More toll booths coming down
Rotterdam, Albany exits are next in second round
Thruway drivers, say goodbye to more of those decades-old fixtures of the superhighway.
Tollbooths, now abandoned and useless because of the newly installed $355 million cashless system, will be removed this week at six interchanges, including those at Albany’s Exit 23 (I-787), and Exit 25A (I-88) in Rotterdam.
Others are being hauled away at Exit B2 (Berkshire Spur-taconic Parkway), Exit 34A in Syracuse, Exit 47 in Leroy and Exit 48 in Batavia. It represents the second wave of tollbooth removals; booths at six other sites were taken down earlier, which included the expansive tollbooth at Exit 24 at I-90 and I-87 that was already removed. The barrier at Canaan will also be removed; the booths were removed in November.
The design-build contractor, Cashless Tolling Constructors, is taking down the remnants of the old ticketed system, used by the Thruway since its beginning in the 1950s.
When completed, 52 toll plazas, about 230 individual booths, will be removed. It will create “highway speed, true open-road tolling by the end of summer 2021, weather permitting,” according to Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s office.
During construction, drivers should expect traffic shifts and increased construction activities — and use caution — near the plazas. The active construction zones will have 20-mph posted speed limits until the booths are completely removed and interchanges reconfigured, the authority said.
“This monumental project is one of the largest projects in the authority’s nearly 70-year history and is transforming our transportation infrastructure by modernizing and enhancing services for the hundreds of millions of travelers that rely on our system each year,” Thruway Authority Executive Director Matthew Driscoll said in a regarding the cashless system.