Even with its glitches, the SunPass program has exceeded expectations and offers a bargain on some tolls.
By JEAN HELLER
Published March 30, 2004
[Times photo: Lara Cerri]
The eastbound toll plaza on the Pinellas Bayway does not have a dedicated lane for SunPass users.
There is nothing like the promise of a deal to spur people to action.
When Florida's Turnpike raised tolls across the state on March 7 - for everyone except motorists who use the electronic toll-paying system SunPass - drivers stripped store shelves of the little SunPass transponders, eager to save a quarter here and there.
"In the first two weeks, we had 77,000 requests to activate new transponders," said Joanne Hurley, spokeswoman for the Turnpike Enterprise. "The growth is nothing short of phenomenal."
But this was no momentary blip. Five years after launching the SunPass program, turnpike officials say the business of collecting tolls electronically across Florida is light years ahead of anticipation.
The state hoped to have 700,000 transponders on the roads at the five-year mark, Hurley said. "We have 1.2-million. We're way ahead of our highest expectations."
Officials launched the electronic toll system in 1999 when they believed the technology had become sufficiently reliable. It allows cars to zip through toll plazas where electronic sensors recognize transponders and deduct the fees from prepaid accounts. It was intended to be a convenience for customers that also was environmentally sound because moving vehicles emit lower levels of pollution than those at idle.
And, of course, there are savings to the state. It costs 17 cents to collect a toll by hand, Hurley said, as opposed to 10 cents electronically.
The transponders cost $25 and can be bought in most grocery and drug stores. When an account is activated, the owner must pay another $25 for the first round of prepaid tolls. Many elect to have their balances replenished through automatic credit card transfers.
Many users agree that the SunPass system delivers on its promise, most of the time, but even the state acknowledges that it still has its flaws.
There are a few toll plazas, including at least one in the Tampa Bay area, where SunPass doesn't have a dedicated lane. SunPass users get stuck in the same slow-moving lines as motorists paying cash. And now that SunPass has been in operation for a few years, some transponders are wearing out. Unhappy owners don't get discounts on new ones.
There also are occasions when the transponders in cars and the "readers" in the toll arches miss making contact. That will get the vehicle owner a citation in the mail, even if it isn't the owner's fault. It can be fixed, but it takes a long-distance call and time to do so.
Florida Department of Transportation officials say they are aware of the problems. The Turnpike has $110-million budgeted for statewide improvements over the next four years, but Hurley said it might spend an additional $10-million.
In the Tampa Bay area, Turnpike Enterprise highways include the Veterans Expressway, the Suncoast Parkway, the Polk Parkway and Florida's Turnpike. Toll roads such as the Pinellas Bayway and the Sunshine Skyway bridge are the responsibility of the state DOT. The Lee Roy Selmon Crosstown Expressway belongs to the Tampa-Hillsborough Expressway Authority.
The same SunPass system works on all of them, as it does on local systems elsewhere, such as E-Pass toll roads in the Orlando area.
"Forty-three percent of the drivers who use (turnpike) roads are SunPass customers," said Hurley. "By 2008, that number will be 75 percent. Clearly, we can see that we have to upgrade and expand facilities."
Part of the plan is to double the number of dedicated SunPass lanes over the next four years statewide.
Upgrades have been made locally, and more are coming:
The downtown Tampa toll facility on the Crosstown now has dedicated SunPass lanes for the first time.
That concrete blotting out the sun on the Crosstown east of downtown is a future elevated express highway that will be dedicated to SunPass users. The reversible-direction highway will feed traffic from the Brandon area to downtown Tampa in the morning and out of town at night.
The four toll facilities in the northbound and southbound lanes of the Veterans Expressway will be getting additional dedicated SunPass lanes later this year.
But help is years away for residents of the southern Pinellas beaches and visitors to the area. The toll facility coming off of St. Pete Beach doesn't have a dedicated SunPass lane and won't get any until the new high bridge is built. Construction is scheduled to begin this fall.
This time of the year, with spring breakers swarming to the beaches, residents of St. Pete Beach and Pass-a-Grille don't even think about moving east off their islands during the late afternoon.
Jay Anderson, who lives on St. Pete Beach but works in Sarasota, said the trick is in the timing.
"I try to travel at hours of the day when you don't catch a lot of traffic, and then it isn't too bad," Anderson said.
While throngs leaving the beaches are a sufficiently potent clotting agent to back up traffic all the way to Gulf Boulevard during the late afternoon, the situation becomes impossible when the drawbridge on the Bayway is raised.
"There can be quite a backup when the bridge is up," said Alan Buchman of St. Pete Beach. "Then it doesn't make any difference whether you're a SunPass user or not. Nobody moves. But it doesn't last very long."
The new bridge will correct all of the above. There will be no drawbridge, and there will be dedicated SunPass lanes.
"We could put dedicated lanes on the current toll facility," Hurley said, "but we'd have to remove them as soon as bridge construction started because they'd be right in the way."
So, until the bridge is completed, the Bayway will remain one of a handful of toll facilities statewide with no dedicated SunPass lane. Hurley said some of the others can't be fixed because there either is no room or the state doesn't have easements.
While SunPass facilities irk some motorists, the transponders also are a source of irritation. Most SunPass owners, who paid a one-time fee of $25 for their transponders, don't realize they will have to pay the fee again, in full, if the transponders fail.
"It's like any other appliance," said Hurley. "When the warranty runs out, you're responsible for replacing it."
The first generation transponder, which is about the size of a deck of cards, has only a one-year warranty. The newer, smaller models have a two-year warranty.
"I didn't know that, no, and I don't like it," said Sara Leslie of St. Petersburg, a graduate student. "Overall, I've been pretty happy with the system, except for those times when you go through the gate and the equipment doesn't pick up the transponder, and you get a violation notice even though it wasn't your fault."
Leslie said she used to use the SunPass system every day, though she uses it less frequently now.
"If the thing died, and I was still using it every day, I'd probably go ahead and replace it," Leslie said. "But the number of times I use it now, if I had to pay another $25, I probably wouldn't."
- Times researcher Kitty Bennett contributed to this report.
ABOUT SUNPASS
- Transponders cost $25. They can be bought in most grocery and drug stores, or ordered online at www.sunpass.com
- The newer models, which are smaller, have a two-year warranty.
- The downtown Tampa toll plaza on the Lee Roy Selmon Crosstown Expressway now has SunPass lanes.
