Toll to Be Driven Into Extinction

More than thirty-six years after the first motorist handed over the first toll, the Vincent Thomas Bridge connecting San Pedro and Terminal Island will end its 50-cent charge after the new year rolls around.

Lawmakers and commuters praise the decision as good for government and taxpayers, not to mention traffic flow over the 1.1-mile span--although tollbooth operators bemoan what they call the abrupt loss of their extended family of regular commuters.

“It’s about time they got rid of that toll,” said Mickey Schroeder, a longshoreman who crosses the bridge every day. “I’ll miss a few of the toll collectors. But I won’t miss waiting in those huge lines.”

A couple of Long Beach lawmakers successfully lobbied the California Transportation Commission to eliminate the toll. Once that action is taken, between Jan. 1 and Jan. 14, it will leave eight bridges across the state that still collect tolls, including the San Diego-Coronado span.

The Vincent Thomas toll, 50 cents for autos and as much as $2.10 for large trucks, is collected for westbound traffic only. It brings in about $2.6 million per year, say officials at the California Department of Transportation.

But after the expense of collecting and administering the toll is subtracted, only 2 cents on the dollar actually winds up in state coffers, Caltrans says. That is not enough to justify the tax, in the opinion of Assemblyman Alan Lowenthal (D-Long Beach), who urged that it be dropped.

The toll was initiated when the bridge opened Nov. 15, 1963, to pay off a $26-million construction bill. Only $6.2 million is still owed, however, and $14 million is in the bridge’s reserves.

Lowenthal soon persuaded state Sen. Betty Karnette (D-Long Beach), a nonvoting member of the state Transportation Commission, as well as Maria Contreras-Sweet, secretary of business, housing and transportation, the agency that oversees Caltrans.

All three then lobbied the commission, which voted Nov. 3 to repeal the toll and instructed Caltrans to stop accepting tolls in early January. Lowenthal and Karnette say that the toll-free traffic will flow better from the Port of Long Beach to the Port of Los Angeles in San Pedro.

Karnette, who is planning a joy ride across the bridge the moment she won’t have to pay to do it, called the end of the fee a savings for government and commuters.

The bridge’s 24 toll collectors, who are paid an average of $28,000 per year, will be moved to other state jobs.

But many said they will miss their extended family, which extends to the regular commuters.

“I love my job,” said Marcus Gonzales, who has worked a booth on the Vincent Thomas for 10 years.

Waiting for drivers to hand over their money, Gonzales can see explosions of industrial color spreading below the bridge: red and green trucks, orange and brown rail cars, yellow cranes, black ship hulls and the endless blue of the ocean.

And then there are the colorful people who pass through his gate.

Gonzales says that he’s met Queen Latifah, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Nicholas Cage as they traveled by.

Then there are “the flashers.” A lot of people get a thrill out of baring it all for the folks in the toll plaza, Gonzales said.

“Fringe benefits,” he said with a smile. “It can get real wild on a Saturday night.”

Among the riders in the buff: an elderly couple in a convertible who enjoy taking Sunday drives totally exposed to the sun.

His favorite customers, however, are those who pay not only their own toll but also those of several cars behind them.

“You get to know your regular customers real well,” said Capt. Don Guyton, who supervises the toll operation, noting that hardened, weather-beaten longshoremen have been known to hand over gift boxes of Christmas candy.

Although the bell is about to toll for the fee, Caltrans wants to make sure the bridge lasts long into the 21st century.

After the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake damaged the San Francisco-Oakland Bay Bridge and the 1994 Northridge quake destroyed portions of Southland freeways, Caltrans began an extensive, multibillion-dollar retrofitting of all toll bridges in the state.

The Vincent Thomas is due to be one of the first completed, in March of next year. The $8 million left in the bridge’s reserves will be applied to paying for the retrofitting.

Bridge Supervisor Bill Hansel, who is in charge of painting the bridge--a Sisyphean task that takes 12 years and is begun anew as soon as it is finished--said some in his department already have their eyes on the toll collectors’ office as headquarters for the painters.

After 16 years of coating the bridge with a plain green, the painters will restore the span to its original iridescent green glory beginning next month, Hansel said.

The bright color was dropped in 1983 because the paint released a residue that was not environmentally sound. But paint technology has since advanced, and the iridescent shade--the first shipment of which arrived at the bridge Wednesday--is now safe.

“It broke my heart to turn it into a dark green bridge,” Hansel said. “At sunrise and sunset, the light coming off the bridge is going to be spectacular. We’ll be starting at the top, making our way down, making it sparkle.”

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Final Toll

After the start of the new year, the toll on the Vincent Thomas Bridge will become a thing of the past. Motorists from the San Pedor and Terminal Island sides will drive free over the 1.1-mile span.