Regional transportation board approves key step toward $3.7B I-77 toll lane project (Charlotte Business Journal)
Local government representatives on the region’s transportation policy board gave the go-ahead Wednesday night to explore adding privately operated toll lanes on Interstate 77 between uptown and the South Carolina state line.
Members approved spending much of the next year negotiating and formulating terms that would then be submitted publicly late in 2025 to attract competitive bids from private companies. The transportation policy group — the Charlotte Regional Transportation Planning Organization, or CRTPO — voted 50 to 15 in favor of the proposal.
They had little other choice, as the state transportation department and industry analysts determined more than a decade ago that toll lanes represent the lone possibility for expanding I-77 because of a lack of taxpayer funding.
There is some opposition to the I-77 south toll lanes beyond Mecklenburg County commissioners and a minority of CRTPO.
Sustain Charlotte, a local nonprofit focused on environmentally friendly growth policies and better transit and mobility options, last week opposed the toll lanes on I-77. The nonprofit stated that “road widening as a mobility strategy … has been proven not to solve congestion long-term, it generates significant harmful environmental impacts, and there is a lack of equity in the case of toll lanes specifically.”
Widening the interstate “would make driving more attractive due to the temporary congestion relief, which will likely result in even more people choosing to drive,” Sustain Charlotte said. “This is known as induced demand. This increase then leads to the same or even greater congestion relatively quickly.”