Fast Lane Discount Extended 1 Month

By Mac Daniel, The Boston Globe

Mar. 1–The Massachusetts Turnpike Authority board voted yesterday to extend discounts for Fast Lane users for another month, but stopped short of making the reductions permanent as Governor Deval Patrick wants.

With the discount, which is now set to expire at the end of the month, commuters save 25 cents off the $1 toll at the Allston-Brighton toll booths and 50 cents off the $3 tolls at the Sumner and Ted Williams tunnels. The program costs about $12 million a year at a time when the turnpike authority is facing a $2.1 billion debt.

At its March meeting, the board is expected to consider approving $10 million to fund the program through the end of the fiscal year. In December, the board went against the recommendations of its staff to end the discounts and voted to extend them for two months.

Lawmakers who represent Boston’s western suburbs argue that the 2002 legislation that created the discounts made them permanent and argue that the turnpike board does not have the legal authority to end them.

“Quite simply they need to move on to other issues and take this off their agenda,” said state Representative David Linsky, a Natick Democrat and supporter of the discounts.

Earlier this month, Patrick killed a proposal to end all tolls west of Route 128. However, a spokesman for the governor said this week that the administration supported the Fast Lane discount program and was working “to construct a long-term solution.” The spokesman, Kyle Sullivan, would not be more specific. Neither would Patrick’s transportation secretary, Bernard Cohen, who attended his first meeting yesterday as a turnpike board member.

—–

To see more of The Boston Globe, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.boston.com/globe.

Copyright (c) 2007, The Boston Globe

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Business News.

For reprints, email tmsreprints@permissionsgroup.com, call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA.