News briefs: Australia, Florida, Mexico, UK, Virginia

Australian Federal Opposition suggests more tolls

Australia's Federal Shadow Treasurer (Opposition Finance spokesman) Joe Hockey (LIberal Party) has suggested to the Western Australian State Government that it should consider tolling, pointing out how successful it has been in New South Wales.  According to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation he said:

"From a federal government perspective there is limited money available for infrastructure"

implying that states that adopt tolling are more likely to be considered sympathetically for future funds compared to those that do not, presumably because tolling states have shown greater willingness to get motorists to pay directly for their infrastructure.

Both major parties in Western Australia continue to oppose tolls, but how long they can do so is questionable.  There are no toll roads in Western Australia, but there is a growing number of major highways around Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane with tolls.  Given much of Australia's highway infrastructure is partially funded from the Federal Goverment paid for by fuel taxes, the inevitable question will be whether states which don't seek to recover whatever they can from tolls should be entitled to the same share of revenue from that tax.

Brisbane's new toll road impresses - but it's free for now

Finally, Brisbane's long awaited AirportLink toll road is opened and media reports indicate that motorists are impressed with the time savings it offers.  That bodes well, the more that try it out for free, the more who will think it is worth paying for, so the owners are hoping.  I profiled the road before, noting that the first month it will be completely toll free, and the subsequent two months it will also be free but users will need to have signed up for an account.  After that, tolls will increase sharply in 6 monthly intervals.   Time will tell if this strategy works.  I suspect it will at first, but such rapid inflation in pricing will put people off too soon, and it may be wiser to wait for a year before making such significant price hikes.   Curiously one report states people queued for "hours" to be the first on the new road.  Does the prospect of a new toll road generate that much excitement and patience elsewhere?

Meanwhile the HeraldSun reports that Brisconnections is trying to avoid the mistakes made around the nearby Clem7 toll tunnel, by being friendlier towards customers with better signage and clarity around speed limits (there was a higher than average level of speed fines on Clem7, with some violators claiming they didn't know the speed limit).

Florida to study shifting toll tariffs towards congestion based pricing

TV station WFTV9 reports that in Florida "Taxpayers are funding a study that could help set even higher toll prices during peak hours on the Florida Turnpike, State Road 528 and State Road 417". ..

The Turnpike Authority received a $400,000 grant from the federal government to study the concept in Florida's three metropolitan areas including, Orlando, South Florida and Tampa. 

The reason for the study is to manage demand on sections that are too expensive to widen, but there is local concern about traffic diversion.  Presumably the study should also consider lowering tolls at off peak times to counteract peak tolls, that is assuming toll revenue is adequate to cover infrastructure costs.  No information about the proposed study is on the Florida Turnpike Authority website.

Mexico - Libramiento de Matehuala highway has steady growth in demand

Standard and Poors affirms the BBB debt rating on the Libramiento de Matehuala toll road in Mexico according to Reuters.  The road is a 14.2 km long toll highway between Mexico City and Monterrey which bypasses Matehuala, on the San Luis Potosi-Saltillo highway.

The report continues:

For the 12 months ended June 30, 2012, traffic increased 4.1% due to the stable economic conditions in the country. Also, revenues grew 9.6% because of higher traffic and tariffs in line with inflation, and a favorable traffic mix, with trucks making up almost 60% of the vehicles on the road. We expect traffic to grow at an average rate of 3% throughout the term of the debt, which reflects the road's vital trade link between Mexico and the U.S. as part of the NAFTA corridor.

The report claims it requires minimal maintenance given its construction is in hydraulic concrete.  Demand is highly dependent on commercial activity and it faces toll-free alternatives.  It has been open since 2004 and carries around 8,579 vehicles per day (low for a toll road).  Tariffs are listed here (in Spanish) ranging from US$1.45 for a car to US$7.24 for the largest trucks.  The concession allows tariffs to be increased in line with inflation.

UK - Lukewarm reception for A14 toll idea

I wrote before about the UK Government's plans to help fund one of its largest highway projects with help from tolling.  It would be fair to say that enthusiasm for tolling is weak at best.  Local newspaper Peterborough Today reports that local businesses are concerned about tolling increasing their costs or that motorists will avoid the tolled route increasing traffic on local roads.   The local Chamber of Commerce head says it might be a "necessary evil".  Clearly there is a lot of work to do to convince people that accelerating a long delayed road project is better than not doing anything at all, but more importantly that the tolling plan envisaged wont make traffic worse.  The key will be to demonstrate that people can either choose to drive the existing route (in one form or another) untolled or have an improved route that is tolled.   Meanwhile, anti-road lobbyists the "Campaign for Better Transport" and "Sustrans" are opposed, because they don't believe in major highway improvements at all - suggesting rail freight improvements would be preferable and that building a toll road will induce additional demand.  It would seem that using pricing to manage demand is considered unacceptable if it means new capacity is funded by it.

Virginia - Dulles Greenway credit rating maintained

Owner of the Dulles Greenway, Toll Road Investors Partnership II, has had its credit rating of BBB- confirmed by Fitch according to Reuters.  TRIP II is 50% owned by Macquarie Atlas Roads.


Key points reported about the toll road (which is just over 20km long from the end of the Dulles Toll Road to the Leesburg Bypass in Virginia):
- From 2013 through to 2020 tolls can escalate annually at the highest of (i) CPI + 1% (ii) Real GDP, or (iii) 2.8% per annum;
- Year on year traffic increased 1.8% by May 2012, but tolls had increased by 6.7% in January 2012 resulting in a 10% increase in revenue year on year;
- This is only starting to offset a year on year decline in traffic since 2005, due to a combination of the economic situation and improvements to parallel routes.