Commuters began paying 25 cents more at the Main Toll Plaza on the Dulles Toll Road New Year's Day. New price $1.25.
Toll rates on the on/off ramps will remain 75 cents .
The same news greeted commuters last New Year's Day because the Metropolitan Airports Authority, the folks who operate the Dulles Toll Road (and Dulles and Reagan Airports), agreed to three straight years of toll increases back in 2009.
Yes, there wil be another New Year's Day increase in 2012.
"A three-year schedule for new toll rates was approved by the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority Board of Directors in November 2009 after conducting a series of public hearings," the Airports Authority reminded its customers in a Dec. 8 press release.
What are you paying for? The construction of the new Silver Line subway line that is now under construction from the East Falls Church Metro station to Wiehle Road in Reston. Phase 2, is supposed to go all the way to the airport. (McLean Patch dreams that in our lifetime we can take Metro to Dulles to catch a flight to Paris!)
Under a complicated agreement between the federal government, the state of Virginia, Fairfax County and other folks, the Airports Authority agreed to operate and maintain the Dulles Toll Road and to construct the Dulles Corridor Metrorail Project, aka, the Silver Line.
Remember that previously the state of Virginia owed the Toll Road which flanks the Dulles Access Road* on both sides.
A substantial part of the money to pay for the new subway line comes from Dulles Toll Road revenues --- aka new tolls paid by commuters. The rest of the money comes from contributions by the federal government, Virginia, Fairfax and Loudoun Counties, and the Airports Authority.
Under its agreement with the Commonwealth of Virginia, the Airports Authority will operate and maintain the Dulles Toll Road for a 50-year period beginning in 2009.
*Last piece of history: The Dulles Access Road was built in the early 1960's to get folks from Washington and the Arlington and Fairfax suburbs to what was then an airport in the middle of nowhere.
Dulles Airport opened in 1962.
Late into the 1970's, you could drive from The Beltway to the Airport and see only one building (yes ONE building) the Sheraton Hotel in Reston. Everything else was trees. Yes trees!!!
