The curse of wayfaring travelers in classic literature used to be trolls. Today, trolls have been replaced by tolls. Much like trolls, they hide near the way the traveler must go waiting to spring on the unsuspecting rider and get their filthy fingers in your money pouch.
This morning my usual commute had a long back up from a wreck. This forced me to take the toll road to work this morning. That's $2 one way. No consideration is given that motorcycles have far less wear and tear on the roads and help to ease congestion. Nope. We pay the same as the monster SUV with the texting soccer mom pilot that is continually threatening our lives. To add insult to injury, we can't even use the express lanes. Technically we can, but half the times I do it fails to register the transponder and I get hit with a toll running fine.
Just this past week our beloved mayor (Theresa Jacobs) was in the news stating that tolls were going to rise. This after she made the campaign pledge to do something about the high price of tolls. (To be fair, she states that she only promised to LOOK at tolls, and now that she has "things are much worse that she expected from previous...blah...blah...blah...." more politically motivated BS far from the implications of campaign rhetoric).
Here's an idea: how about you drop tolls entirely for motorcyclists until ridership hits over 10% of total traffic? We ease congestion, cause far less pollution, and are easier on the roads. How about you actually promote ridership? I know it's not the energy independence solution, but it certainly could be a part.
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