The benefits of the Pennsylvania Turnpike’s network-wide transition to barrier-free, open-road tolling (ORT) are manifested in a proposed interchange project, writes turnpike chief executive Mark Compton in a TribLIVE op ed column. The SR 130 interchange in suburban Pittsburgh will be built after the collection system transition makes “costly, concrete-laden toll plazas and tollbooth choke points” obsolete. With toll-reading equipment mounted on roadway-spanning gantries, new connections like SR 130 are feasible,” Compton notes. Increased direct access to the turnpike often stimulates economic activity, as well as improving local mobility.
Compton observes that the “new configuration [also] brings added safety benefits, on and off our system. Data collected at three locations that previously implemented ORT” — the Delaware River Bridge, the Warrendale interchange, and the Gateway in Lawrence County — “show significant crash rate reductions.”
The turnpike commission recently showcased preliminary designs for the SR 130 interchange at a public meeting.
A new ORT system will go live on January 5 on the turnpike’s eastern segment and Northeast Extension. Western interchanges will convert to ORT by 2027. Demolition and removal of obsolete toll plazas begins next year.