Gareth Manning, Gleaner Writer
President of the Portmore Pines Citizens' Association, Howard Hamilton, joins with other Portmore residents yesterday in singing 'We Shall Overcome'. The residents were meeting at the Portmore Lions Club's Civic Centre in Edgewater, St. Catherine, to discuss the issue of the announced toll rate. - NORMAN GRINDLEY/DEPUTY CHIEF PHOTOGRAPHER
TREVOR JACKSON, managing director of toll road operator Trans-Jamaican Highway, has confirmed that motorists using electronic tags (T-Tags) will pay $60 per passage for the first nine trips across the Portmore toll road each week.
On the 10th trip for the week, the figure will move to $50 and decrease to $40 on the 11th trip. On midnight Friday, the discount becomes ineffective and the toll moves back to $60. The same applies to all other classes of vehicles.
Therefore, the average person working an ordinary nine-to-five job, Monday to Friday, travelling on the toll road only, from home to work and back again in a simple motor car, would spend $590 per week. In total, each month that person would spend $2,360, perhaps close to any one of his utility bills. For an entire year, that person would have spent at least $28, 830.
For an average person driving a class-two vehicle (sports, minibus or van), the average cost would be $990 per week if he uses the toll 10 times each week or $3,960 per month. At the end of the year, that person would spend at least $47,520 for toll charges.
A Gleaner-commissioned Bill Johnson poll last year showed a majority of Portmore residents were prepared to pay a maximum of $30 per passage. However, there was a majority 62 per cent who said they would probably use the toll road an average 4.2 times each week if the toll was set at $60.
With current toll prices, however, an estimated 28,000 vehicles are expected to use the toll road daily, and toll operators should rake in a minimum daily revenue of $3.36 million. This is $1.26 million above the minimum $2.1 million that Transport Minister Robert Pickersgill said the operators needed to collect to pay interest.
Toll rates
CLASS 1 (MOTOR CARS)
Nominal $60
10 passages $50
11 passages and more $40
CLASS 2 (SUVs)
Nominal $100
10 passages $90
11 passages and more $80
CLASS 3 (BUSES, TRUCKS)
Nominal $200
10 passages $90
11 passages and more $160
