Though bill is dead, toll lanes on I-75 are still possible

Southwest Florida officials plan to gather next month to discuss possible ways to accomplish the project through interlocal agreements among counties stretching from Collier to as far north as Sarasota, or through the creation of a new, locally controlled expressway authority.

State Rep. Mike Davis, R-Naples, said he has decided not to file a bill this upcoming session to create a new toll-road authority in which he has named this project as a top priority.

Despite intense lobbying efforts, he was not able to sway Lee County commissioners to support a new toll authority.

And Davis vowed not to file the bill unless county commissioners were on board. But the proposal to add four new toll lanes to the interstate is far from dead.

County and city officials from Southwest Florida are being invited to attend a meeting at the Southwest Florida Regional Planning Council office in Fort Myers on Dec. 10.

The Lee County Commission recently directed its staff to investigate the creation of a local expressway authority as allowed under state law, instead of the legislatively created independent authority that Davis was proposing.

On Nov. 20, officials from throughout Southwest Florida listened to a Lee County transportation official discuss the pros and cons of some of the options.

"Counties can establish an expressway authority by resolution rather than a special act of the Legislature," Lee County transportation planner Dave Loveland said at the council meeting in Fort Myers. "And that can be done with two counties, or one county, simply by resolution. ... So we wanted to get input as to whether this body thought something like that might be a good idea."

County and city leaders said they were receptive to holding the future planning meeting to discuss the possibilities.

"I can tell you as one commissioner from Collier County, I'm very excited about the prospects ... to make major improvements to 75," Collier County Commissioner Jim Coletta said. "I think we all owe a debt of gratitude to Mike Davis for bringing his visionary presentation to us."

Under Davis' proposal, there would be no manned toll booths. Drivers would use transponders to get through the booths. These allow cars that have electronic devices on their dashes to pass. Tolls would fluctuate based on the time of day. During rush hour, when the demand would be high for the toll lanes, the toll would go up. When traffic is lighter on the regular lanes, the toll would be reduced to encourage drivers to use those lanes.

Coletta told the group that whatever process is used to accomplish this type of project is fine by him. He has said that these types of lanes could be critical in moving traffic during an accident or hurricane evacuation. "If we form a joint authority between the two counties, I think that would be a wonderful idea," he said. "If we expand it to three counties, including Charlotte, that's even a better idea."

Coletta said he supports the Southwest Florida Regional Planning Council being at the forefront of coordinating the effort so Collier County's resources aren't stretched any more than they are.

There are several ways that the addition of toll lanes on the interstate might be accomplished without a legislatively created authority.

Lee County currently has three toll facilities and could choose to expand its toll operations to other roads within its boundaries without any special legislative action or change in government structure, a regional council staff report read.

"Charlotte and Collier counties could also choose to establish their own toll facilities," it states. "If the issue is construction of a multicounty toll road, that could be achieved within the existing governmental structure, through interlocal agreements. However, that can make for a complex project management system."

The staff report says that the Southwest Florida Transportation Initiative (SWFTI), which is a road lobbying group, has suggested that the interlocal agreement route may not be the best option, because it might not provide the same access to state funding as a multicounty road authority focused on building regional roads.

David Graham, a member of SWFTI and vice president of planning and development for The Bonita Bay Group, said if a local transportation authority does not address a project such as adding toll lanes to the interstate, there is a chance that the Florida Turnpike Enterprise might embark on the project. "There is a lot of competition with who is going to be able to toll I-75, Graham said. "This is competition. This is not something you go into loosely, undivided, and disparate as a region. You have to be together on it."

He said the concern is that should the toll-lane project be handled by the state, any surplus dollars from tolls might not make their way back to local projects. Last year toll revenues from Alligator Alley were redistributed to other state transportation projects.

He said a local expressway authority run by Southwest Florida residents could decide to take excess toll revenues and use them for project proposals that are currently not funded, such as a loop road that would divert traffic off of Alligator Alley along the State Road 29 corridor up into Fort Myers. These cars would not end up not traveling along Interstate 75 through the Naples area, helping ease congestion.

"We as a region need to control where those (toll) dollars go. ... Those excess revenues would go to those kind of improvements, with your discretion," Graham said. "We feel that if we go with a local-government-based approach only, and don't have any state representation, it would be extremely difficult to get the state to allow us to toll one of their facilities. That is the bottom line."

Ken Heatherington, a principal planner for the regional planning council, said earlier this week that the Florida Turnpike Enterprise is currently evaluating the feasibility of adding toll lanes to the interstate in Southwest Florida.

"We are curious to see what revenue forecast for the toll might be," he said.

Plans call for I-75 through Southwest Florida being widened to 10 lanes in the year 2030, but toll lanes could significantly speed this up, said Debbie Tower, a spokeswoman for the Florida Department of Transportation. A proposed widening of the interstate from four to six lanes is scheduled to start in Lee County in 2008 and in Collier in 2010.

She said if four toll lanes were going to be added, it would make sense to do the study to widen the interstate to six lanes. She said this more extensive study process might delay the overall initial widening by a year or two, but maybe not. She said the best-case scenario would be no delay in the beginning of the widening, and a 10-lane project could begin at the same time the six-lane one was supposed to begin. Bonita Springs Councilman Jay Arend questioned whether a locally controlled regional road authority could also address possible toll projects such as a northward extension of County Road 951 out of Collier into Lee County.

Loveland, the Lee County transportation planner, said that is possible.

Environmentalists are concerned that there is now talk of creating a toll road to extend this road. It's a project they vehemently oppose.

"If you refer (this issue) to committee of this body, you could explore all options," Loveland said. "The kind of facility you want to pursue is the key to how you set up the structure."