The Rhode Island Department of Transportation (RIDOT) has released the results from the first month of their controversial truck-only tolling program.
From June 11, 2018, when the truck-only tolling system went online at the first two gantries, until July 10, RIDOT expected to toll about 177,000 trucks. The actual number of trucks tolled — 188,815 — exceeded RIDOT’s expectation.
This higher than expected number of trucks tolled brought RIDOT’s truck-only toll revenue for the month up from the predicted $598,667.00. to $625,989.00, a difference of $27,322.00.
RIDOT said that they expected about 300 trucks to divert off of I-95 onto Route 3 to avoid the two tolling locations every day, but that they actually saw an average of only four more trucks than usual every day on Route 3.
“With one full month of operation under our belts, we feel confident that the tractor trailer truck only tolling system is working as expected. The data we are seeing is in line with what we had estimated and all is going well. We are seeing a stable tolling system. We have and will continue to monitor the system closely,” said RIDOT Director Peter Alviti.