By Whitney Donohue

Moapa Valley Progress

The Arizona segment of I-15 including the Virgin River Gorge, is on a short list of candidates for a federal pilot program that would institute a toll for travelling on the interstate.

The segment of I-15 running through the corner of Arizona could eventually become a toll road. The Arizona Department of Transportation (ADOT) has applied for a federal pilot program which would add tolls to sections of three interstate highways in the country.

Arizona applied for the program in August, stating that the stretch of interstate needs $251 million in repairs and that the state doesn’t have the money to pay for the work. States are charged with maintaining all highways, including interstates, within their boundaries.

ADOT has plans to complete detailed studies in 2012 to determine if a toll road is feasible, financially and environmentally, for the area. If the federal government agrees, drivers could pay anywhere from $1 to $3 to travel the road between Mesquite and St. George. Semi truck operators would pay even more.

“The state has a duty to maintain those bridges and make them safe,” stated ADOT Director John Halikoswki. “That’s my priority. Tolls are just one option to meet an increasingly urgent need.”

I-15 is a major national corridor for both freight and tourists. Some 1,200 residents also live in that section of Arizona, which currently houses almost no retail shops or industry. Most residents travel to nearby Mesquite, NV or St. George, UT to work or shop.

ADOT has pointed out that the area provides little economic benefit to the state because it is so sparsely populated. Combine that with the fact that the 29 mile stretch of road is the only way for drivers to travel through the area without a major detour, and suddenly you have a good candidate for raising state revenues.

Since 1998, ADOT has made nine repairs to bridges on I-15. In 2011 ADOT found broken welds and joints and cracks in steel girders in some of the bridges over the Virgin River. Without repairs, weight restrictions could be placed on these bridges; or the interstate could be closed.

In May of last year, ADOT requested $30 million a year from the state to repair and maintain I-15, but the request was denied by the State Transportation Board.

Concerns have been raised about the economic impact of instituting a toll on such an essential thoroughfare. Freight traffic accounts for more than 25% of the traffic on I-15.

US Representative Glenn Thompson, R-PA, points out that since the pilot program was introduced in 1998, no state has successfully converted a federally funded interstate into a toll road.

“I am staunchly opposed to tolling existing interstate capacity,” Thompson stated. “Simply put, tolls are taxes, and you don’t raise taxes in a recession. And you don’t double tax on truckers, when they’re adding a significant service to our already ailing economy.”

The American Trucking Association also opposes the proposed toll. In 2006 commercial vehicles paid a total of $17.8 billion in federal highway user taxes, approximately 45% of all federal highway user fees. In addition, they also paid an additional $19.6 billion in state user fees, the ATA stated in a press release.

There are only three slots for the pilot program, two of which have been filled by Virginia and Missouri. The final slot has three states vying for it: Arizona, Rhode Island, and South Carolina. The requests are currently being reviewed by the US Department of Transportation.