Serene, gently rolling rural Texas scenery. A speed limit of 85 miles per hour—the highest in the nation. A sense of eerie isolation. And an hour cut from a drive to Dallas. That’s what $19.59 gets on you the new Texas State Highway 130.
Or did — the toll went up slightly to $19.75 Jan. 1.
Let me explain: SH 130, completed in October 2012, runs from an intersection just east of Seguin on I-10 to an intersection just north of Georgetown on I-35, allowing north-south traffic to avoid Austin’s congestion.
My wife and I took it in November to drive to Dallas. Getting to Seguin took us 48 miles out of our way. After we got on SH 130 the ride was scenic and relaxing, and driving 85 mph posed no challenges. However, that was partly because we were nearly alone for much of the trip — there was usually only one vehicle in sight ahead and behind us.
Coming back, we stayed on I-35 all the way back to San Antonio. It was stop-and-go through Austin in congestion dominated by heavy trucks — there were a dozen in sight at any one time. Even though we did not have to go through Seguin, the trip back took an hour longer.
But the trip back, for all its headaches, was also free. SH 130 is a toll road, although one without toll booths. If you have a TxTag transponder in your back windshield your account is billed automatically. Otherwise, cameras read your license plate and the car’s registered owner is sent a bill, which is about one-fourth higher than the toll for someone with a TxTag account. Those bills are sent out monthly and we did not get ours until nearly two months after we made the trip.
Meanwhile, the side trip to Seguin makes more sense when you realize that the road was not intended for San Antonio commuters, but for trucks carrying Mexican commerce to and from Laredo. SH 130 is just one leg of the evocatively named Pickle Parkway, named after former U.S. Rep. J. J. “Jake” Pickle (1913-2005), who represented the Austin area in Congress from 1963-1995. The Pickle Parkway actually starts at the intersection of I-35 and Loop 410 in southwest San Antonio, follows 410 east around the outside of the city to I-10, follows I-10 east past Seguin to the SH 130 intersection, and then takes SH 130 north to its juncture with I-35 north of Georgetown.
In the end, driving the Pickle (we’ll see if that phrase enters the language) only adds about 10 miles to a trip between, say, Laredo and Dallas, and that seems like a small price to pay to avoid Austin’s (as well as San Antonio’s) congestion. But you also have to pay a toll—mine, for a passenger car, was nearly $20 and a heavy truck would be charged three to five times more.
Stuck in the shadow of big rigs while crawling past downtown Austin, I got the impression that it might be wiser to, on the contrary, bribe drivers to take SH 130.
Such a move would certainly gladden the hearts of the managers of SH 130 Concession Company LLC. While SH 130 north of Mustang Ridge was built by the State of Texas, the last 41 miles from Mustang Ridge to Seguin were built by that private firm, a consortium of Cintra, a Spanish construction company, and San Antonio’s own Zachry American Infrastructure, a subsidiary of Zachry Construction Company. The partners spent about $1.3 billion, and in return, collect most of the tolls.
The chief result is that a driver has to consult two different sources for SH 130 toll information. The consortium’s site has a toll calculator that covers the segment it owns and acts like the rest does not exist. The TxDOT toll site likewise doesn’t cover SH 130 south of Mustang Ridge.
That may change if things get worse for the SH 130 Concession Co. Moody’s has downgraded the consortium’s bonds to junk status as traffic on the road had not been increasing fast enough to cover debt payments. (The consortium’s spokesperson did not respond to requests for information about its current financial status.) In case of bankruptcy, presumably the state would consolidate SH 130 operations, both on the ground and on the web.
That would be the last nail in the coffin of the TxDOT Trans-Texas Corridor (TTC) initiative, of which SH 130 was the only survivor. Recognizing that local traffic was causing congestion where highways went through urban areas, the TTC would have amounted to “super-corridors” that would have routed long-distance traffic of all sorts around population centers. Each corridor would have included a toll road, a railroad, and utilities – including oil and gas pipelines. The toll roads would have been divided into truck and passenger lanes, and the railroads into freight, commuter, and bullet lines.
The first TTC (of which SH 130 is a remnant) would have gone from Gainesville to Laredo, sidestepping the D-FW area, Austin, and San Antonio. A second would have gone from Texarkana to the Rio Grande Valley, sidestepping Houston. Other corridors would have connected Houston with Dallas, and (grandest of all) El Paso with Orange. Construction would have been on a scale that would have heartened the pharaohs. Private money was, somehow, supposed to pay for the whole thing.
After a decade of fighting massive skepticism, TxDOT abandoned further TTC planning in 2009. If Moody’s is correct about SH 130’s financial prospects, the skeptics will be proven right. On the other hand, in a few decades, gridlocked in our hovercars, we may be cursing the day TxDOT abandoned the rest of the TTC.
In the meantime, SH 130 is good for a pleasant drive.
This story was originally published on Jan. 25, 2015.
*Featured/top image: SH 130 signage. Photo courtesy of SH 130 Concession Company (via Facebook).
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Bribery is not necessary for me! I took 130 twice yesterday, to and from Austin.
With family in Dallas it is a God send. We use it every time which is often. Don’t they have a bill/interest paying problem? Send trucks.
Best things ever for those of us who travel often. Paying fee out side of Texas is a way of commuting life.
We take it every time we head to Dallas. Fabulous road. Empty and 85-90
Mph no problem
We took it on the way to Dallas and got a bill for $37.00. The toll road will probably go broke soon, leaving Texans to pick up the tab.
Find 130 to be a great way to and from Round Rock. Not sure where the 48 miles out of the way comes from. I 35 and I 10 run pretty parallel to each other until Seguin.
Love that road! I am so very glad that most Texans “Ain’t payin’ to drive on the highway”. I wouldn’t want it to get too crowded out there.
Helped relieve us when we drive to and from Chicago, especially when we were almost home.
I have used the entire stretch many times and it is well worth the $19 and change not having to deal with the almost-always stop-and-go traffic on IH35 through Austin. I would have paid $20.00 more to take it all the way up to the Dallas/Fort Worth area.
All toll companies in this states are a ripoff.. 3 times I’ve been on them, and 3 times I’ve had to pay $30. for what should have been no more than $8…. Customer service is non-existent, because they have eminent domain and can do whatever the hell they please… I will NEVER ride this crap again, I would rather sit in traffic. They will go broke and probably get state taxpayers to foot the bill.. I am happy that the new governor is against them!!!
Maybe if it was $10 they would have performed better on volume. Good idea, but greed and stupidity damned it. Using private funding for national infrastructure almost always leads to failure. Look at the backlash with Chicago’s parking meters. If you would need to commute every day, it’s $100 a week.
And THEN, the forlorn pig crossing the road!
I’ve always considered toll roads to be signs of third-world countries and have regretted seeing them grow in Texas. At the same time, people in San Antonio need to look at a map. Going to Seguin is not far out of the way from going to New Braunfels; Interstates 35 and 10 are only about 20 miles apart between the two cities. The reason the new route is not feasible to so many people in San Antonio is that most of our population is on the north side of the city requiring backtracking to get to IH 10 East. For anyone living downtown or on the Southside, the toll road seems like a reasonable alternative if you don’t mind paying the toll and feeling as if you live in a third-world country for not being able to provide free roadways.
When my parents were going through their last year, we drove to ft worth numerous times using the toll road. It was a godsend, bypassing the nightmare that is 35 through austin.
I also have been overcharged, using it without a TollTag. Get a bill 2 months later, then another bill in a month adding “previously unbilled” charges! I now take 281 from San Antonio, enjoy the drive, avoid big rigs, & still save time. But don’t tell everybody!
Hell yes. I LUV tollways. Keeps me away from stupidity. I’m an elitist snob and I like driving with fewer idiots on the road. Harrumph.
The point is being missed both by the author and by the other commenters. The author himself says that I-35 is “free,” which is far from true. Either we pay for the infrastructure with direct paid back through user fees (tolls) or we collectively pay for it through our taxes–fuel taxes, federal taxes passed down to TxDOT, and in the case of local roads, property taxes. What we pay for public roads has become so invisible to the average person that toll roads seem to be a sham. And as long as people perceive the so-called free option to be easier than going out of the way, the toll road won’t succeed. Clearly by the comments and this article, I-35 isn’t bad enough.
But it’s just so boring.
If you are going to be going through Texas don’t use the bill & pay system. Get yourself a tag! We use this all the time heading in to San Antonio and coming back into Oklahoma and our fees are never as outrageous a price as you all are posting.
The late fee if you are slow with sending in your toll is around $150. Never driving that road again.
This Tollway was placed in a poor location.
We use Toll Roads in Houston often. Toll Roads are better than no roads or crowded highways!!!!
BTW Why are people complaining. If you don’t like the toll road don’t use it. So what’s the big deal use a tollroad if you like it don’t use it if you don’t like it
If traffic gets heavy before Austin on trips to North Texas, I sometimes cut over to SH 130 around San Marcos. But I would rather travel US 281. Sure, each little town along the way has a traffic light or two, but it’s generally faster than trying to drive through Austin. I believe the State purposely designed Austin’s freeways to generate traffic jams just so people would use SH 130. Ta’hell with Travis County; Hello Marble Falls!
Not to mention, 281 is also a much more scenic route.
This toll road makes me very angry.
Big rigs bypassing stops in Austin should be required to take it, then 35 would not be such a f-ing nightmare. They are the primary clog on the road.
Big rigs are the reason you have food on your table, clothes on your back, and most of those other creature comforts you enjoy…eat crow Adam!
Can I pay $100 per 10mph I will pay $300 so I can coast over at 100mph which is not super fast for many modern cars.
I actuslly like using the toll roads
I drove it last nite, there were 3 other cars in the 2 hours I was on it
Funny thing… after reading this I made my trip back home from Dallas. stop and go in Troy and Temple and Waco. Right before the Georgetown exit to 130, the car next to me seemed to want to play a game of chicken. I decided at that point that I would take the toll road to avoid those knuckleheads. I put my blinker on to change lanes and exit. The same knucklehead deliberately pulled next to me to block my lane change. I made it over just in time to get on 130. Put cruise control on 85, and sailed home to San Antonio. I wasn’t bribed, but rather convinced. lol
The only thing that bothers me about this toll road is the fact that, the money should be going to our schools. That’s what Romney promised and failed to deliver.
Pray tell wth does Romney have to do with a toll road in a Texas?
Dumb,what if it was a daily commute,i would be bleeding money
$9 each way Buda to Georgetown. Well worth passing sucky Austin traffic
A bargain. By the way the TxTag goes on the Front windshield.