Charging, Tolling & RUC

Cofiroute USA, which introduced toll road automation on the 91 Express Lanes in Orange County, California, has installed a fully integrated back office system as part of a five year US$38.5 million contract awarded earlier this year. The system provides for transponder tracking, accounting, a web-based consumer interface and dynamic pricing capabilities. The company worked with its software partner TollPlus to meet the specific requirements of the Orange County Transportation Authority (OCTA). This include

German company Vitronic has been selected by Thales Group to supply key components for all fixed enforcement gantries for the nationwide truck charging system to be implemented on 15,000km of French roads. The multi-million euro contract is part of the prestigious Ecotaxe project, a distance based charge for trucks. From mid-2013 onwards, all vehicles over 3.5 tons in weight will have to pay a tax on national roads with the fee being collected by means of an onboard GPS satellite system. Vitronic has been s

Finland-headquartered RFID technology specialist Confidex has opened an office in São Paulo, Brazil, to be closer to the Latin American market where the company has already built up an extensive partner network and is engaged with key players in the industry to provide solutions for large deployments across the continent. Confidex centralises its R&D activities in Finland and already has offices across Western Europe, the US, India and China.

The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey has awarded a contract, valued at approximately $88 million, to Electronic Transaction Consultants Corporation (ETC Corporation) to provide a facility-wide replacement toll collection and audit system as well as related system maintenance services. Under the contract, ETC will implement its latest-generation Rite solution on the Port Authority’s toll facilities to deliver a number of advanced system features including a sophisticated toll data warehouse, an adva

Q-Free has been awarded an order, valued at US$6.27, million for tolling tags from Centro Gestao Meios de Pagto (CGMP) in Brazil. This order is the third call-off from the earlier announced frame agreement of US$38million which was announced last October.

The Puerto Rico Highway and Transportation Authority (PRHTA), working with TransCore, has converted two of its busiest and most essential AutoExpreso roadways to all-electronic toll collection as part of a US$26 million conversion project that is expected to be completed across all AutoExpreso roadways by next summer. The PR-52 north to south arterial highway, which includes five toll plazas, and PR-53 linking the south and east coasts of the island, with three toll plazas, were part of Phase I of the proje

3M has entered into an agreement to acquire the business of Federal Signal Technologies Group (FSTech) from Federal Signal Corporation for a purchase price of US$110 million in cash, subject to post-closing adjustments. 3M says the fast-growing $3 billion electronic tolling industry is projected to grow at a rate greater than 12 per cent per year as government agencies increasingly rely on tolling to fund roadway infrastructure, construction and maintenance. The company says FSTech’s solutions for electroni

Tex Toll Services, a subsidiary of Cintra in the USA, which is in turn a branch of Ferrovial, has awarded Spain-headquartered Indra a US$14.9 million contract to implement electronic toll back office systems on the SH-130, LBJ Express and North Tarrant Express highways, in Texas. Besides the development, implementation and maintenance of the electronic toll systems back office on the three highways, the contract also includes the setting up of two high-availability data processing centres, one in Austin and

South African National Roads Agency (Sanral) has received a bailout of over US$770 million from the government for its Gauteng Freeway Improvement Project (GFIP). The cash injection is a bailout for the electronic toll system which cost an estimated US$2.66 billion, much of it which still has to be paid for. The cash injection will enable tolls to pay for over 25 per cent of the cost of the project and enable the planned toll charges, due to be introduced on highways on 30 April, 2012 to be reduced by 25 pe