Discount for Indiana drivers on Illinois Tollway in jeopardy

April 15, 2007

Post-Tribune staff report

Indiana officials say the rollout of new toll-tabulating transponders in June will make highway travel cheaper and easier for Indiana motorists, but their peers across the border in Illinois say private toll road operator ITR Concession Co. are making things harder.

Illinois Tollway officials say they will reconsider their longstanding practice of granting all users of Indiana's I-Zoom transponders an automatic 50 percent reduction in the tolls paid by drivers who pay cash, since ITR Concessions announced plans to give a 40 percent reduction solely to Indiana residents.

Illinois gives the 50 percent discount to the 90,000 Indiana residents who have I-Pass transponders, at an annual cost of $9 million.

The move by ITR, which last year took over management of the Indiana Toll Road that is a major thoroughfare for Northwest Indiana travelers commuting to Chicagoland and vice versa, flies in the face of the logic used by Illinois and other members of the E-Z Pass Interagency Group.

The national association of toll road operators has used similar transponder technology precisely to standardize and simplify toll collection for interstate travelers, said Illinois Toll Way spokeswoman Joelle McGinnis.

If Illinois and other states were to require Indiana residents to get a second transponder, it would clutter drivers' windshields and could lead to double-billing and other errors.

ITR Concessions officials have blamed the problem on conditions imposed by the state legislature when they negotiated a $3.8 billion lease of the Toll Road, which included the reduced tolls for Hoosier drivers.

The company will discuss the problem with officials from Illinois and the E-ZPass group.