Comments on: Tourist Blogger Hates Dallas Tollways

By: Sachin

Sachin — Tue, 15 Nov 2011 01:35:12 +0000

Hey all,
I rented a car from DFW for just one day and I drove to the university of texas @ dallas just 25 miles and returned the car. My toll bill is $12 and the service charges are $250. I donot want to pay the $250 for a no fault of mine.. What can be done??

By: DEVE

DEVE — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 16:02:45 +0000

Got a letter from National rental, but not from NTTA yet for chargin $10. Do I have to ppay to NTTA too?
Damn these tolls…..

By: Marcus

Marcus — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 17:53:45 +0000

@Jason Heid

There are no longer any toll booths if you enter the DNT from Harry Hines or 35 going Northbound. I don’t believe there is a pay entrance until Mockingbird.

By: LakeWWWooder

LakeWWWooder — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 16:59:40 +0000

I have a 1966 Mustang. I recently got a toll bill for it but the car pictured is a 2008 van-something…yes, they are really on the ball at the NTTA. I had to point out that there were no mini-vans nor SUVs in 1966. Well, the Robinsons on “Lost in Space” did have the first SUV, but that was supposed to be in 1997.

By: Seven

Seven — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 06:59:30 +0000

@Lazy: Glad you enjoyed our fair city. WRT Whataburger, most people I know only hit it post-bar. It just seemed a random, and therefore humorous, entry in your trip report. But a guy’s gotta eat.

To the topic at hand, I’m still on the tollroad boycott since the rates went up because usage went down.

By: PeterK

PeterK — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 01:25:41 +0000

Why even charged the customer. I’ve taken two business trips recently one to Maryland and one to Wisconsin and both cases Hertz had a little box mounted on the dash or windshield that contained transponder. the box was metal and the transponder worked only if the drawer holding it was pulled out. when pulled while going through a tollbooth the toll is charged to your credit card

finally don’t rely solely on your GPS, stop at a gas station and pick up a Mark Zero GPS ie a map

By: A.B.

A.B. — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 01:07:51 +0000

@Jason–the rental car companies are paying the tolls and not paying a fine. They are charging their customers a fee for that ’service’. It is just another revenue stream for the rental car company, like charging $5 for a gallon of gas if it isn’t full when you return the car. I’m betting the rental car companies were all for the zipcash implementation since there is no way for their customers to opt to pay cash on parts of the toll road, leaving all customers with 2 options: either opt for the $32 ‘all you can rack up’ toll feature (without knowing if you are going to even drive on a toll road) or risk being dinged by the car company for $25 if they happen to enter a toll road.

I think I’m going to get into the rental car business.

By: Lazy Man and Money

Lazy Man and Money — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 00:57:07 +0000

Tthe car rental guy misinformed us about the Dallas North Tollway then. It could have been an honest mistake. Either way, we couldn’t risk it, because it’s not like you can turn around if they don’t take cash.

From the link here it looks like there are fines: http://www.thenewspaper.com/news/21/2110.asp

“After the North Texas Tollway Authority sent Advantage Rent-A-Car a $77.25 bill for the $2.25 in unpaid tolls, the rental car agency added its own fee of $120 to “process” the collection notice. The latter fee was disclosed in the fine print of the contract that Martinez-Holtz signed.”

That sounds like a $75 fine that NTTA is assessing to me. The article is nearly 2 years old – it seems that NTTA has dropped fines and just gone with the “ZipCash” solution. I like that as long as rental car companies don’t tack on their $25 per picture taken (which is what they told us).

Brad, I am kind of glad that I missed that wrong way driving. That ranks a notch or two below missing visiting Fort Hood and going with the NAS JRB Fort Worth.

By: Brad

Brad — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 23:54:14 +0000

Hey Lazy,

Sounds like u’d fit right in round here. Lots of us hate the NTTA too. In fact…I wouldn’t be surprised to find out if they are somehow in cahoots with the rental car companies (wink wink). Maybe they’ve been getting business advice from our disgraced former Dallas City Council member Don Hill.
But I digress……Look at the bright side. You missed out on getting to witness/experience Dallas’s latest & hottest new sport…..wrong way driving on the tollway. All the cool kids (ie…drunk asses) are doing it.
Maybe we should have included that in our failed Olympic bid. I am sure that would have pushed us right to the top of the list. Right?

By: Jason Heid

Jason Heid — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 23:10:11 +0000

Lazy: Don’t worry, Whataburger wasn’t a bad choice for someone not familiar with the wilds of North Texas.

As for your presentation of the toll system, I think you’ve still got it a little wrong. Some of our toll roads (like the Dallas North Tollway that you could have taken from Dealey Plaza to Addison) still take cash. They are phasing that out, but the toll collectors are still there.

Some of the toll roads, especially the new ones, have no toll booths. Either you have a Toll Tag, or you pay “ZipCash.” You just drive on through and they take a picture of the license plate. The NTTA doesn’t fine you for not having a Toll Tag on these roads. They charge more to ZipCash customers than they do to Toll Tag users, but when they send you a bill it should be just for the tolls, not a fine. In the case of a rental car, they’d send that bill to the agency. Are the agencies then not paying the bills promptly, racking up fines, and then charging the customer for all of that?