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Senate Passes Tolling Ban

Thursday, September 13, 2007
KXAN

The U.S. Senate passed a ban on tolling existing Texas roadways Wednesday.Texas Rep. Kay Bailey Hutchison attached the amendment to a $106 million transportation spending bill after a recent proposal by TxDOT."The Texas Department of Transportation recently indicated that it wanted to buy back portions of federal highways and put toll booths on them. It's an astonishingly bad idea, in my opinion," said State Sen. Kirk Watson. "It is time that we send a message to TxDOT that there are certain just things that we just don't want to tolerate when it comes to our roads."Watson said the Senate bill will not impact the plan to build new tolled parts of highways 290 and 183 that Capital Area Metropolitan Planning Organization will vote on Oct. 8.The Senate bill now heads to conference committee to be reconciled with the House version.