Van pool driver Lisa Gammons has watched traffic in Interstate 95's High Occupancy Vehicle lanes get thicker and thicker over the past 12 years.
Gammons, who drives six people from the U.S. 17 commuter lot in Stafford to downtown Washington, hopes the state's proposal to replace HOV lanes with High Occupancy Toll lanes will speed up her trip--and encourage commuters to ride share.
"The flow is still decent," Gammons said of HOV, "but it's at least 40 percent hybrids at the time I come through, and they're one person, so it's kind of frustrating," Gammons said.
Gammons toured information displays about the HOT lane project last night at the Wingate Inn in southern Stafford with 45 other people. The Virginia Department of Transportation and state Department of Rail and Public Transportation sponsored the session, and officials spent several hours answering questions.
Not everyone was excited about the project.
"We're all taxpayers, we all have a right to use the highway," said Rocklyn Bates of Stafford.
With HOT lanes, "it's like a tax on top of a tax," he said.
Commuters who take the time to car pool, van pool, slug or ride a bus are rewarded for their efforts between Washington and Dumfries--they can escape gridlock in two High Occupancy Vehicle lanes.
At rush hour, only vehicles with three occupants or more can use these lanes (with a few sizable exceptions--motorcycles, law enforcement officers, and anyone with special fuel vehicle license plates registered prior to July 1, 2006).
Two private companies, Fluor Virginia Inc. and Transurban (USA) Development Inc., want to extend two lanes to the Massaponax area, and add a third lane between Washington and Dumfries.
The lanes will become HOT lanes--High Occupancy Toll lanes. The lanes will always be free for vehicles carrying three occupants or more, just like HOV lanes.
But cars with one or two occupants can use the lanes if they pay a toll. Tolls will be set using congestion pricing, which adjusts prices as traffic grows heavier or lighter.
Fluor-Transurban must charge a toll that will deter enough drivers to stay in the regular lanes, so traffic is free-flowing in HOT lanes.
A "free-flowing" speed is defined as 55 mph, said David Ogle, VDOT Fredericksburg District administrator.
Fluor-Transurban has said tolls could average $1 a mile at peak travel times, but some transportation planners have estimated it could cost up to $1.60 a mile.
At the $1 mark, 56-mile rush hour trip into Washington from Massaponax and back would cost roughly $112 a day.
When traffic is light, tolls could be as low as 10 cents a mile, said Larry Cloyed, VDOT's project manager for HOT lanes.
However, "There is no cap on that toll," Ogle said.
I-95 would be divided into a number of segments--to be determined--and as drivers approach a new segment, they will see the toll price for the upcoming stretch of interstate. Drivers can proceed or bail out to regular lanes. Once a driver enters a segment, the toll rate will lock in for that entire segment.
Motorcycles would be allowed to use HOT lanes for free, but hybrid vehicles would be subject to tolls.
There will never be a "open" period in the lanes. Currently, outside of rush hour, HOV lanes are open on I-95 to all vehicles.
With HOT lanes, tolls will be charged seven days a week, 24 hours a day.
The only way to get a free ride will be rounding up three people or more, taking a bus or riding a motorcycle.
Tolls will be paid electronically by EZ-Pass, and will not require motorists to stop at a booth.
Law enforcement officers, paid for by Fluor-Transurban, will patrol for violators, aided by video detection and an alert system in the tolling equipment. "They're going to be more strict in the enforcement of violators than what we currently have going on," Ogle said.
If Fluor-Transurban signs a comprehensive agreement with VDOT, construction would begin on the northern HOT lane project in late 2008, with HOT lanes opening between Washington and Dumfries in 2010.
There's been some tussling over the Dumfries dividing line between the northern and southern parts of the project, which was determined by the Federal Highway Administration to be the natural terminus for the two halves.
Members of the Fredericksburg Area Metropolitan Planning Organization expressed dismay at this divide last year, arguing stopping the lanes where they do now will bring no relief to motorists who sit in a traffic jam where HOV lanes merge with regular ones.
Fluor-Transurban is now proposing to build a single HOT lane from Dumfries to Garrisonville Road by 2010, helping to ease this jam until both lanes can be built.
This lane would operate until the southern project is complete.
But Stafford Supervisors Mark Dudenhefer and Bob Gibbons want the single lane extended past the Garrisonville Road exit. Too much traffic gets off at Garrisonville, they said last night, and it would simply move the Dumfries jam south.
Kelly Hannon: 540/374-5436