[Pedestrian]

I-580 pay-to-use lanes are a success, report says
By Michael Cabanatuan
Updated 4:38 pm, Thursday, March 16, 2017

The Bay Area’s newest express lanes — on Interstate 580 through the Tri-Valley region of Alameda County — are just a year old, but drivers are already pouring into them, eager to pay for a quicker commute.

More drivers will get that option in the next few years as the lanes spread across the Bay Area at an accelerated pace.

Since the combination express and carpool lanes opened in February 2015 on I-580, along the main route between the Bay Area and the Central Valley, more than 7.6 million drivers have taken advantage of them, according to a report released Thursday by the Alameda County Transportation Commission, which operates the lanes.

By paying an average toll of $1.62 westbound and $2.13 eastbound, drivers get to drive about 10 mph faster than those in the other lanes. On an average day, about 11 percent of the vehicles traveling on I-580 through the area use the express lanes. That’s about 30,000 cars and trucks a day.

Express lanes are carpool lanes equipped with signs and technology that allow solo drivers to buy access using a FasTrak toll tag. They’re charged a continually adjusted toll that rises and falls with the level of congestion. Critics deride them as “Lexus lanes,” saying they allow the wealthy to buy their way past the backup . . . .

So far, the region has just 50 miles of express lanes along three stretches of slow-moving freeway, mostly on the outskirts of the urban core. But plans call for a regional network that includes 550 miles of them around the Bay Area by 2035. By then, every carpool lane will be converted to an express lane and gaps between the lanes will be filled in . . . .

http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/articl...a-11007105.php