OKLAHOMA CITY – The trio of mainline toll plazas on the H.E. Bailey Turnpike between Lawton and Oklahoma City/Norman converted to totally cashless tolling on June 21, but four ramps along that route won’t convert until early July.
Tollgates that converted June 21 to PlatePay as well as PikePass were the Newcastle plaza, the Chickasha plaza, and the S.H. 4/H.E.B. spur plaza near Blanchard.
The ramps at U.S. 277 in Elgin, U.S. 62 in Chickasha, S.H. 4/Bailey Spur near Bridge Creek, and S.H. 76 on the H.E.B. spur near Blanchard will add PlatePay to Pike Pass in early July, according to James Poling, public information officer for the Oklahoma Turnpike Authority.
The Walters toll plaza and its ramps at S.H. 5, between Lawton and the Texas state line, will become cashless in late July, Poling said.
With PlatePay, tollbooths and coin machines will be scrapped. Motorists who do not have a PikePass will no longer have to stop to pay a toll. Instead, the vehicle’s license plate will be photographed automatically, and an invoice will be sent to the registered owner of the vehicle.
The Turnpike Authority will install 40 camera systems on the H.E.B., Poling said.
PlatePay customers will pay an average of 75% more than the current cash rates because of the expenses incurred in collecting the tolls via mailed invoices.
PikePass customers receive a discount of nearly 20% on tolls across the turnpike system and a volume discount program. PikePass rates on the Bailey will remain the same after the conversion, Poling said.
The H.E.B. will be the third Oklahoma turnpike to transition to all-electronic tolling; the John Kilpatrick and Kickapoo turnpikes in Oklahoma City moved to PlatePay within the past year. OTA plans to transition the state’s remaining turnpikes to cashless tolling over the next two years.
The Turnpike Authority “has been working for years,” Poling said, “preparing for this transition to cashless tolling.” As a result some toll attendants “already have or are in the process of moving to different roles within the agency in anticipation of this conversion.” The OTA had 236 toll attendants in February 2021, Southwest Ledger was told.
The Bailey generated $33.8 million in toll revenue in 2021, according to Wendy Smith, the OTA’s director of finance and revenue.
The H.E.B. logged more than 20.7 million transactions last year; each time a toll is charged or collected counts as a transaction, Poling said. Two-axle vehicles such as passenger cars and pickups accounted for 18.6 million of those transactions (89.7%); three-axle vehicles, 405,193 transactions (2%); four-axle vehicles, 231,835 (1.1%); five-axle vehicles, 1.46 million transactions (7%); and six-axle vehicles, 48,271 (0.2%).
Average daily traffic volume on the H.E.B. in 2020 numbered approximately 19,700 vehicles, Turnpike Authority records indicate.
The Legislature authorized construction of the H.E. Bailey Turnpike in 1953 with the goal of connecting Oklahoma City, Lawton and Wichita Falls, Texas. The turnpike opened in two phases in 1964 and received the Interstate 44 designation in 1982. The Bailey Turnpike Spur, connecting I-44 with Bridge Creek, Newcastle, Blanchard and Goldsby, was completed in 2001; it received the S.H. 4 designation last year.
All-electronic tolling
initiated because of
convenience, necessity
Conversion of the state’s entire turnpike system to cashless tolling is a matter of convenience and necessity, OTA Deputy Director Joe Echelle told the Turnpike Authority earlier this month.
“We recognize the fact that our customers want a safe, fast and efficient way to travel our system,” Oklahoma Secretary of Transportation and OTA Executive Director Tim Gatz said previously. “Converting to cashless tolling will relieve motorists who struggle to find money to put in the coin machines.” One of the biggest complaints from patrons of Oklahoma’s turnpike system “is that we still expect them to carry a pocketful of quarters,” Gatz said.
Additionally, coin receptacles on Oklahoma’s turnpikes “have to be specially manufactured because nobody uses them anymore.”
Safety, too, is a major factor. Most recently, a pickup approaching the Newcastle gate while on cruise control plowed into the crash attenuator and “narrowly missed the toll booth,” Echelle reported.
Several recent traffic snarls along the Turner Turnpike “highlight the dire need to reinvest into the state’s turnpike system,” Gatz said.
A crash on Interstate 44/Turner Turnpike between S.H. 66 in Wellston and the Kickapoo Turnpike closed westbound traffic for more than 90 minutes May 31, less than a week after a May 26 crash on the westbound Turner Turnpike near Stroud stopped traffic for more than an hour. In April, more than a hundred motorists sat idle up to seven hours as state troopers pursued an armed robbery suspect west of Stroud.
The OTA’s 15-year plan includes nearly $1.3 billion in projects to modernize the Turner Turnpike – the most heavily traveled toll road in the state. Initial projects are in the design phase.
The Turner toll road opened in 1953, three years before the federal National Interstate and Defense Highways Act created the interstate highway system. The turnpike was a modern marvel at its opening, but it has since seen traffic volume and the modern-day freight vehicles outgrow its capacity. Average daily traffic volume on the Turner was approximately 32,000 vehicles at the end of 2020, OTA ledgers indicate.
“For decades, the Turner Turnpike met the needs of motorists traveling between the state’s two largest cities,” Echelle said. “For safety and convenience, we have to enhance the turnpike to meet the modern needs of 21st century transportation.”
The OTA’s plan, ACCESS Oklahoma, will provide at least five new interchanges on the Turner Turnpike, creating traffic diversion points for motorists and added access to nearby towns.
ACCESS Oklahoma also will widen the Turner to three lanes between Interstate 35 in north Oklahoma City and Bristow, completing a project that started near Tulsa and creating a six-lane highway for the entirety of the turnpike between Oklahoma’s two largest cities. The widening will include serviceable shoulders, lighting in the median and additional clearances on overhead bridges.
Three lanes of traffic with serviceable shoulders provides emergency responders and maintenance crews space to work while safely keeping at least one lane of traffic moving, the OTA explained.