Tollway Operators Driven to $4-Million Ad Campaign

Seeking to boost sluggish ridership, operators of the San Joaquin Hills Transportation Corridor will spend $4 million on a marketing plan that may offer riders free ice cream, hamburgers and coffee if they’ll only take the tollway.

The efforts are part of a perky advertising campaign designed to counteract the reality that the roadway is attracting far fewer drivers than expected.

Among the proposed strategies are giving away coupons using slogans like “Get Your Buns on the Corridor for a Free Carl’s Jr. Hamburger,” and possibly reducing tolls.

The marketing campaign unveiled Thursday at the Transportation Corridor Agencies meetings is aimed at increasing ridership 138% by the end of next year, as well as improving traffic on the Eastern Foothill Corridor.

Although Transportation Corridor Agency officials insist they’re not worried, ridership on the 15-mile tollway was 48% below projections in May, with an average 49,000 vehicles using the road daily, a far cry from the 97,000 forecast. That means the agency is taking in about $80,000 a day less than expected.

The revenue shortfall has no effect on daily operations of the road. The agency has a two-year cushion of other funds, but could be in trouble after that if ridership and revenue do not increase significantly.

Caroline Johnson, one of the advertising executives who designed the campaign, said the theme is “What’s everybody wearing on the corridors this summer? Smiles!”

“We want to give the road a face and a personality,” she said.

But critics assailed the plan as tasteless and a waste of money.

“This kind of confirms our concerns,” said Carolyn Wood, president of the Laguna Canyon Conservancy, which opposed the road because it cut through pristine land filled with wildlife. “If it had been the great solution that they promoted it as, then they wouldn’t need to advertise.”

Gerard Livernois, a member of Orange County People for Animals and a toll road critic who is leading a boycott of the highway, vowed that if the campaign did boost ridership he would once again organize demonstrations.

The giveaways are one part of an aggressive five-year marketing campaign to jump-start ridership on the road, which links Newport Beach and San Juan Capistrano. The campaign, conceived by Johnson/Ukropina Creative Marketing of Irvine, will be paid for largely by Lockheed Martin IMS, the company hired to handle toll collections. Because it is paid a percentage of revenues, Lockheed Martin would profit from more vehicles on the road.

A similar hamburger giveaway by the Orange County Transportation Authority last year became a public relations disaster when a vegetarian bus driver was fired for refusing to hand out coupons for free Carl’s Jr. hamburgers. The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ruled that the transportation authority had discriminated against him, and the authority settled the case for $50,000.

Transportation Corridor Agency staff said contracts have not been finalized with Carl’s Jr. or other corporate sponsors, but they plan to have the marketing program running by July 15.

The glossy booklet touting the plan also promised test runs of discount toll packages on weekends, off-peak hours and for frequent riders, which board member Patricia C. Bates said she was delighted to see.

“As far as the board goes, we want that ASAP. If you want people to use the road, you’ve got to get them on it,” she said.

But agency spokesman Paul Glaab said: “These are just concepts. No final decisions have been made. . . . Right now the information we have is: If we cut tolls by half, we’d be under water big time.”

Johnson said focus groups and surveys show that while people are confused about how to use the road, those who drive it enjoy it.

In fact, she said, many drivers are so happy on the road that they sing. “That’s because they’re so happy, not dodging other cars,” she said.

Bates acknowledged that the advertising campaign was extremely upbeat.

“But happy people equals happy roads,” she said. “Advertising works, we all know that. And I do like riding on the road. But I don’t sing.”