TRENTON – Senate President Steve Sweeney today praised the Delaware River Port Authority Finance Committee for acting to reduce bridge tolls for frequent commuters.
The reduction comes after Sweeney previously urged the DRPA to offer a 20 percent discount for motorists who take a minimum of 18 monthly trips across the Ben Franklin, Walt Whitman, Betsy Ross or Commodore Berry toll bridges. The DRPA’s Board of Governors voted on Wednesday to enact the frequent commuter discount.
“Thanks to disciplined and careful financial management, the DRPA is moving forward to actually cut tolls for commuters rather than hiking them,” said Senator Sweeney. “A twenty percent reduction in tolls is significant for hardworking commuters who continue to suffer from New Jersey’s sluggish economic recovery.”
The two-way toll will be discounted from five dollars to four dollars on each of the four DRPA-operated bridges.
In April of last year, Senator Sweeney wrote to the DRPA requesting that the authority “begin the process necessary to reduce tolls” to ease the financial burden for regular commuters.
“I applaud the DRPA for advancing this discount and I thank them for being responsive to my request and more importantly the needs of commuters,” said Senator Sweeney.
The full DRPA Board is expected to vote on the proposal on July 15th.