10/18/04-A North Texas highway group has agreed to add a Denton County highway to the state’s list of toll roads.
The Dallas area’s Regional Transportation Council voted unanimously Oct. 14 to impose tolls on the new Texas Highway 121 under construction from the southern end of the 121 Bypass near Coppell to the Dallas North Tollway in Plano and Frisco.
The measure must be approved by the Texas Transportation Commission, which should vote on it in November, The Dallas Morning News reported. If approved, tolls would be collected by overhead electronic equipment that would read TollTags.
To help reduce costs, no toll booths are planned. Electronic toll collection could start when construction ends by 2008.
The tolling plan likely won’t be the last for the state.
The transportation commission mandates that all major new road projects and expansions be studied to see if toll financing is viable.
Regional leaders have approved tolling the planned 11.4-mile extension of Highway 161 through Irving and Grand Prairie.
Collin County officials are studying imposing tolls along their portion of Highway 121. North Texas also has the 21.5-mile Dallas North Tollway and the 29.2-mile Bush Turnpike.
Road planners, however, put the brakes on a proposal to convert an eight-mile stretch of highway in northwest Harris County into a toll road to fund a northward extension.
Instead, they opted to seek other funding options for Highway 249, the Tomball Parkway, including a mix of free and high-occupancy toll lanes.
The decision to not toll the stretch of road follows a similar conclusion reached last month on the state’s far west side.
In El Paso, a task force turned aside a recommendation to toll motorists on Interstate 10 or Loop 375 to pay for road improvements. Instead, the group opted to consider tolling only large trucks on a possible new tollway in far west El Paso County. It would be called the Northeast Parkway.
The task force estimates the toll road would cost more than $100 million.
The state highway department says construction could start in the next five years.

10/12/04-Road planners said this week that they have put the brakes on an unpopular proposal to convert an eight-mile stretch of Texas highway in northwest Harris County into a toll road to fund a northward extension.
Instead, they told a group of local officials, residents and business owners that other funding options would be considered for Texas Highway 249, the Tomball Parkway, including a mix of free and high-occupancy toll lanes.
Bruce Hillegeist, president of the Tomball Area Chamber of Commerce, told the Houston Chronicle that the Oct. 11 announcement by Gary Trietsch, district engineer for the Texas Transportation Department, helps alleviate concerns that a toll road would harm “the vitality and growth of our businesses.”
The targeted segment, from the Sam Houston Tollway to a point two miles north of Spring Cypress Road, consists of a six- to eight-lane freeway with three-lane frontage roads in the area southeast of Tomball. Its conversion to a toll road would have been the state’s first use of a new funding tool authorized by the Texas Legislature in 2003.
The Texas Transportation Commission mandates all major new road projects and expansions be studied to see if toll financing is viable.
The proposed extension of the segment through Tomball to Pinehurst and eventually Navasota could still be developed as a toll road, Trietsch said. Currently, that stretch is a mix of three-lane frontage roads and a four- to six-lane highway with stoplights.
The decision to not toll Texas 249 follows a similar conclusion reached last month on the state’s far west side.
In El Paso, a task force turned aside a recommendation to toll motorists on Interstate 10 or Loop 375 to pay for road improvements. Instead, the group opted to consider tolling only large trucks on a possible new tollway in far west El Paso County. It would be called the Northeast Parkway.
The task force estimates the toll road would cost more than $100 million.
TxDOT says construction could start in the next five years.

9/24/04-A group of El Paso residents will recommend converting Interstate 10 into a toll road at a meeting of the city’s Transportation Policy Board Friday, Sept. 24.
The El Paso del Norte Toll Roads Task Force wants to see toll booths erected near Anthony, TX, and Fabens to the south.
“The recommendation is to pursue the concept of tolling the interstate in a way that would minimize the impact on local citizenry and businesses, Gilbert Moreno, who heads the task force and the policy board, told the El Paso Times. “For the most part, the toll payers will be the traffic going through El Paso.”
The group voted 13-1 Sept. 16 to recommend tolling the freeway.
Moreno said the board has until Oct. 1 to propose a toll-road concept for El Paso to the Texas Transportation Commission or risk losing access to the billions of dollars the state may be committing to toll roads.
State Rep. Joe Pickett, D-El Paso, who missed last week’s task-force vote, hopes the board will reject the recommendation because it goes against the overwhelming opposition to toll roads by El Pasoans at a series of public meetings.