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Follow TURFTollways to lack word 'toll' in their name
These Regional Mobility Authorities are TOLL authorities, yet they lack the name in their titles, on purpose. Now their tollways lack the word as well in yet another deceptive way of getting more people to pay the CTRMA's toll taxes (likely only temporarily until motorists get their first bill with hundreds of dollars in fees and fines tacked onto it -- the norm with toll agencies in Texas).
A tollway by any other name
Ben Wear: Getting There
Austin American Statesman
Updated: 8:15 p.m. Sunday, July 3, 2011
Published: 7:33 p.m. Sunday, July 3, 2011
The big transportation news of the day is that you won't be tempted to get caught in a downtown traffic jam for fireworks tonight. No fireworks, no jam.
But in honor of the day, a couple of transportation tidbits:
Austin, unlike some cities, has never been much for slapping names on its highways. We tend to stick with the numerical designations that God and TxDOT gave the roads in the first place. But your Central Texas Regional Mobility Authority (note that the word "toll" does not appear in its name) is trying to change that.
Already, it has begun to call its under-construction toll road on U.S. 290 East the "Manor Expressway." Not tollway, expressway. We'll see how that catches on when the turnpike's first section opens in a couple of years. Sometime back, the authority also began to refer to its planned expansion of U.S. 183 in East Austin (which will have tolls on the main lanes) as the "Bergstrom Expressway."
The trend is expanding.
There is now, in concept, an "Oak Hill Expressway," meaning the short section where U.S. 290 West and Texas 71 meet that in a few years might be a tollway. The agency board voted last week to pay a consultant about $750,000 to manage that coming project. The board also approved $2 million for similar work, referred to as the "Manchaca Expressway," which you might know as Texas 45 Southwest. Which will also be a toll road.
As of now, the only Austin highway with a commonly used nickname is MoPac Boulevard (Loop 1), which is named after a defunct railroad company. Using that as a guide, perhaps Texas 71 East to Smithville and La Grange should become the Chicken Ranch Expressway.