Charging, Tolling & RUC

China is considering regulations that would allow road operators to levy a toll on users beyond the current 15 to 30-year limit, according to Bloomberg. The plan would potentially boost an industry that has been plagued by losses as companies struggle to earn enough to cover their debt and operating costs. “The extension of the tolling period can help to woo private investors into highway development,” said Zhu Haibin, chief China economist at JPMorgan Chase in Hong Kong. The plan shows the government’s

Regina Bypass Partners, a subsidiary of Vinci Concessions, in partnership with Parsons Enterprises, Connor Clark & Lunn GVest fund and Gracorp Capital, has signed a public-private partnership contract with the Saskatchewan Ministry of Highways and Infrastructure with a term of 30 years for the completion and operation of the highway bypass of Regina, the capital city of the province of Saskatchewan in Canada. The project, which represents a total investment of around US$1.4 billion, includes the design,

US-based Gila is to partner with Kapsch TraffiCom on an electronic toll collection system (ETCS) operations and maintenance contract for the toll roads owned and operated by the Puerto Rico Highways and Transportation Authority (PRHTA) and Autopistas Metropolitanas of Puerto Rico (Metropistas, an Abertis-Goldman Sachs consortium). The PRHTA selected Gila to provide comprehensive program management services including customer service centre management and operations for all toll roads within the island ne

The International Bridge, Toll and Turnpike Association’s 83rd annual meeting and exhibition takes place in Dublin, Ireland on 30 August to 1 September. The industry's thought leaders from around the globe will discuss the most pressing topics in the field in a country that has gone through a rapid road network transformation in the 21st century.

As the US Congress once again struggles to find funding for a long-term highway bill, a new Reason Foundation study details why truckers should embrace the use of tolling to finance the reconstruction and modernisation of aging Interstate highways, describes how all-electronic tolling can solve the industry’s previous privacy and logistical concerns about toll roads and proposes a set of rules to ensure that the tolls paid by truckers and motorists are used only to rebuild and widen the newly tolled Inters

From early November 2015, the multi-million pound Humber Bridge project will introduce the UK's first electronic toll collection (ETC) and open-road tolling system to the bridge, enabling motorists who apply for a HumberTag account to pay the toll automatically using an electronic tag linked to a personal online account. The middle lanes of the bridge won’t have any booths and will be for account holders only – enabling drivers to cross the bridge without stopping. The outside lanes will still have booth

Fix 66, a newly formed group to advocate for a managed lanes and bus rapid transit system to improve mobility in the I-66 corridor outside of the Capital Beltway, has applauded Virginia Department of Transportation’s (VDOT’s) announcement that they will advance a public-private partnership (P3) option for I-66 improvements to evaluate it with the previously announced public financing option. Fix 66 said, “We applaud VDOT’s decision to put the public-private partnership option on the table because maximi

Slovakia’s complex electronic toll collection (ETC) system has seen steady growth since it opened in 2010; toll collection in 2013 totalled US$161 million, while in 2014 US$200 million of told were collected. The first quarter of 2015 saw a total of US14.4 million of tolls collected. At the end of March 2015, 245,408 on-board units (OBUs) were registered with the system; 72 per cent of OBUs are registered to foreign drivers. Designed, developed and operated by Skytoll on behalf of the National Motorwa

N3 Toll Concession (N3TC), the company responsible for the N3 toll route between Heidelberg in Gauteng and Cedara in KwaZulu-Natal, has begun testing of its electronic toll collection (ETC) System in selected toll plaza lanes. N3TC aims to implement electronic toll collection (ETC) as an additional convenient payment method for vehicles fitted with electronic tags. It is envisaged that ETC will be implemented at all plazas along the N3 Toll Route during the latter part of 2015. “With the roll out of a

The Legacy Way expressway, in Brisbane, Australia, is now open to traffic. The seven kilometre long expressway is approximately and includes one 4.6 kilometre long twin-tube tunnel connecting the Western Freeway with the Inner City Bypass. Traffic on the expressway is forecast to rise from 34,200 vehicles on an average weekday to 50,800 in 2026. Brisbane City Council (BCC) awarded the contract for the design, construction, operation and maintenance of the seven kilometre long expressway to the Transcity