Darned close call at toll booth - Lesson to pass on

Checkswrecks

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I came very close to being taken out yesterday and it's worth passing on. The location was the left-most EZ-Pass west-bound lane into the Northern Virginia Greenway toll station near Dulles airport and there was very light traffic moving fast. (Dirt Dad knows it well.) The station has arms which drop and block the lane if the toll is not paid. I was wearing a mesh jacket with the EZPass in the chest pocket, which has worked many many times and never been a problem. It works so well that like most people I just slow a bit, but on this occasion, the bike or the pass didn't register as I approached and I had to suddenly get on the brakes to stop.

(Press photo off web)


The "UNPAID TOLL" message was on and the gate stayed down, so I honked for the guy in the booth and he came over to tell me that I needed to pay cash. Irritating but I had it and started to dig for the cash. Suddenly we heard squeezing tires. As my eyes went from the toll booth guy to behind me, all I could see was the grill of a big black Chevy Suburban with the tires locked up and starting to slide when he hit his horn. Clearly that driver too was so used to driving through and having the gate rise without a motorcycle stopped in front of the gate. I had my gloves off, the gate down in front of me, out of gear, a hand in my pocket, and couldn't have moved if I wanted to. Fortunately, the 'Burban came to a stop with his nose at the start of the island and I could hear the driver screaming at me even with his windows up and all the noise.


As the Suburban was coming to a stop, a car had been tailgating him and popped for the next lane over, right at the car already in that path who dodged to the 3rd lane, and suddenly we had all three of them on their brakes and horns. Now that all three EZPass lanes had cars stopped or nearly so, following cars were starting to arrive and a back-up was forming. Once everything came to a stop, the attendant shook his head and said it was still $5.35, almost like it was comic relief. I finished digging out a $20 as he started yelling at a pickup behind the Suburban backing into the now developing backup at the tollbooth. It was total Looney Tunes.


My guess is that the road sensor didn't pick up the bike. Road sensors have always had issues with motorcycles and coming back through another lane at the same booth a few hours later there was no problem. Again, I've never had a problem with the transponder and use it constantly.


So the bottom line that I'm going to pass on is that with looking closer and maybe tilt the bike, it'd just make it past the end of the gate arm. It'll be tight and I doubt it'd work on a 'Wing or dresser, but if or when this happens again, there is no way I'm stopping in the lane.


I'll risk a ticket to squeak past the gate and stop where the end of the concrete island gives me cover. In case I later get sent a ticket, to fight it I'll make sure to get a receipt.
 

TheHelios

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FL just simply doesn't use gate arms anymore. I'm going to credit that to old people probably blasting through them all the time.

Anyway, our EZ Pass lanes have no arms and you can always go right through. Even the normal pay lanes don't use arms. If someone decides to drive right through, then one of the many different camera systems they have setup will gladly take a picture of your plate and send you the bill.

For once, Florida got something right.

PS - f*** those people yelling at your for stopping at a toll. Freaking ridiculous.
 

JRE

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Their assumption probably was that he went to the EZ pass lane in error and had to stop and pay cash as a result.
 

Checkswrecks

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Helios -
Maryland got rid of the arms too in (I think) all tolls, and the State is really really good at billing after the fact. Don't pay and they'll cancel the registration for the vehicle.
Virginia's Greenway toll arms where this happened really do come close to completely blocking the full lane and I wonder if that was intentionally not to allow bikes to get by.

JRE -
I doubt there was any assumption at all about WHY I stopped. The guy was near freeway speed and all of a sudden either saw the bike or immobile gate was not going to move out of the way, leading to the panic stop. Yelling and getting emotional is pretty normal after a big scare for anybody, which is why I didn't care a bit. If you notice what I wrote about the other cars, they were coming through full-tilt, too, even though the sign calls for 35 mph (iirc).
 

trikepilot

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I had a toll booth to commute thru a few years back and my Ez-Pass would not work when in a vertical pocket in my jacket. If I lifted the fabric of the jacket to get the ez-pass horizontal or nearly so - it would pick up fine. I think the sensor was above the toll booth lane to get a good line on the spot above the mirror where the cars usually mount it. I never found a good solution other than riding on thru - there was no gate. They had my tags on file so could see that it was me that went through if they really wanted to.
 

Dirt_Dad

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Checkswrecks said:
...the Northern Virginia Greenway toll station near Dulles airport and there was very light traffic moving fast. (Dirt Dad knows it well.)
You're right, I go through that toll plaza every damn day. Glad you didn't get splattered...I'm sure it would have slowed my drive home. ;)

The Greenway arms are usually only down during non-rush hours. Otherwise they'd go through a lot of those easily broken (by a car) arms. Most of us regulars are pretty good at timing the arm opening after passing underneath the overhead sensor. There's a lot of visual clutter in the area of those toll lanes, I can easily imagine how a driver would miss seeing a bike sitting there maybe even until they didn't see the arm raise. That's a really scary situation, Bob. So happy it didn't turn out differently.

As far as the guy behind you yelling. Trust me, I get it. For those that don't know, the DC area commuter has a miserable driving life. You come to expect certain things, including a gate opening at a certain rate. When it doesn't happen due to someone not triggering the gate correctly some bad words definitely come out. Guilty! Oh by the way, I've also been guilty of not triggering the gate and forcing everyone to stop behind me. Those #$%@ little transponders have batteries that die without warning. Knowing that, the bad words are tempered with..."I'm glad that's not me."

A bit of backgound..."The Greenway" was the first private toll road in the USA. For years it had the distinction of being the most expensive toll in the USA on a per mile traveled basis. You can make an argument the new "Hot" lanes around the DC Beltway and on I-95 are even more expensive. Especially when you consider some people have received bills for $15,000 to $20,000 when they were notified they unknowingly had a dead battery in their window transponder and missed $15 worth of tolls because there was no arm or any other way to know if your transponder was read. After this raping became public the "capped" the max fine to $2,500. Gee... thanks.
 

EricV

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Good story worth sharing. ::008::

I found it interesting that they asked you to pay in cash. I've had my EZ-Pass not read, but always just gave them the S/N of the transponder, (printed on the unit), and was let thru. Granted, not the pass thru at speed versions though. Not been thru many like you describe, most of the 'at speed' lanes I've been thru didn't have gates. I have gone thru the type you described, but not had any issues with my transponder mounted to the back of the bike's screen with duo-lock. The angle seems to work well for the over head readers, much as the windshield versions do on the autos.
 

viroid

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I've been having issues with my transponder in the far left east-bound lane. No issues in any other lane.

Also, if you happen to be coming in a little hotter than you should be and the gate doesn't go up... The gates are actually quite soft and have a hinge that allows them to fold away...



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viroid

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You can pay with transponder number? I had my transponder in my hand, that attendant made me dig my credit card out from under my suit.

Maybe he was mad because I couldn't understand what he was saying with earplugs and a helmet on... And I told him his shit was broken.



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dcstrom

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Got lucky that time Bob! Crossing Europe there's a number of places that ONLY use ez-pass style systems, with no manned booths at which to pay a toll. Bet you can't guess what I do in that situation? Those warning bells can be pretty loud! So far none have tracked me back to Sth Dakota :)
 

EricV

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viroid said:
You can pay with transponder number? I had my transponder in my hand, that attendant made me dig my credit card out from under my suit.

Maybe he was mad because I couldn't understand what he was saying with earplugs and a helmet on... And I told him his shit was broken.
As long as the transponder S/N is linked to a valid account. As I understood it at the time, they simply logged the toll into the system manually and let me go thru. It did show up on my bill later. FWIW, I have my transponder linked to an account that auto-adds funds when it gets low, billing to a CC. I think it would be the same for any active account. I did have to read it off the transponder to the attendant. Luckily it was visible where I had it mounted! I don't think it matters, but I have an I-Pass, which works at any EZPass toll as well as the I states. I've been told my OK Pike Pass will be the same, but haven't had any issues with my Pike Pass in OK or TX.
 

viroid

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EricV said:
As long as the transponder S/N is linked to a valid account. As I understood it at the time, they simply logged the toll into the system manually and let me go thru. It did show up on my bill later.

I'll have to try that the next time their equipment fails to work.

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Checkswrecks

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Thanks guys. Jon - I knew you'd relate immediately to that near miss. A bit to add:

Most States and I think the entire length of I-95 along the east coast have gotten rid of the arms and even the booths due to accidents like Fred wrote about. Or the accidents where sleepy drivers in big trucks took out the attendants in the booths.

If I did not have the cash, then he'd get a form, put down my info, and the Sate would send a bill which adds a stiff transaction fee. BTDT in a car and truck a couple of times. Because the States work together here on the east coast, non-payment means that you won't be able to re-register when the tags expire AND they will add a penalty which goes up every month. Or they'll send it to collections. Or they'll refer it to the Court:

http://dullesgreenway.com/violations-unpaid-tolls/

And this silly stuff happens unfortunately too often:
http://www.nbcwashington.com/news/w...200000-Tab-on-Dulles-Toll-Road-232760361.html
Like I wrote, I'm pretty sure it was the wire loop in the road, as I've never had a problem before, or on the ride home.
 

La Knee

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First off glad you didnt wind up a speed bump wreckschecks !!
Secondly we have had EZPASS For about ten years. And there employees are the rudest bunch of babboons on the planet !!
When my ezpass box doesnt work sometimes they will look up my tag number up and send me a ticket for $35 . Once they look my tag# up they can clearly see i have EZPASS but they write the ticket anyway !! Then i have to call them and get it staightened out .
BTW the EZPASS box works great on the top inside of the topbox.




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Sckill

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I've had no problems so far with my EZ pass mounted on the front windshield of the Tenere. You get the best success when it is mounted horizontally with the flat side facing up / forward. On previous smaller bikes, I had issues with the tolls not registering until I tried mounting the EZPass to the handlebar and facing forward.

If I'm reading the original post correctly, it sounds like the arm drops down only if the toll is not paid. That sounds like a collision waiting to happen.

I wish NYC would get rid of the toll booth arms on the bridge / tunnel crossings and just switch over to the higher speed systems to free up traffic flow. At least on some of the crossings here, there is a secondary reader by the base of the toll arm. So when I had issues in the past, I could get off the bike, put the EZPass on top of the reader, hit the button, and then be off.
 

La Knee

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There seems to be more high speed areas like the AC Expressway where you cAn do 70 mph and it still picks em up


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offcamber

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All the EZ pass lanes around here have no gate....in fact NH has been putting in open road tolling so no booths....just cruise through at 65.

Toll booths are always a dangerous place. CT pulled all their tolls back in the 80s after a truck driver fell asleep and killed 6 people when he plowed into the tolls at full speed.
 

stomp347

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offcamber said:
All the EZ pass lanes around here have no gate....in fact NH has been putting in open road tolling so no booths....just cruise through at 65.

Toll booths are always a dangerous place. CT pulled all their tolls back in the 80s after a truck driver fell asleep and killed 6 people when he plowed into the tolls at full speed.
I really like the way they did that, but it still makes me laugh when people slow down to 40-45 through those. Can't fix stupid.
 

Defekticon

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Had a similar event at the Commodore Barry bridge and did actually go around the gate. Honked... no one was there, no one came out. Not sure what cars do in the same situation. I was carrying my ezpass in the chest pocket of my mesh jacket and it works in MD/DE and the NJTP no problem but wouldn't read. Now I purchased the smaller form factor ez pass and have it mounted low on the inside of the windshield and it reads without any problems. Just an eyesore on the front of a beautiful bike.
 
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