to drive on the Parkway. After all, it represented an improvement in travel and it was generally understand that tolls would be removed once the original construction costs were paid, in the early 1970s.
This would have been consistent with the states of Washington and Kentucky, for which tolls are prohibited from staying in place after a road’s initial construction has been paid. However, not only have tolls continued, but they increased 43 percent on Dec. 1, 2008, and are planned to increase another 50 percent in 2012.
The Parkway is 173 miles from Cape May in the south to Park Ridge in the north. It opened to traffic on July 1, 1955, under the control of the New Jersey Highway Authority. The original Parkway construction was financed by bond issues totaling $330 million.
The Parkway started its toll operation with 11 barrier toll plazas. In addition, it has 37 ramp toll plazas. Of those, 17 represent exit toll plazas, 18 represent entrance toll plazas and two represent joint exit and entrance toll plazas.
While the Parkway authority may have saved money by not having tolls at every entrance and exit, drivers can avoid tolls by exiting and then re-entering the Parkway. Many drivers are undoubtedly aware of alternate routes to avoid paying a toll.
An example is a local road known as the “Poor Man’s Parkway,” which is parallel to the Garden State Parkway between Stage Road in Bass River Township and Route 539 in Little Egg Harbor Township.
This road effectively bypasses the northbound New Gretna toll plaza. But it’s awkward to reach that road and so few drivers seem to know about it that Parkway officials apparently do not feel threatened by it. But why would any driver take this route just to save a $1 toll? Well, for someone who travels in this direction on a daily basis, the savings could amount to $250 a year.
With increasing traffic on the Parkway came increasing road congestion at barrier toll plazas. To help ease the congestion, Parkway officials began selling tokens in 1981. The feeling was that the tokens would save time by preventing drivers from fishing around for exact change. However, the sale of tokens was stopped on Jan. 2, 2002, apparently to persuade drivers to switch to E-ZPass.
As of Jan. 1, 2009, tokens were no longer accepted.
In late 1999, an organization named Citizens Against Tolls (CAT) was formed as an outgrowth of the public’s concern over mounting toll costs and the inconvenience of the Parkway’s toll collection system. Headed by President Ray Neveil, the goal of CAT was to remove tolls from the Parkway. Neveil, retired after 38 years as an AT&T manager, and was very proactive in his quest to rid tolls from the Parkway. Lost revenue, he claimed, could be made up by a mere three cents per gallon increase in the gasoline tax.
Neveil’s position led to a supporting article by syndicated columnist Gordon Bishop entitled “A Toll-Free Parkway for only 30 cents a week?” That 30 cents was based on the assumption that the average driver purchased 10 gallons of gasoline a week. The cost to drive on the Parkway would therefore be less per week than it would be to drive past a single (then) 35 cent toll booth.
Neveil’s contention was that the Parkway toll collection system was inefficient because it cost the Parkway 13 cents to collect each toll. This was denied by Parkway officials who claimed that the cost was closer to eight cents. But Neveil was quick to point out that the eight cents only represented directly assigned expenses, which left out related expenses such as employee benefits, general and administrative and toll booth maintenance.
With ever increasing support from citizens and newly acquired state-wide recognition, the strategy of CAT was to contact influential elected officials and recommend the elimination of Parkway tolls, based on supporting studies and analytical data.
However, the letter writing campaign was not successful.
But CAT gained an important ally when core members met with Bret Schundler, mayor of Jersey City. Schundler had been elected mayor of Jersey City in 1993. His top goal had been to keep Jersey City out of bankruptcy. In the years prior to his election, the city had been borrowing $40 million to $60 million annually on a $300-million budget to cover a huge structural deficit.
In a brilliant display of financial management, Schundler decreased the deficit, increased the city’s tax-collection rate and cut the city’s work force by 15 percent through attrition, thus gaining national prominence.
With such an accomplishment as the mayor of New Jersey’s second largest city and with the next gubernatorial election less than a year away, Schundler decided to announce his candidacy for governor. On Feb. 13, 2001, he visited a Garden State Parkway rest stop and told a gathering of anti-toll supporters that “Tolls are taxes, and this is one form of tax that we have the ability to eliminate completely.”
He went on to say, “if we could eliminate the tolls on the Parkway, it would be one of the greatest tax cuts we could provide to New Jersey residents. Not only would we give back almost two dollars for every dollar this would cost the state treasury, but we would make the Parkway safer and allow commuters to spend less time sitting in traffic and more time with their families.”
Schundler won the Republican nomination and signed a pledge to eliminate Parkway tolls within nine months of taking office as governor. The elimination of Parkway tolls became a 2001 gubernatorial campaign issue. His opponent, James McGreevey, quickly added that if elected, he would also get rid of Parkway tolls.
With both candidates supporting elimination of Parkway tolls, it looked as if it would finally happen. However, Yogi Berra’s famous saying that “It ain’t over ‘til it’s over” would ring a prophetic note. With the election of McGreevey as governor in 2001, he quickly reneged on his promise to eliminate tolls on the Parkway.
Instead, several toll plazas were actually added.
It appeared as if the CAT effort was losing steam. However, CAT kept up its anti-toll drive and made numerous recommendations for easing traffic congestion. One of those was for the implementation of one-way tolls. The authority’s response was that it felt that such a change wasn’t practical. Yet in 2004, they did start one-way toll plazas, acknowledging that the elimination of toll plazas reduced traffic congestion. The obvious implication was that the elimination of all toll plazas would reduce traffic congestion even more.
(Next week:
The Atlantic City Expressway)