Lawmakers: eliminate Mass Pike tolls

BOSTON, Mass (WWLP) - The Joint Committee on Transportation heard 19 bills Tuesday that aim to give commuters on the Massachusetts Turnpike a break by proposing a freeze on rate increases at the toll plazas, free access to seniors 70 years old and up, or even eliminating the tolls completely.

“I think it would be great, because you wouldn’t have the fast lane traffic, everybody would go straight through and there wouldn’t be such tie-ups,” said SOT Christine Duval from Chicopee, MA.

But only four people showed up to testify at the transportation hearing, and none of them were in favor of the bills.

“Given the chronic underfunding of the transportation system and the looming threat of diminished federal support for transportation in the near future we feel that any move to reduce revenues dedicated to transportation would be imprudent at this time,” said Richard Parr, the policy and development director at A Better City, a transportation and land development group.

Others suggested innovative ways to give commuters road relief: Instead of a gas tax, charge people for the types of roads they travel, with greater fines for city driving where there’s plenty of access to public transportation.

“Someone driving on Storrow Drive in the middle of rush hour [in Boston] would be paying a larger fee than somebody who would be driving in the middle of the night on a deserted road in Western Mass which could be charged nothing doing that,” said Rafael Mares, an attorney at the Conservation Law Foundation.

Transportation advocates say Oregon has implemented a successful pilot program where drivers are tracked by devices similar to fast lane easy passes – And instead of a gas tax, they are charged a mileage based fee.