Dulles Greenway Blues a la Berkeley Springs Musician

[Willis]

Musician vocalizes disenchantment with the Dulles Greenway

Trevor Baratko

Angela Petry, a singer-songwriter from Berkeley Springs, West Virginia, released a song Sept. 3 calling for Virginia legislators to reduce tolls along the Dulles Greenway...


...The Dulles Greenway is a 14-mile stretch of highway running through Leesburg to the Dulles airport privately owned by Toll Road Investors Partnership II, a subsidiary of the Australian-based Macquarie Group.


“Rush hour commuters are now being charged $5.55 to travel the 14-mile stretch – or 40 cents a mile – making it one of the most expensive highways in the country,” reads a prepared statement about Petry’s song....

Read the full story HERE
The lyrics:

“Highway Robbery”
by Angela Petry


Sending our money overseas
Making a mockery of you and me
Because it’s highway robbery
They built a road in the countryside
Rolling green hills for miles and miles
The farms and the fields no factory
But don’t you dare think you can drive for free
Because it’s highway robbery.
Fourteen miles and its nice and smooth
From Leesburg to Dulles you can really move
Drive everyday but you cry at night
Cause of the price of the toll is out of sight
The Commonwealth should stand up strong
Tell those Aussies they’re just plain wrong
Roll back the tolls or make it free
No more highway robbery.

[LFE]

It might be worth it if they got rid of the speed limits.
- I took 7 the other day in a personal protest...
- Since I did not stop at Wegman's, it did not really take that much more time.

[Kensey]

I used to take the Greenway in and Rt. 7 back to save on the tolls.

But a major difficulty is that the Greenway is not and never has been profitable -- and VDOT knew it wouldn't be, which is why they didn't extend the Dulles Toll Road out past the airport to begin with. As I understand it it was influential people in Loudoun who exerted enough political muscle to get it authorized as a private toll road, and even then it was with the stipulation that VDOT would not spend any resources on it, it would have to pay for police patrol activity and eminent domain could not be used to acquire land for it.

Given the lack of profitability and that the road is privately owned, any pressure from the state to reduce tolls might just result in the Greenway's total abandonment by its owners. Then VDOT has to either close it, or take over the maintenance of it.

[Superman]

If you look back in history, many early roads were privately owned or issued as such under government contract. I don't like the rates either, but maybe that’s the cost of decent roads.

We have infrastructure in the middle of nowhere (Corridor H) and suburbs, but not in the cities where it’s needed.

Hate to say it, but the government can't spend all its money on social issues and have any left (no pun) for the real duties assigned to government.

[cindylu]

Well, love it or hate it the Dulles toll rates are going to increase. Regardless how much input they request from the public they're going to increase the tolls.