North Carolina tolls will go up on Jan. 1

Toll rates are going up on the Triangle Expressway and the Monroe Expressway in North Carolina.

Beginning Friday, Jan. 1, the cost to travel the full length of the Triangle Expressway will cost $3.60 for two-axle vehicles, a 12-cent increase. On the Monroe Expressway, a full-length trip will increase by 6 cents to $2.66. Vehicles with four or more axles will pay four times the two-axle rate. For trucks, a full-length trip will be $14.40 on the Triangle Expressway and $10.64 on the Monroe Expressway.

The above rates are for drivers with the NC Quick Pass. Rates for bill-by-mail customers will go up 19 cents on the Triangle Expressway and 9 cents on the Monroe Expressway.

For truckers, that means paying as much as $22.08 on the Triangle Expressway and $16.40 on the Monroe Expressway.

Toll hikes are part of scheduled incremental annual rate increase established by the North Carolina Turnpike Authority Board. Increases are based on the financing requirements for each project, according to a North Carolina Department of Transportation news release.

Like many other toll roads, revenue from the Triangle Expressway and Monroe Expressway go to paying off bonds sold to fund construction and maintenance of the projects.

The Triangle Expressway is nearly 19 miles and extends the partially complete outer loop around the greater Raleigh area from Interstate 40 to the N.C. 55 Bypass. The toll road was built to relieve congestion on N.C. 55 and reduce travel times to the Research Triangle Park. The 18-mile Monroe Expressway is an alternative route to the U.S. 74 corridor southeast of Charlotte.

The N.C. Turnpike Authority is developing other toll projects, including extending the Triangle Expressway from the N.C. 55 Bypass in Apex to U.S. 64/264 (Interstate 495) in Knightdale. The turnpike authority also is developing or considering express lanes on Interstate 485 from Interstate 77 to U.S. 74, U.S. 74 from Conference Driver in Charlotte to I-485 in Matthews, and U.S. 74 from Interstate 277 to Wallace Lane.

According to NCDOT documents, a through trip on the Triangle Expressway can be as high as nearly $9 for a two-axle vehicle with a transponder in 2058, or nearly $36 for trucks. On the Monroe Expressway, a through trip for trucks with the NC Quick Pass can go up to $16 by 2040. LL