Two tolls on the 1-95 in southern Rhode Island have raked in $7.2 million just in their first year of being operational.
The Rhode Island Department of Transportation’s (RIDOT) Director, Peter Alviti, said, “They’ve been doing a bit better financially than we anticipated.”
Initially, the Department estimated that the tolls would bring in seven million dollars within the first year.
“It confirms that the traffic counts, both in number of trucks that are going through this corridor, are exactly what we predicted.”
Even though trucking companies are putting up a legal case against the tolls, RIDOT officials continue to stand their ground and say they, “have all the confidence in the world in our legal opinions.”
The third toll in their roll-out plan went up Tuesday night and tolls will continue to be put up once a month until a dozen new truck-specific tolls are operational.
Alviti claims that the money generated from the tolls will be going towards funding the reconstruction of several bridges throughout the state.
“We have a large number of bridges in the state that need to be reconstructed. The money from those tolls is going directly into the reconstruction.”
“[The funds] will assure the continued maintenance and operation of this investment that we’re making in rebuilding our infrastructure here in the state.”
