Published: January 19, 2006 11:44 pm            

Free ride between turnpike exits ending soon

BEDFORD — For seven years, drivers saved a few quarters at a time driving the Pennsylvania Turnpike between Bedford and Breezewood.

That savings added up to $11 million for 8.1 million motorists.

But the free ride on the turnpike is coming to an end.

Effective at midnight April 2, those traveling the 16-mile stretch between the two interchanges will have to pay what is now $1.25 for the one-way trip.

It will mark the first time since Oct. 1, 1998, that they will be charged for the ride.

“It was an unique project. It had never been done in Pennsylvania before,” turnpike spokesman Carl DeFebo said Thursday. “It took the cooperation of a couple agencies and it was enabled by technology.”

The free rides were instituted to provide a detour through the central part of the county while improvements were made to east-west Route 30 between Everett and Bedford. Motorists who entered the pike at Bedford and exited at Breezewood – or vice versa – didn’t pay a toll.

The freebie was the brainchild of now-retired U.S. Rep. Bud Shuster, R-Everett, who even wrangled the federal government into subsidizing the state for lost revenue.

The no-toll program reduced traffic congestion through construction sites on Route 30 and appeased residents who were pushing for construction of a two-lane alternate highway in the construction area.

“Yes, it definitely worked, and I was thankful for that,” Steve Steele, a state Department of Transportation construction project manager, said Thursday. “I was shocked to learn, just in talking to people, the number who ran the turnpike rather than running Route 30.”

While extensive work remains on the Narrows Bridge outside Bedford, much of the former two-lane highway beginning at the Sheetz and extending east to Everett is now four-lane blacktop with a fifth turning lane.

Undertaken at a total cost of $63 million, the three-phase project is set for completion later this year when renovation of the two-lane cement bridge at the Narrows is completed and a second two-lane bridge is opened.

Steele hopes delays will be kept to a minimum around the bridges and feels confident the new highway will accommodate additional traffic when the tolls resume.

“It isn’t going to effect us at all,” Steele said from the work site.

Initially, Shuster had $3 million set aside in federal funds, with the understanding that motorists would still pick up a ticket at the booth at Bedford or Breezewood and turn it in at the other end.

The money was turned over to the turnpike commission.

The $3 million was used up at a faster pace when work on Route 30 began about five years ago. In 2001, an additional $8 million in federal highway money was allocated.

When the program started, the fare between the two interchanges was 80 cents.

Aware that the funds were nearly depleted, the commission recently voted to set the April 2 deadline to end the program, DeFebo said.

“We had to come up with a date so people would know in advance,” he said. “The commission wanted to get out there and make a decision because we really want to inform people.”

The program was a windfall of sorts for the turnpike – which saw traffic on the 16 miles more than double between 1997 and 2005.

While the program initially was viewed as one local residents would take advantage of, the sense is that many from across the region enjoyed the free ride.

“Certainly all those people couldn’t have been previously taking little Route 30,” DeFebo said. “Common sense tells you there are people from across the region who are taking advantage of this deal.”

During the next two months, toll-booth signs and message boards will alert the public that the program is ending

Paper notices are to be handed out at the Bedford and Breezewood interchanges, DeFebo said.



Kathy Mellott can be reached at 539-5328 or kmellott@tribdem.com.

        

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