Lawmakers unhappy about bridge tolls reminded of legislation they passed

HARRISBURG » Pennsylvania state lawmakers unhappy Gov. Tom Wolf’s administration is considering tolling nine major bridges were warned about that prospect when they passed legislation in 2012 delegating approval to appointees of the governor and top lawmakers, they were told Tuesday.

Rep. Mike Carroll, D-Luzerne, reminded colleagues of that vote at the end of an Appropriations Committee hearing during which more than a half dozen committee members questioned Transportation Secretary Yassmin Gramian about potential bridge tolls.

“It turns out it’s difficult to fund transportation,” Carroll told colleagues during the hearing.

But, Carroll said, “those were decisions that we made, that this General Assembly made in an effort to find an easy path forward for an admittedly very complicated problem.”

Carroll, himself, voted against the 2012 bill, but other lawmakers now criticizing potential tolls backed the bill.

The Public-Private Transportation Partnership Board, created by a 2012 law, in November voted for the very first time to approve toll projects. The “major bridge” program allows the Department of Transportation to toll bridges to fund improvements.

PennDOT last week named nine bridges that it said it is considering tolling to pay for the reconstruction.

Tolls would be between $1 and $2, probably both ways, raise about $2.2 billion and last from the start of construction in 2023 for three or four years until construction is finished, Gramian told the Appropriations Committee.

Tolling would be electronic and collected through E-ZPass or license-plate billing, PennDOT has said. The money collected on a bridge is supposed to go to its construction, maintenance and operation.

The bridges are I-78’s Lenhartsville Bridge in Berks County; I-79’s bridges over State Route 50 in Allegheny County; I-80’s bridges across Canoe Creek in Clarion County, Nescopeck Creek in Luzerne County, North Fork in Jefferson County and the Lehigh River, near WilkesBarre; I-81 over the Susquehanna River in northern Pennsylvania’s Susquehanna County; I-83’s South Bridge across the Susquehanna River, a mile from the state Capitol and downtown Harrisburg; and I-95’s mile-long double-decked Girard Point Bridge across the Schuylkill River in Philadelphia.

PennDOT has said it selected major bridges badly in need of repair and balanced its selections by geography to limit the impact on any one area.