Transportation officers, the governor and a state consultant all mentioned the Cape Cod bridges will stay toll-free after a city official floated the concept of taxing motorists from outdoors the area.
Healey mentioned Wednesday she doesn’t assist tolls on the Sagamore and Bourne bridges and hopes to “make continued progress” on renovating the 90-year-old constructions that state officers have deemed “functionally obsolete.”
“That’s been something that we prioritized and want to move ahead on,” the governor mentioned of infrastructure enhancements, “but not tolls on the bridges.”
Healey’s feedback on the State Home on Wednesday got here after the Herald first reported Tuesday that Mashpee Choose Board Vice Chairman David Weeden had pitched an thought of tolls on the bridges resembling congestion pricing.
Talking at a Choose Board assembly on Monday, Weeden estimated charging motorists from outdoors Cape Cod to enter the favored trip getaway would herald tens of hundreds of thousands yearly. He instructed that the cash needs to be earmarked to handle “coastal and water quality issues.”
“Massachusetts reaps the benefits of Cape Cod tourism,” Weeden mentioned. “It is a significant amount of money that comes into the state through the tourism that we receive here on the Cape. They come over here and leave their stuff behind, and we are left to deal with it.”
The state Division of Transportation shortly shot down the concept.
“Tolls at the crossings over the Cape Cod Canal are not being considered,” MassDOT Spokeswoman Jacquelyn Goddard advised the Herald Tuesday evening.
Weeden instructed officers on the native and state stage contemplate “some approach” the place Cape Codders aren’t being charged to cross the bridges. He added that the concept might take the form of an E-ZPass exclusion.
State Rep. Steven Xiarhos, a Republican who represents Barnstable, Bourne, and Sandwich, mentioned he understands “some of the sentiment behind the suggestion,” as he “regularly travels over the bridges and walks, runs, and rides along the canal recreation paths.”
“But respectfully, I remain firmly opposed to any tolls on our bridges,” Xiarhos mentioned in a Fb submit Wednesday morning. “A toll is a tax – and the working families who rely on those bridges for their daily commutes simply can’t afford the added burden.”
“Yes, the bridges bring in precious tourist dollars that help drive our local economy, and that’s important,” he added. “But they are also a lifeline to the mainland for those of us who call the Cape home. I’m not willing to charge people a fee just for the privilege of living here.”
Native, state and federal businesses are working to interchange the Sagamore and Bourne bridges, owned, operated, and maintained by the U.S. Military Corps of Engineers. Officers had acquired $1.7 billion in federal funding for the estimated $4.5 billion effort as of final yr.
Transportation Secretary Monica Tibbits-Nutt didn’t rule out tolls final yr as a possible supply to fund the replacements.
“As for the construction of new bridges – which I fully support – my position is the same: No tolls,” Xiarhos wrote in his Fb submit. “The cost of rebuilding aging federal infrastructure should not fall on the shoulders of Cape residents.”
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