The Pennsylvania Turnpike will roll out two cashless booths in April.
The Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission is continuing its efforts to go cashless with two more tolling points in the state.
The commission announced in March that it will implement cashless tolls on April 29 on the Findlay Connector section in Washington and Allegheny counties and at the Clarks Summit and Keyser Avenue tolling points in Lackawanna County.
According to the commission, “cashless” means there will be no coin baskets or toll collectors, and cash will no longer be accepted at locations participating in the pilot project.
Drivers with E-ZPass will not notice a difference and can continue to use the toll booth as usual.
Drivers without an E-ZPass will have their license plate captured in a photograph as they travel through the cashless facility. PennDOT will then mail a toll bill to the registered owner of the vehicle.
“Agencies across the country are introducing cashless systems, and we owe it to customers to continue to use the best technology available in every facet of our operations,” commission CEO Mark Compton said in a news release.
With conversion of the two new tolling points, the turnpike will have four cashless tolling locations.
Last spring, the turnpike converted the Beaver Valley Expressway, and in January 2016, the turnpike opened a cashless tolling point near the turnpike bridge over the Delaware River.
The commission said it has assured employees that there will be no layoffs associated with these pilot projects.
According to the commission, the benefits of having such cashless facilities include enhanced safety since no one is swerving to find the correct lane, reduced congestion and travel times, reduced environmental footprint, reduced cost to build new interchanges and reduced long-term capital and operating costs.
ABC27 reported that the turnpike hopes to convert all tolling to the cashless system, possibly as early as 2022.