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Thread: Battle over Buffalo toll booths goes on

  1. #1
    Member steven's Avatar
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    Battle over Buffalo toll booths goes on

    Assemblyman Sam Hoyt has repeatedly introduced legislationy asking the state Thruway Authority to remove two Buffalo toll booths and finding new locations for two suburban booths

    Hoyt, D-Buffalo, is using his clout as a member of the Assembly Transportation Committee to hold a March 2 public hearing aimed at ratcheting up pressure on the authority to remove the Ogden and Breckenridge toll booths and find new locations for booths in Williamsville and Hamburg. The hearing is set for 10 a.m. in the Buffalo and Erie County Public Library auditorium in downtown Buffalo.

    The hearing marks the first time the transportation committee has held a public session in Buffalo to discuss the controversial toll booth issue. It comes almost one year after the authority raised toll booth charges by 25 cents and increased the Thruway levy by 15 percent.

    "People should not have to pay for the right to enter City of Buffalo," Hoyt said. "It is an absolute disincentive. The City of Buffalo has enough obstacles, the Thruway Authority shouldn't be contributing to that."

    http://www.bizjournals.com/buffalo/s...ml?jst=b_ln_hl
    People who wonder if the glass is half empty or full miss the point. The glass is refillable.

  2. #2
    Member DR_GONZO's Avatar
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  3. #3
    Member SolarEclipse's Avatar
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    Yes! A Thursday morning... when all those commuters that use the toll booths everyday will be at work.

  4. #4
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    get rid of the tolls

    Raise the state income tax to incorporate the cost of fixing the roads. Get rid of the toll collection jobs. I hate the toll booths.

  5. #5
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    Our toll booths are nothing to complain about.

    Now, Chicago, there's a town that's perfected the toll booth system.

    If you try to stay on the I-90 going west, you have to pass through two or three banks of toll booths. Thirty of them stretching across the two directions of traffic.

    And the toll is only ten or fifteen cents. Yet you have to wait to get through each bank, because the daytime traffic is so heavy.

    Being a dumb-@ss anti-government type, I wondered why the heck would they set up all those toll booths just to collect 15 cents. Why not just have one bank of booths and a higher toll?

    Then it hit me. What a patronage opportunity. Three banks of toll booths, 30 booths each. Got to be manned 24x7.

    What a terrific patronage "opportunity."
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  6. #6
    Member Linda_D's Avatar
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    Unless Hoyt's bill has a sponsor in the State Senate, it's going nowhere, and his grandstanding is just that. Grandstanding.
    Your right to buy a military weapon without hindrance, delay or training cannot trump Daniel Barden’s right to see his eighth birthday. -- Jim Himes

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    Thumbs up

    Originally posted by Linda_D
    Unless Hoyt's bill has a sponsor in the State Senate, it's going nowhere, and his grandstanding is just that. Grandstanding.
    Agreed! Nothing new from this bunch. Hyot et. al.

  8. #8
    Member SolarEclipse's Avatar
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    Now THIS I like! Except that Giambra's involved.

    http://www.bizjournals.com/buffalo/s...tml?from_rss=1

    The battle over the future of two New York Thruway Authority toll booths in Buffalo is headed for the courts.

    Erie County has joined businessman Carl Paladino in his quest to have the Thruway Authority remove the South Ogden and Breckenridge toll booths. The booths, Paladino and other business leaders say, are impediments to economic development growth in the city.

    Paladino and the county will be filing paper work in State Supreme Court later this week to start legal action against the Thruway Authority.

    "It's time to go the courts and ruffle some feathers," Paladino said.

    Thruway authority officials could not be reached for comment.

    Buffalo is the only upstate city where the Thruway Authority has toll booths. The booths generate about $11 million in annual revenues while costing the Thruway Authority $4 million to operate.

    The toll booths, in place since 1956, were scheduled to be eliminated a decade ago. Paladino and Erie County Executive Joel Giambra say the authority has failed to act on federal aid and legislation that would have facilitated the removal of the booths and relocation of other booths in Hamburg and Amherst.

    "This is going to be David vs. Goliath all over again," said Michael Powers, a partner at Phillips Lytle LLP, who is serving as lead counsel in the case. "We expect they will fight us tooth and nail. We tried everything we could but now we are forced to go the litigation route."

    Powers and Paladino said they are hoping for an expedited court date and have the trial, if it comes to that, began within a few months.

    The push to eliminate the toll booths has been a long standing issue, however, Paladino's lawsuit, which he initiated last April after the authority raised its fees, marks the first time it is headed to the courts.

    "We've been hearing the booths are coming down for the past 30 years," lamented Giambra. "They are truly a barrier to development in our city."

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