Toll Road to Cost Millions More for Us

Did you know that today we pay 47% more per mile to use our end of the 73 San Joaquin Toll Road than South County residents pay to use their end of the same toll road? It gets worse. By 2031, we will be paying 108% more than they do. That same toll road will collect $100 million this year in tolls. That’s three times what it did when it opened in 1997.

How did I become such an expert on toll roads? It all started when Newport Beach City Councilman Don Webb left me a message two weeks ago about an idea for a column. I got a hold of him later that week and he asked if I had heard about the rate increases that were being proposed for the San Joaquin Hills Toll Road. I remembered skimming over an article in the Pilot referring to a 25-cent increase. He explained how Newport-Mesa residents were going to be charged more per mile entering or exiting the toll road at Newport Coast Road.

I’ve got to be honest with you, getting excited over a 25-cent increase seemed a little over the top; but what the heck, I thought. I was in my car on the Eastside and Don’s home was two minutes away, so I stopped by his house to pick up his copy of the “Traffic and Revenue Report for the Transportation Corridor System.”

This two-inch-thick tome was packed with graphs, charts and models that only an engineer could love. Don, who in his previous life was Newport Beach’s city engineer, had his copy all highlighted and tabbed. Don also created his own graph showing the cost per mile up and down the 73. Sure enough, based on his calculations, Newport-Mesa residents were paying more per mile to use our end of the toll road than south county folks paid to use theirs.

The 73 is a major transportation backbone for Costa Mesa, Newport Beach and UCI. Of the 6.5 miles that go though our towns, 1.8 miles of it is a toll road. That last 1.8 miles costs you $1.50 each way today. You could argue that there are other ways to get to the Eastern parts of Newport Beach without using the toll road, but the options are limited. If you are already traveling south on the 73, it would be unusual to get off two miles before your destination and take side streets to Newport Coast. So unlike other parts of the county we have to pay to travel around our community.

But is Don really getting worked up over a two-bit increase? Well, it was not the first 25-cent increase that was his concern. It was getting a 25-cent increase every two years until 2031.

That $1.50 trip will cost you $4.25 in 2031 while south county users don’t get a 25-cent increase for seven years; and then they get only a 25-cent increase every five years. Their trip that costs them $1.25 today goes up to only $2.50 by 2031.

If I have not confused you enough, here is the bottom line: Newport-Mesa users will pay $66 million more than South County users for traveling the same distance. Didn’t think those quarters could add up that fast, did you?

On May 10 the San Joaquin Hills Transportation agency’s “SJHTCA” board will probably approve the rate increases. Only two of the 14 board members, Don Webb and Costa Mesa Mayor Eric Bever, are from our end of the road.

I will let you in on a little secret about local governance. While most of the residents are still arguing about where we should locate City Hall or whether we should light the athletic fields — be it the SJHTCA, F/ECTA, OCWD, OCSD, MWD, OCWM, OCTC or SCAG — the real money is being spent in a bunch of agencies you’ve never heard of with alphabet soup-like acronyms.