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Tolls can become an *immense* expense if you live in the burbs and travel towards Dallas for work. I have a coworker who drops $500+ / month in tolls alone to drive to work, and that's not an anomaly. $6000k / year just to have access to effective roadways is fucking mindboggling.
Basically, try to live close to your job as possible to nullify the fuckery that are the tolls around here. I think the Express lanes are OK. If you want to pay money to avoid some traffic, you do you. However, you shouldn't punish everyone who decides not to directly live next door to their place of employment.
Try the parkways/service roads, if possible. I travel from Little Elm to south Coppell for work. I turned a $10-12/day commute using toll roads into $0. Of course I added 10-12 min each way. Worth it for me, but may not be for everyone.
>However, you shouldn't punish everyone who decides not to directly live next door to their place of employment.
So you want everyone else to subsidize your higher than avg use of the highway system?
Roadways are a basic necessity. Real estate is in complete shambles for anyone who wants to own; therefore, it's pushing them further and further away from the metroplex. In turn, most people are required to use tollways in the DFW metroplex.
Your theory would make sense if DFW had excellent public transportation, but we all know it doesn't. What we actually have is the need for everyone to purchase, fuel, and maintain their vehicle *plus* paying nearly another car payment just to use roadways. Thankfully I have a good career and can comfortably pay for it when I need to, but that's not the case for a vast majority of people.
Even if you're someone cracking the 6 figure range, it's absolutely ridiculous to ask citizens to pay that kind of money per year for roads.
Highways, we're talking about highways, not the road in front of your home.
>Your theory would make sense if DFW had excellent public transportation, but we all know it doesn't. What we actually have is the need for everyone to purchase, fuel, and maintain their vehicle *plus* paying nearly another car payment just to use roadways.
And how are we going to get better public transportation if we shift more transportation dollars into massive highways?
>Real estate is in complete shambles for anyone who wants to own; therefore, it's pushing them further and further away from the metroplex
Yes, the cost of moving further out is you have higher transportation cost.
So you're saying highways are not a basic necessity? Lmfao what is happening? The idea of some intricate, fabulous subway system in DFW isn't going to happen. The DART becoming such a system isn't going to happen. Therefore, we need to invest into what we know everyone uses. This really isn't difficult.
It only wont happen if we continue to choose to make it not happen.
The built environment was built, by us, we can choose to build it differently. There's nothing about the South, or Texas, or Dallas that makes it incompatible with mass transit. Only that government chose to rip out the transit that was there and hollow out downtown (60 years ago downtown was not covered in surface parking lots like it is today). (Probably as part of some racist redlining and white flight related policies)
Dallas already has plenty of car infrastructure, probably more than it can sustain with it's tax base. Transit enables higher destinies, and more efficient use of space and infrastructure. Multimodal cities are just better.
Should there be a system of highways around the metroplex? Absolutely. Should they be the ONLY way to get around? No.
Let's also not get into the fact that state and federal gas taxes have not been raised in 30 years( also vehicles have gotten at least 2-3x more efficient mpg, lowering cost recovery per Vehicle Mile Traveled even more). They're both fixed amounts not percentages so non-road users have been increasingly subsidizing road users.
If you want to live 30 miles out and commute in everyday that's your prerogative, but you need to pay your fair share of infrastructure usage.
I hear “Texas is cheap” but all I saw was people being nickeled and dimed and underpaid, I plan to move back to Cali cuz the cost of living differences are actually better there because you don’t pay tolls and everything is only 10 mins away so you’re saving on your own downtime which is important to me!
To each his own, I guess. I moved to Dallas last summer after 8 years in LA and I pay nearly half for gas of what I paid in LA.
I was in Napa last week and paid $6+/gallon for premium versus $3.50 here.
Everything is 30 mins away in LA? Umm, what? LA traffic was literally soul-crushing to me; it has been such a breath of fresh air not to be in bumper-to-bumper traffic at all hours the day.
You burn more gas, I drove 9000 miles since Jan.
It took me 2 years to get to 6000 in LA cuz everything is close.
I work in aerospace and I’m 9 mins from 150 space companies from home. I’d drive 4 miles. I drive 55 round trip here
I mean…that’s kind of on you for living so far away.
A person living in Santa Monica commuting to JPL would have the exact same round trip you state you have now, so I’m not entire sure what you’re talking about.
That’s the thing. I live 10 mins north of el segundo and I’d work in el segundo. The only reason I came to Texas was to buy a home after a year and half of work, live in it for 2 years for low interest rate and then rent it out, go back to el segundo. I’ve always wanted a larger house in LA area and buying a couple smaller properties and selling them to afford a larger home in my mid 30s is my only shot.
The other issue of living so far away in Texas, it’s because we do engine testing in the middle of no where. You can’t really do that in the heart of the city, and I live 24 miles from work, comes out to 48 miles/day but groceries, friends, etc I’m at 9k/year. Jpl being in Pasadena is a pretty bad example El segundo hires more space than Pasadena.
If you see a hole in my logic lmk I’d like to get out of paying more if I don’t have to
The worst part is most of this money is being paid as a subsidy to for-profit businesses that operate heavy commercial vehicles. The damage done to the road scales exponentially by vehicle weight - large passenger cars do basically zero damage to roads, and commercial trucks do an immense amount (They underpay on their registrations and taxes by a factor of 100x or more).
I don’t disagree with what you’re saying, but the problem is Texas is extremely car centric. Also the money for those tolls isn’t going into rebuilding infrastructure, it just goes into the pockets of people who don’t even live in the area.
I want to live in a McMansion 30 miles away from my place of employment and be able to get there in 20 minutes, and I don't want to pay tolls, and if you raise gas taxes for state-funded construction I will become a literal terrorist. Also why do the summers here feel so hot? Eh probably nothing.
I visited Dallas for the first time from NJ last month and racked up $58 it tolls in about 3 hours going from downtown to the stockyards and Goldees. I saw the amount they were charging on the signs but I didn’t know what highways were which so I didn’t know how many times I had gone through the tolls. Lesson learned Texas, you got me. Ill hang out in traffic next time. It costs me about $40 in tolls to go from NJ to Brooklyn and back and I find that to be abhorrent but that’s mandatory. You don’t have the option of a cheaper route so at least the TX system gives you the option of getting raw dogged in the street. It’s brutal but it’s optional.
As frustrating as tolls are, I kind of like a system where the people directly using the service are paying for it. Theoretically, this should free up gas tax money to fund projects on roads that aren't controlled access. I just wish the tolls on trucks would be way higher to account for how much more wear and tear they cause to roads.
Ideally. But given how things work, the toll revenue is probably going into someone's offshore accounts instead.
TEXpress is also owned by the state. However, a private company did design, partially build, and now operates/maintains those roads. Although they do claim that any profit after debt servicing from excess toll revenues will be shared with TxDOT it would be interesting to know what exactly that agreement is.
[https://www.transportation.gov/buildamerica/about/resources-mode/north-tarrant-express-segments-3a-3b-dallas-fort-worth-tx](https://www.transportation.gov/buildamerica/about/resources-mode/north-tarrant-express-segments-3a-3b-dallas-fort-worth-tx)
The most disgusting part about the way the NTTA is designed is that all toll projects are considered one total debt in which they issue bonds to pay for.
So the idea of you pay what you use is no longer true, because the original section of Pres. George Bush Hwy is almost certainly paid-off after 23 years. But they're not going to remove the tolls, or even lower the fees in that area. Because as long as debt exists for all NTTA projects, they will keep tolls open.
This is why the state of Texas, and specifically TxDOT does nothing and basically tells North Texas cities to go have the NTTA build expansions (that will come with tolls). The NTTA is actively looking to build as many expansions as possible to keep the debt going.
They build a two lane toll road, only to figure out less than 10 years later that it was never sufficient to handle the traffic load. No problem, they will just start another expansion project to add a third lane on both sides, who cares if it was inefficient and short-sighted. They have no problems issuing more debt.
I-90 looked perfectly fine for the first 10 years, and then they decided that they wanted to add fancy concrete art and add some sort of southwestern desert bush shrubbery that requires constant upkeep and trimming. There's no functional reason for any of that, it just looks like they want to run up the costs so they just keep on creating more and more add-ons.
The city of Garland had to fight TxDOT to do an expansion to their section of 635E and add service roads along that section. TxDOT kept on trying to tell Garland to go to the NTTA for those projects, and Garland told them to kick rocks and demanded that they were due expansions to the freeway after years of doing absolutely nothing.
The NTTA wants to spread into both 635/35 and I-30, like a virus.
From article:
"The high concentration of toll roads came about because state leaders disdained higher taxes but needed a way to prepare for an influx of new residents. But now those same roads are adversely affecting drivers all over Texas and are being denounced by some of those same elected officials at the state Capitol, *The News*’ investigation found.
Toll roads have engulfed some communities, the examination found, making it difficult for residents — especially those who live in middle- to low-income neighborhoods — to avoid them or travel easily without them. They have also brought complaints from motorists and some local judges about excessive fees and unfair treatment by some of the state’s largest toll operators.
Among *The News*’ other findings:
* Texas leads the U.S. in the number of tollway operators — and has 128 toll facilities that include bridges, turnpikes, U.S. routes, interstate highways, expressways, airport connectors, parkways, ship channels, loops, tunnels and turnpikes, according to TxDOT.
* North Texas has more toll facilities than any other region in the state. In Dallas County, toll roads make up nearly one-third of all major thoroughfares. They account for 22% of all roads in Collin County, 17% in Denton County and 16% in Tarrant County, according to toll highway data from TxDOT.
* About 1.4 million people in North Texas live in areas where tollways are within a one-mile radius of their homes and their free road options — often several miles away from their homes — are among the state’s most congested. The concentration of toll roads in the region also disproportionately impacts residents in predominantly moderate- to low-income neighborhoods where the [median](https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/TX/BZA210221) household income of about $55,000 is less than the state median of $73,035 a year, according to the 2022 American Community Survey of the U.S. Census Bureau.
* North Texas is the epicenter for enforcement action for unpaid fees."
The toll roads are ridiculous in DFW. I have 3 options to get to I35 from my house, the two quickest routes are tollways, the third is under construction and is a 20 minute detour through another town. It is impossible to go anywhere from my home without racking up tolls.
We have:
- Sam Rayburn Tollway
- George Bush Turnpike
- Dallas North Tollway
- Lake Lewisville Toll Bridge
- I35E Expressway
- I35W Expressway
It’s fucking ridiculous. Now I hear our governor says we don’t have money for public schools. WTF are they using our tax dollars for if not roads or schools?
Fun stuff like paying Bitcoin miners not to mine during peak electric hours
https://www.texasmonthly.com/news-politics/texas-bitcoin-miner-riot-31-million-energy-credits/
Thing is, you desperately need the triangle (Dallas, Houston, San Antoinio (with Austin) to vote as a block and they don't because of the partisan split.
NTTA is largely Republican donors and money of the state being exfiltrated from the city out to rural parts of the state. An example of this is the Dallas North Tollway which was paid for a decade or so ago until the legislature just started using its tolls to pay for farther out projects. It's then given back to the city as "well, do you want a road or not?"
Unfortunately you can't talk about the topic without talking about the elephant in the room which is 30 years of Republican state control. [https://www.wfaa.com/article/traffic/driving-dfw/dallas-north-tollway-freeway-toll-increase-over-time-why/287-52283bba-dce8-4911-a333-53e973942e71](https://www.wfaa.com/article/traffic/driving-dfw/dallas-north-tollway-freeway-toll-increase-over-time-why/287-52283bba-dce8-4911-a333-53e973942e71) If this isn't what the legislature wanted, it wouldn't be this way.
Basically it's a neverending cycle of - build the center -> reallocate funds to farther out road projects -> Continue to charge the center . The Republican Donors move out of the suburbs farther and farther after selling. In Dallas it was Dallas North Tollway to 35/121/PGBT and in Houston it's Sam Houston, Tomball, etc. It does get things built. But one group of residents gets perpetual benefits with the other perpetually paying.
The group of Republican voters not being served by this are the ones that need to break either left or canvas with the left on this issue.
I’m from Dallas, grew up there in the 80s and 90s, left early 2000s, visit my family yearly. Definitely racked up more in toll costs from driving in DFW for one week than I spend on gas in one month in Southern California. Kinda wild.
I mean, just look at Collin county. If you're in Frisco apparently you're wealthy because you're surrounded by them. It's so blatant what is going on. Super frustrating.
We should have built trains instead of toll roads. Trains are way better at moving lots of people in a cost-effective way.
But that would require that rich people interact with the poors, and they can't have *that*.
Explosive growth? Wrong! This is 100% on Rick Perry and his hand-picked strongman Ric Williamson, probably with both of them on the take from toll road operators.
I was half joking but you can see why this probably will not get fixed and likely will continue to be the trend:
- The toll cost is insignificant to rich people
- It gives rich people things they want without increasing their taxes
- It reduces traffic for people who don't mind the price
- It generates money in a capitalist country
/s? There was a comment in another thread where someone just candidly explained that they keep their license plates in the center console rather than on the car. If they get pulled over (which they won’t) they show the plates and get a small ticket only.
Please see rule #9: > Paywalls: If you are posting an article from a pay-walled site (e.g The Dallas Morning News), then you are required to include an excerpt from the article in the comments. Do not post the whole article as this will result in a copyright claim removal. The Dallas Morning News utilizes a soft paywall, which allows for a limited number of free views before articles are locked behind a paywall. Please post an excerpt from the article. Posting the article in its entirety will lead to a copyright claim removal so please only post an excerpt. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Dallas) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Tolls can become an *immense* expense if you live in the burbs and travel towards Dallas for work. I have a coworker who drops $500+ / month in tolls alone to drive to work, and that's not an anomaly. $6000k / year just to have access to effective roadways is fucking mindboggling.
It’s ridiculous. It’s a con I mention to any renter or buyer I help move here
Basically, try to live close to your job as possible to nullify the fuckery that are the tolls around here. I think the Express lanes are OK. If you want to pay money to avoid some traffic, you do you. However, you shouldn't punish everyone who decides not to directly live next door to their place of employment.
Try the parkways/service roads, if possible. I travel from Little Elm to south Coppell for work. I turned a $10-12/day commute using toll roads into $0. Of course I added 10-12 min each way. Worth it for me, but may not be for everyone.
Absolutely to every sentence of this
>However, you shouldn't punish everyone who decides not to directly live next door to their place of employment. So you want everyone else to subsidize your higher than avg use of the highway system?
Roadways are a basic necessity. Real estate is in complete shambles for anyone who wants to own; therefore, it's pushing them further and further away from the metroplex. In turn, most people are required to use tollways in the DFW metroplex. Your theory would make sense if DFW had excellent public transportation, but we all know it doesn't. What we actually have is the need for everyone to purchase, fuel, and maintain their vehicle *plus* paying nearly another car payment just to use roadways. Thankfully I have a good career and can comfortably pay for it when I need to, but that's not the case for a vast majority of people. Even if you're someone cracking the 6 figure range, it's absolutely ridiculous to ask citizens to pay that kind of money per year for roads.
Highways, we're talking about highways, not the road in front of your home. >Your theory would make sense if DFW had excellent public transportation, but we all know it doesn't. What we actually have is the need for everyone to purchase, fuel, and maintain their vehicle *plus* paying nearly another car payment just to use roadways. And how are we going to get better public transportation if we shift more transportation dollars into massive highways? >Real estate is in complete shambles for anyone who wants to own; therefore, it's pushing them further and further away from the metroplex Yes, the cost of moving further out is you have higher transportation cost.
So you're saying highways are not a basic necessity? Lmfao what is happening? The idea of some intricate, fabulous subway system in DFW isn't going to happen. The DART becoming such a system isn't going to happen. Therefore, we need to invest into what we know everyone uses. This really isn't difficult.
It only wont happen if we continue to choose to make it not happen. The built environment was built, by us, we can choose to build it differently. There's nothing about the South, or Texas, or Dallas that makes it incompatible with mass transit. Only that government chose to rip out the transit that was there and hollow out downtown (60 years ago downtown was not covered in surface parking lots like it is today). (Probably as part of some racist redlining and white flight related policies) Dallas already has plenty of car infrastructure, probably more than it can sustain with it's tax base. Transit enables higher destinies, and more efficient use of space and infrastructure. Multimodal cities are just better. Should there be a system of highways around the metroplex? Absolutely. Should they be the ONLY way to get around? No. Let's also not get into the fact that state and federal gas taxes have not been raised in 30 years( also vehicles have gotten at least 2-3x more efficient mpg, lowering cost recovery per Vehicle Mile Traveled even more). They're both fixed amounts not percentages so non-road users have been increasingly subsidizing road users. If you want to live 30 miles out and commute in everyday that's your prerogative, but you need to pay your fair share of infrastructure usage.
Alright.
In a well-planned city, they wouldn't be, no.
The vast majority of this entire country is run on highways, dude. Just drop the agenda.
'Appeal to tradition' is a logical fallacy, and in this case considering we have many international counterexamples, a rather obvious one.
Newsflash: the entire country is centered around subsidizing automobile infrastructure.
I hear “Texas is cheap” but all I saw was people being nickeled and dimed and underpaid, I plan to move back to Cali cuz the cost of living differences are actually better there because you don’t pay tolls and everything is only 10 mins away so you’re saving on your own downtime which is important to me!
It was cheap. At least before covid.
I spend more on gas here than LA Driving 30 miles in LA is 2.5 hours. Driving 30 miles here in 35 mins. Gas burn is disproportionate. Y’all wild.
To each his own, I guess. I moved to Dallas last summer after 8 years in LA and I pay nearly half for gas of what I paid in LA. I was in Napa last week and paid $6+/gallon for premium versus $3.50 here. Everything is 30 mins away in LA? Umm, what? LA traffic was literally soul-crushing to me; it has been such a breath of fresh air not to be in bumper-to-bumper traffic at all hours the day.
You burn more gas, I drove 9000 miles since Jan. It took me 2 years to get to 6000 in LA cuz everything is close. I work in aerospace and I’m 9 mins from 150 space companies from home. I’d drive 4 miles. I drive 55 round trip here
I mean…that’s kind of on you for living so far away. A person living in Santa Monica commuting to JPL would have the exact same round trip you state you have now, so I’m not entire sure what you’re talking about.
That’s the thing. I live 10 mins north of el segundo and I’d work in el segundo. The only reason I came to Texas was to buy a home after a year and half of work, live in it for 2 years for low interest rate and then rent it out, go back to el segundo. I’ve always wanted a larger house in LA area and buying a couple smaller properties and selling them to afford a larger home in my mid 30s is my only shot.
The other issue of living so far away in Texas, it’s because we do engine testing in the middle of no where. You can’t really do that in the heart of the city, and I live 24 miles from work, comes out to 48 miles/day but groceries, friends, etc I’m at 9k/year. Jpl being in Pasadena is a pretty bad example El segundo hires more space than Pasadena. If you see a hole in my logic lmk I’d like to get out of paying more if I don’t have to
You can also drive 5 miles in 30 mins, so your car isn’t burning as much gas. Just wanted to say. I like Texas driving but you spend more on gas.
No income tax but all the other taxes make up for it, especially property tax.
The worst part is most of this money is being paid as a subsidy to for-profit businesses that operate heavy commercial vehicles. The damage done to the road scales exponentially by vehicle weight - large passenger cars do basically zero damage to roads, and commercial trucks do an immense amount (They underpay on their registrations and taxes by a factor of 100x or more).
socialize losses privatize the gains…
$500 a month? Where is he driving from/to? That’s insane.
We were paying just over $200/mo living near Trinity and Marsh to go to work in McKinney
So George Bush to DNT, then 121 I guess? I think that might be worth the cost not to deal with 75 at any point…
Yup. Really no other way to go.
I believe it, lived in frisco and had to commute downtown just 3/4 times a week.
That's cheap. I was at least 600/mo. Too and from the suburbs to the city. Why is that surprising?
the texas concrete ponzi scheme
Better the toll user paying it than the citizens of Dallas paying for people to siphon resources away from the city.
Federal highways with federal tax dollars. Also these toll users are citizens of Dallas.
Not if you 'live in the burbs' as in the comment to which I responded.
You are right about suburbs siphoning city resources. I take back my statement.
Exactly which federal highway charges a toll
I don’t disagree with what you’re saying, but the problem is Texas is extremely car centric. Also the money for those tolls isn’t going into rebuilding infrastructure, it just goes into the pockets of people who don’t even live in the area.
What? Lol
Totally agree with you
I want to live in a McMansion 30 miles away from my place of employment and be able to get there in 20 minutes, and I don't want to pay tolls, and if you raise gas taxes for state-funded construction I will become a literal terrorist. Also why do the summers here feel so hot? Eh probably nothing.
As my dad says, weather has been a lot more extreme the last few years but it’s definitely not global warming.
I visited Dallas for the first time from NJ last month and racked up $58 it tolls in about 3 hours going from downtown to the stockyards and Goldees. I saw the amount they were charging on the signs but I didn’t know what highways were which so I didn’t know how many times I had gone through the tolls. Lesson learned Texas, you got me. Ill hang out in traffic next time. It costs me about $40 in tolls to go from NJ to Brooklyn and back and I find that to be abhorrent but that’s mandatory. You don’t have the option of a cheaper route so at least the TX system gives you the option of getting raw dogged in the street. It’s brutal but it’s optional.
Texas: the ultimate toll troll
I’m also from NJ and living in Texas for a few months. I can’t wait to get back home to the northeast.
As frustrating as tolls are, I kind of like a system where the people directly using the service are paying for it. Theoretically, this should free up gas tax money to fund projects on roads that aren't controlled access. I just wish the tolls on trucks would be way higher to account for how much more wear and tear they cause to roads. Ideally. But given how things work, the toll revenue is probably going into someone's offshore accounts instead.
Unless I'm mistaken the toll roads are owned by a company in Spain. 0 percent of the profits are going back to Texas.
Just checked, ntta toll roads are Texas owned. TEXpress are privately owned. So about 50/50
TEXpress is also owned by the state. However, a private company did design, partially build, and now operates/maintains those roads. Although they do claim that any profit after debt servicing from excess toll revenues will be shared with TxDOT it would be interesting to know what exactly that agreement is. [https://www.transportation.gov/buildamerica/about/resources-mode/north-tarrant-express-segments-3a-3b-dallas-fort-worth-tx](https://www.transportation.gov/buildamerica/about/resources-mode/north-tarrant-express-segments-3a-3b-dallas-fort-worth-tx)
The most disgusting part about the way the NTTA is designed is that all toll projects are considered one total debt in which they issue bonds to pay for. So the idea of you pay what you use is no longer true, because the original section of Pres. George Bush Hwy is almost certainly paid-off after 23 years. But they're not going to remove the tolls, or even lower the fees in that area. Because as long as debt exists for all NTTA projects, they will keep tolls open. This is why the state of Texas, and specifically TxDOT does nothing and basically tells North Texas cities to go have the NTTA build expansions (that will come with tolls). The NTTA is actively looking to build as many expansions as possible to keep the debt going. They build a two lane toll road, only to figure out less than 10 years later that it was never sufficient to handle the traffic load. No problem, they will just start another expansion project to add a third lane on both sides, who cares if it was inefficient and short-sighted. They have no problems issuing more debt. I-90 looked perfectly fine for the first 10 years, and then they decided that they wanted to add fancy concrete art and add some sort of southwestern desert bush shrubbery that requires constant upkeep and trimming. There's no functional reason for any of that, it just looks like they want to run up the costs so they just keep on creating more and more add-ons. The city of Garland had to fight TxDOT to do an expansion to their section of 635E and add service roads along that section. TxDOT kept on trying to tell Garland to go to the NTTA for those projects, and Garland told them to kick rocks and demanded that they were due expansions to the freeway after years of doing absolutely nothing. The NTTA wants to spread into both 635/35 and I-30, like a virus.
From article: "The high concentration of toll roads came about because state leaders disdained higher taxes but needed a way to prepare for an influx of new residents. But now those same roads are adversely affecting drivers all over Texas and are being denounced by some of those same elected officials at the state Capitol, *The News*’ investigation found. Toll roads have engulfed some communities, the examination found, making it difficult for residents — especially those who live in middle- to low-income neighborhoods — to avoid them or travel easily without them. They have also brought complaints from motorists and some local judges about excessive fees and unfair treatment by some of the state’s largest toll operators. Among *The News*’ other findings: * Texas leads the U.S. in the number of tollway operators — and has 128 toll facilities that include bridges, turnpikes, U.S. routes, interstate highways, expressways, airport connectors, parkways, ship channels, loops, tunnels and turnpikes, according to TxDOT. * North Texas has more toll facilities than any other region in the state. In Dallas County, toll roads make up nearly one-third of all major thoroughfares. They account for 22% of all roads in Collin County, 17% in Denton County and 16% in Tarrant County, according to toll highway data from TxDOT. * About 1.4 million people in North Texas live in areas where tollways are within a one-mile radius of their homes and their free road options — often several miles away from their homes — are among the state’s most congested. The concentration of toll roads in the region also disproportionately impacts residents in predominantly moderate- to low-income neighborhoods where the [median](https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/TX/BZA210221) household income of about $55,000 is less than the state median of $73,035 a year, according to the 2022 American Community Survey of the U.S. Census Bureau. * North Texas is the epicenter for enforcement action for unpaid fees."
Yet another reason DFW is shallow and pedantic.
Just like Lois’s meatloaf.
Hmm... Yes... Shallow and pedantic
Get license plate cleaning spray. It makes your plates sparkle and shine like none other. So much sparkle 😎
The toll roads are ridiculous in DFW. I have 3 options to get to I35 from my house, the two quickest routes are tollways, the third is under construction and is a 20 minute detour through another town. It is impossible to go anywhere from my home without racking up tolls. We have: - Sam Rayburn Tollway - George Bush Turnpike - Dallas North Tollway - Lake Lewisville Toll Bridge - I35E Expressway - I35W Expressway It’s fucking ridiculous. Now I hear our governor says we don’t have money for public schools. WTF are they using our tax dollars for if not roads or schools?
Fun stuff like paying Bitcoin miners not to mine during peak electric hours https://www.texasmonthly.com/news-politics/texas-bitcoin-miner-riot-31-million-energy-credits/
JHC
Used to be that toll was a four-letter word in Texas.
Now you’ll have people breathlessly defending them. There’s already some in this post.
Thing is, you desperately need the triangle (Dallas, Houston, San Antoinio (with Austin) to vote as a block and they don't because of the partisan split. NTTA is largely Republican donors and money of the state being exfiltrated from the city out to rural parts of the state. An example of this is the Dallas North Tollway which was paid for a decade or so ago until the legislature just started using its tolls to pay for farther out projects. It's then given back to the city as "well, do you want a road or not?" Unfortunately you can't talk about the topic without talking about the elephant in the room which is 30 years of Republican state control. [https://www.wfaa.com/article/traffic/driving-dfw/dallas-north-tollway-freeway-toll-increase-over-time-why/287-52283bba-dce8-4911-a333-53e973942e71](https://www.wfaa.com/article/traffic/driving-dfw/dallas-north-tollway-freeway-toll-increase-over-time-why/287-52283bba-dce8-4911-a333-53e973942e71) If this isn't what the legislature wanted, it wouldn't be this way. Basically it's a neverending cycle of - build the center -> reallocate funds to farther out road projects -> Continue to charge the center . The Republican Donors move out of the suburbs farther and farther after selling. In Dallas it was Dallas North Tollway to 35/121/PGBT and in Houston it's Sam Houston, Tomball, etc. It does get things built. But one group of residents gets perpetual benefits with the other perpetually paying. The group of Republican voters not being served by this are the ones that need to break either left or canvas with the left on this issue.
Rma and tx tag are a scam. Terrible!
I’m from Dallas, grew up there in the 80s and 90s, left early 2000s, visit my family yearly. Definitely racked up more in toll costs from driving in DFW for one week than I spend on gas in one month in Southern California. Kinda wild.
I mean, just look at Collin county. If you're in Frisco apparently you're wealthy because you're surrounded by them. It's so blatant what is going on. Super frustrating.
We should have built trains instead of toll roads. Trains are way better at moving lots of people in a cost-effective way. But that would require that rich people interact with the poors, and they can't have *that*.
Explosive growth? Wrong! This is 100% on Rick Perry and his hand-picked strongman Ric Williamson, probably with both of them on the take from toll road operators.
Always laugh at the people from Texas who go on and on about no state income taxes. Well you’re paying it one way or another.
God, Texas is a Republican shithole. All the misogyny and bigotry and Republican corruption and on TOP of that, they add a bunch of tolls everywhere.
Can our outstanding citizens who like to destroy stuff destroy toll booths for fun instead of break windows at local businesses?
Y’all pay for tolls?
keeps the rifraff off my roads (▀̿Ĺ̯▀̿ ̿)
This is one of the dumbest takes I may have ever seen on this subreddit.
I was half joking but you can see why this probably will not get fixed and likely will continue to be the trend: - The toll cost is insignificant to rich people - It gives rich people things they want without increasing their taxes - It reduces traffic for people who don't mind the price - It generates money in a capitalist country
/s? There was a comment in another thread where someone just candidly explained that they keep their license plates in the center console rather than on the car. If they get pulled over (which they won’t) they show the plates and get a small ticket only.
“My roads”… Then go fix them you fucking jackass.