The Washington State Department of Transportation recently replaced certain HOV lanes with “express toll lanes”, which allows drivers to pass through toll booths, without stopping, for an extra fee. The system scans vehicle’s license plates as they pass through and mails the toll bill to the owner of the vehicle.
Under state law, vehicles weighing above 10,000 pounds were prohibited from driving on the highway’s HOV lanes. Because the lanes were reclassified as express toll lanes, many truck drivers wanted to know if the HOV lane restrictions still apply. Turns out, the Washington State DOT didn’t even know the correct answer.
After receiving several questions from truck drivers, KIRO radio reporter Chris Sullivan went straight to the source and asked WSDOT if truckers were allowed to use the lanes. According to his post on MyNorthWest.com, he was initially told that the same rules that applied to HOV lanes, also apply to the express toll lanes.
But WSDOT quickly realized their error and issued a correction, which Sullivan posted publicly:
“We made the assumption that since the [express toll lanes] replaced the HOV lanes, that the weight restriction would apply. But, since these are not HOV lanes, we’ll need to make changes to the current law before we can enforce the no 10,000 lbs rule.”
They clarified the situation further:
“Vehicles over 10,000 [gross vehicle weight] can drive in the express toll lanes for now. However, WSDOT is actively working to change that rule, and drivers of large vehicles can expect changes in the near future. Background: State law prohibits vehicles over 10,000 [gross vehicle weight] in the HOV lanes. We had originally thought express toll lanes would be under the same restriction since the express toll lanes replaced HOV lanes. However, this is not enforceable under current law.”
If you’ve ever wondered how the government can possibly keep up with all the new laws, well know you know — they can’t.
So until a new law is enacted to prevent large vehicles from driving through the new toll lanes, feel free to use them to your heart’s (and wallets) desire.
