# TBA: Take Your $2,250 Tolls (Regressive Subsidies) & Shove Em Up Your 6-Lane Tunnel **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [March 16, 2005, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tba-take-your-2-250-tolls-regressive-subsidies-shove-em-up-your-6-lane-tunnel/294873 "2005-03-16T20:51:13Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![even\_sven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/dfb087/32.png) [@even\_sven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/even_sven)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2005, 5:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tba-take-your-2-250-tolls-regressive-subsidies-shove-em-up-your-6-lane-tunnel/294873/21 "2005-03-17T05:18:39Z")
> [@Shagnasty](#): > > Do you live in a bubble? That is a typical commute for many, many people. Actually, this town really is a bubble. There has to be a better way to plan our cities and outlaying areas. ---
**Author:** ![WCOT](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e5b9ba/32.png) [@WCOT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WCOT)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2005, 6:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tba-take-your-2-250-tolls-regressive-subsidies-shove-em-up-your-6-lane-tunnel/294873/22 "2005-03-17T06:24:47Z")
thats a ridiculous amount to pay in tolls, seeing as it only costs about 8 dollars to drive from albany to buffalo. and stretches alot more highway. ---
**Author:** ![Typo\_Negative](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/typo_negative/32/484_2.png) [@Typo\_Negative](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Typo_Negative)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2005, 8:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tba-take-your-2-250-tolls-regressive-subsidies-shove-em-up-your-6-lane-tunnel/294873/23 "2005-03-17T08:34:17Z")
> [@even sven](#): > > A forty mile commute? As in you drive eighty miles every day of your life? That’s nothing. Before I got laid off, my round trip commute was 140 miles. And if there had been a toll road with no traffic congestion, I would gladly have paid. Are the toll roads there clear, are do they also face gridlock? To face gridlock AND have to pay tolls to do it would have caused me to go on a murderous ramage. ---
**Author:** ![Cheesesteak](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cheesesteak/32/3694_2.png) [@Cheesesteak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheesesteak)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2005, 12:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tba-take-your-2-250-tolls-regressive-subsidies-shove-em-up-your-6-lane-tunnel/294873/24 "2005-03-17T12:51:39Z")
You refuse to get EZ-Pass to save yourself $250 a year because they’re going to have you put a $50 advance in your account, which you’re going to use up in a week anyway? I’m also sure that they will start, any day now, ticketing people for speeding by using EZ-Pass data. It’s only been, what, 10 years? The plans must be final. Frankly, the fact that you live in LI and work in Yonkers is your own problem. You have the largest, most densely packed city in the nation between your home and your work. The only way your commute is not going to suck is if you move to the same side of the city as your job. Do yourself a favor, get the EZ-Pass. ---
**Author:** ![Exgineer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a88e4f/32.png) [@Exgineer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exgineer)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2005, 1:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tba-take-your-2-250-tolls-regressive-subsidies-shove-em-up-your-6-lane-tunnel/294873/25 "2005-03-17T13:27:54Z")
> [@WCOT©](#): > > thats a ridiculous amount to pay in tolls, seeing as it only costs about 8 dollars to drive from albany to buffalo. and stretches alot more highway. Even that’s high. I drive between here and southern Maine a lot, and my usual route is I-90/Berkshire Spur to the Mass Pike to I-495 to I-95 to the Maine Turnpike. Even with the New Hampshire one dollar extortion station and the State of Maine charging a buck to cross the border in each direction it’s still cheaper toll-wise than driving to Syracuse. New York is the Toll King, edging out even New Jersey. The bridge tolls are the worst, and you shouldn’t think it’s limited to NYC because the Thruway Authority gets its dip too. The southernmost non-toll bridge across the Hudson is the Dunn Memorial between Albany and Rensselaer. ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2005, 1:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tba-take-your-2-250-tolls-regressive-subsidies-shove-em-up-your-6-lane-tunnel/294873/26 "2005-03-17T13:29:25Z")
> [@WCOT©](#): > > thats a ridiculous amount to pay in tolls, seeing as it only costs about 8 dollars to drive from albany to buffalo. and stretches alot more highway. I am amazed people actually\* pay\* to go to Buffalo at all. ---
**Author:** ![Who\_me\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/958977/32.png) [@Who\_me\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Who_me_1)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2005, 2:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tba-take-your-2-250-tolls-regressive-subsidies-shove-em-up-your-6-lane-tunnel/294873/27 "2005-03-17T14:01:17Z")
> [@spooje](#): > > That’s nothing. Before I got laid off, my round trip commute was 140 miles. And if there had been a toll road with no traffic congestion, I would gladly have paid. > > Are the toll roads there clear, are do they also face gridlock? To face gridlock AND have to pay tolls to do it would have caused me to go on a murderous ramage. I only drive 120 miles round trip. I also use EZ pass to head through the Fort McHenry tunnel in Baltimore. The toll is nothing like the OP’s, without EZ Pass it’s 2.00 each way, with EZ Pass .40 each way. I can deal with saving $3.20 a day using the pass. ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2005, 5:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tba-take-your-2-250-tolls-regressive-subsidies-shove-em-up-your-6-lane-tunnel/294873/28 "2005-03-17T17:49:24Z")
> [@JohnBckWLD](#): > > Look, I totally understand the fact that a sizeable amount of revenues collected at the bridges & tunnels go to subsidize mass-transit – and without those subsidies, the price of a train ride would rise and more people would congest the roadways. Enough already! This system of robbing Peter to pay Paul is both regressive and inequitable. Actually, I think the system is quite progressive, not regressive. People who have the money to buy cars and pay tolls are paying to subsidize people who have to take the bus. It’s not like the Wall Street brokers are lining up in their Gucci boots to get on the ol’ public bus. I’m just stunned at how you refuse to consider for even a moment that the government should act to make your lifestyle choices easier. You choose to live far away from your work and you choose to drive in. Why on earth should everyone bend to your whims to reduce the burdens you have placed on your own life by lowering tolls that are needed to keep transportation services running for everyone? This rant is pretty much the texbook definition of someone wanting to have one’s cake and eat it, too. ---
**Author:** ![JohnBckWLD](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d6d6ee/32.png) [@JohnBckWLD](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnBckWLD)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2005, 8:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tba-take-your-2-250-tolls-regressive-subsidies-shove-em-up-your-6-lane-tunnel/294873/29 "2005-03-17T20:27:14Z")
> [@Ravenman](#): > > Actually, I think the system is quite progressive, not regressive. People who have the money to buy cars and pay tolls are paying to subsidize people who have to take the bus. It’s not like the Wall Street brokers are lining up in their Gucci boots to get on the ol’ public bus. Maybe I’m too jaded…but the system sucks. Poe-tay-to poh-tah-to I guess. Correct me if I’m wrong, but aren’t you essentially saying, ‘_Owning a car should be expensive - a luxury that only the wealthy should be able to afford_’. I’m willing to wager most people who ride (non-Manhattan) buses wish the cost of owning a vehicle was lower and they wouldn’t have to be herded like cattle stopping every two blocks along the way. > [@](#): > > I’m just stunned at how you refuse to consider for even a moment that the government should act to make your lifestyle choices easier. You choose to live far away from your work and you choose to drive in. Why on earth should everyone bend to your whims to reduce the burdens you have placed on your own life by lowering tolls that are needed to keep transportation services running for everyone? I already pointed out how the practice of putting toll booths at indiscriminate points is both unfair and expensive. Trick Question: How much is the toll to drive through the tunnels of the big dig in Boston compared to the tolls along the Pacific Coast Highway? > [@](#): > > This rant is pretty much the texbook definition of someone wanting to have one’s cake and eat it, too. Even better, you could have said ‘people who live on an island have no right bitching about the price of the ferry’. I’ll continue to ante up and squawk as I do so. I’m not too concerned though. On 6/22/15; When my youngest daughter graduates high school, it’ll be my emancipation day and the only bridges I’ll have to concern myself with are the Natural Bridges of Aruba. ---
**Author:** ![JohnBckWLD](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d6d6ee/32.png) [@JohnBckWLD](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnBckWLD)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2005, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tba-take-your-2-250-tolls-regressive-subsidies-shove-em-up-your-6-lane-tunnel/294873/30 "2005-03-17T20:40:41Z")
> [@Cheesesteak](#): > > You refuse to get EZ-Pass to save yourself $250 a year because they’re going to have you put a $50 advance in your account, which you’re going to use up in a week anyway? I know as I type this metaphor, it’s going to sound hair-brained: I equate the entire EZ-Pass system with the government offering additional tax credits to parents who have their child’s social security number tatooed on their ankle. ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [March 17, 2005, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tba-take-your-2-250-tolls-regressive-subsidies-shove-em-up-your-6-lane-tunnel/294873/31 "2005-03-17T21:23:56Z")
> [@JohnBckWLD](#): > > MI already pointed out how the practice of putting toll booths at indiscriminate points is both unfair and expensive. Perhaps you’d also like to “point out” how government are supposed to pay for the upkeep of roads without the money that is raised by tolls. And if you think you’ve made any kind of coherent point about unfairness, think again. All I have seen is a nonsensical rant about you being a cheapskate when it comes to indulging your whim to drive everywhere. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/tba-take-your-2-250-tolls-regressive-subsidies-shove-em-up-your-6-lane-tunnel/294873.md?page=1)