Just wave and go with electronic tolls

Drivers using the Windsor-Detroit tunnel linking Canada with the US will shortly be able to pay electronically on both sides of the border. Until now, electronic payment has only been available on the US side. Tunnel president Neal Belitsky said it’s part of a plan to eventually phase out tunnel tokens after 2013. “We’re going to be getting out of the token business,” Belitsky said. “It takes time to buy rolls of tokens. All that is going to disappear. If you look throughout the US or Canada, you can count
November 2, 2012 Read time: 2 mins
Drivers using the Windsor-Detroit tunnel linking Canada with the US will shortly be able to pay electronically on both sides of the border. Until now, electronic payment has only been available on the US side.

Tunnel president Neal Belitsky said it’s part of a plan to eventually phase out tunnel tokens after 2013. “We’re going to be getting out of the token business,” Belitsky said.

“It takes time to buy rolls of tokens. All that is going to disappear. If you look throughout the US or Canada, you can count the number of transportation facilities that use tokens ... probably on one hand.”

The electronic system uses Nexpress cards, radio-frequency identification (RFID) cards similar to those used in the NEXUS program. Canadian customers will be able to order a Nexpress card online, load it with funds, then pass through the toll gates quickly and smoothly by waving the card at an electronic reader.

“It’s a lot faster and it’s a lot more convenient,” Belitsky promised.

Belitsky said there are currently about 15,000 tunnel tokens in circulation. He envisions the tunnel will stop selling tokens in early 2013, and stop accepting them entirely at the end of that year. Belitsky said the tunnel will still have attendants, and always accept cash.
Charging, Tolling & RUC

Related Content

  • ARTBA president: what happened to the hoverboards?
    October 28, 2019
    What keeps Dave Bauer up at night? David Arminas caught up with the head of ARTBA at his Washington, DC office during daylight hours Dave Bauer doesn’t really have many sleepless nights. He might sleep, though, with one eye open, just in case. “We have become a much more divided country politically,” says Bauer, president of ARTBA – American Road and Transportation Builders Association. “Whether you are thinking about federal government, or state or local government, there’s a hostility now in our politi
    Read More
  • MoceanLab discovers new Covid car-share use
    October 20, 2020
    The coronavirus pandemic has prompted some radical re-thinking of mobility services. Ben Spencer hears how MoceanLab car-share vehicles are delivering care to LA's homeless
    Read More
  • Oklahoma Turnpike to go interoperable
    July 19, 2013
    Oklahoma Turnpike (OTA) is in discussion with Kansas Turnpike and North Texas Tollway (NTTA) on the viability of electronic interoperability between the three companies. It is close to agreement with North Texas Tollway and billing of each other’s customers should be in operation by the spring or summer of 2014. Discussions with the Kansas Turnpike are a little further behind and interoperability is likely to happen by the second half of 2014. Director of operations at the OTA, David Machamer, says much o
    Read More
  • Investors say politics is hurting Chile infrastructure spending
    October 22, 2013
    While the financial community praises Chile as a safe haven and pioneer in Latin American infrastructure, investors say that political leaders lack commitment to push for projects, and they have called for the creation of an independent authority to plan public works and coordinate projects. Chile's construction chamber has proposed the installation of an agency, such as those that exist in Canada and New Zealand, which would be independent from the national government and would plan long-term infrastruc
    Read More

Highlighted Content