View Single Post
Old 05-01-2012, 03:07 PM   #5
Slickcraft
Senior Member
 
Join Date: Mar 2008
Location: Welch Island and West Alton
Posts: 3,211
Thanks: 1,167
Thanked 1,999 Times in 913 Posts
Default

From the Union Leader:

Quote:
HOOKSETT — Where did all the trees go?

A lot of New Hampshire commuters might have asked that last week after hundreds of trees, most of them tall pines, were cut, stacked and chipped near the Hooksett toll plaza on Interstate 93.

The answer actually may make a lot of those folks happy: It's the first step toward "open-road tolling" at that location.

As anyone who's gone through the I-95 tolls in Hampton in the past two years knows, open-road tolling allows motorists with E-ZPass transponders to drive in separate lanes at highway speed instead of slowing down for the toll plaza. The Department of Transportation said last week the same system should be up and running at the Hooksett tolls by mid-June of next year.

Christopher Wasczcuk, administrator of the Bureau of Turnpikes at DOT, explained the paved roadway in the area will need to be widened to accommodate two extra booths on each side.

And that's what commuters are seeing: “They're in essence cutting all the trees to accommodate the slope work that is going to be needed to support the widening,” he said.

R.S. Audley Inc. of Bow won the $22.9 million contract, according to DOT spokesman William Boynton. He explained it involves taking away six conventional tollbooths in the middle of the plaza and replacing them with four open-road tolling lanes, two in each direction.

Concrete median barriers will separate those lanes from regular traffic, both before and after the toll plaza, he said.

“That has proven to be very effective because you don't have the differing speeds next to each other,” Boynton said. “You're committing early to those lanes, and by the time the vehicles that have stopped at the conventional plaza get up to speed, they're merging again.”

The project also involves adding a highway lane south of the tolls to give drivers more room to maneuver the split for I-93 and Interstate 293, Wasczcuk said. Three bridges will also need rehabilitation, and drainage areas will be built, he said.

Boynton said the initial phase of the project involves clearing about 12.5 acres of state-owned land; about 80 percent of the trees are pines. The contractor will save some trees for saw logs, and the rest will go to a wood-burning energy plant, he said.

Wasczcuk said the contractor won't start work on the center of the toll plaza until fall, so that it doesn't hinder summer travelers.

The new lanes will be open in time for July 4th traffic next year, Wasczcuk said.

Drivers who have E-ZPass will save time and aggravation, he said. Overall, the new system is projected to save an estimated 460,000 gallons of gas a year and reduce exhaust emissions.

And it may not be just the air quality that improves, Wasczcuk noted. “I would think people's dispositions would improve,” as well, he said.

He said he's gotten many “very positive” emails about Hampton's open-road tolling.

Wasczcuk calls it “the next generation of tolling.”

“It's really fantastic and really a benefit to the traveler. We still need tolls to collect revenue and invest in the system, but it certainly makes it a lot easier to collect that toll for customers that have E-ZPass.”

Statewide, he noted, about 65 percent of turnpike users have the transponders. It's only about 60 percent of those who drive through the Hooksett tolls, but Wasczcuk expects that to increase once the new system is up and running.

Boynton noted the project is being funded through “a reissuing of turnpike bonds at a very favorable interest rate.”

“That saves a significant amount of money that's being applied toward this project,” he said.
Slickcraft is offline   Reply With Quote
The Following 2 Users Say Thank You to Slickcraft For This Useful Post:
Sponsored Links