The Oklahoma Turnpike Authority adopted a $330 million budget for calendar year 2026.
That sum includes $165,020,177 for capital expenditures and $165,056,062 for operations and maintenance of the state turnpike system, Finance Director Wendy Smith said.
Oklahoma has a dozen toll roads totaling approximately 635 miles, with 900 bridges and 104 interchanges.
Last month, the Legislative Office of Fiscal Transparency submitted a report on its 16-month study of Oklahoma’s turnpike system, the effect of cross-pledging toll receipts, and financing new construction with bonds.
Legislation enacted in 1965 authorized “cross-pledging” of turnpike revenues, in which tolls from all but one turnpike (the Gilcrease in Tulsa) are deposited into one fund “to support the entirety of the system’s operations and maintenance.”
A key feature of the turnpike system is that its debts are not an obligation of state taxpayers.
The system is “fully funded by toll revenues paid only by those who choose to travel on them,” OTA Executive Director Joe Echelle told the agency’s governing board during a Nov. 4 meeting. Furthermore, “about 50%” of OTA’s toll revenue is generated from out-of-state travelers, he said. “Our user-fee system is sustainable.”
Toll receipts pay the salaries of OTA employees, debt service requirements on the bonds, O&M expenses, even the salaries of the Oklahoma Highway Patrol troopers who monitor traffic on the toll roads.
The OTA has one of the lowest toll rates in the nation at an average of 7 cents per mile for passenger vehicles and an average of 25 cents per mile for commercial vehicles, Echelle told Chickasha Rotarians on Aug. 28. Nationally, the averages are 22 cents per mile for passenger vehicles and 79 cents per mile for commercial vehicles, he said.
In July, 81.7% of the OTA’s toll revenue was derived from the Pike-Pass, 7.4% from inter-operational agreements with other states (Texas, Kansas, Colorado and Florida), and 10.87% from PlatePay, which replaced the cash rate. Oklahoma has no cash toll booths remaining on its system.
OTA’s bond ratings are among the highest of any tolling entity in the nation. They include Moody’s, Aa3; Fitch, AA-; and S&P Global, Aa-.
Oklahoma’s turnpike system has logged at least two ‘firsts,’ Echelle said.
The Turner Turnpike was “the first four-lane, high-speed, divided highway west of the Mississippi River,” he said. It opened to traffic three years before the federal National Interstate and Defense Highways Act created the interstate highway system.
Last November, the OTA completed a four-year effort to create nonstop travel on Oklahoma’s turnpike system. “We were the first in the nation to go to ‘open road’ tolling,” Echelle told the Rotarians.
In yet another matter, Echelle said the OTA is prepared for the approaching winter months.
He said the agency has 100 trucks with plows, including 17 tow plows; 65,000 tons of salt and sand stored in 44 sites throughout the turnpike network; 85,000 gallons of magnesium chloride; and 38 crews with 148 heavy equipment operators “trained and ready to tackle winter weather.”