Witzenburg Municipality Tender No: 8/2/5/18

2.2Scope

Collecting tolls is an equitable, reasonable and calculated process for financing transportation facilities and can generate revenues to mitigate roadway and bridge construction, operation and maintenance costs throughout the life of the facility. Users of the toll facility benefit directly from the tolls via an enhanced and improved roadway system that may not have existed without the implementation of toll collection. Drivers that choose to use alternative toll-free routes to reach their destinations are not mandated to contribute financially via tolls and also benefit from the congestion relief offered by the existence of the toll facility.

Figure 3 Toll plaza lane layout

Toll roads can accelerate the availability of start-up funding and make the system available sooner to the public. The variable rates per mile for various vehicle classes allow pricing to reflect the users’ variable wear and tear on a facility as well. For example, there is a significant difference in wear and tear caused by trucks on the facility than by passenger cars. Thus, rates are often assessed according to the number of axles on a vehicle.

In recent years, public attitude towards tolls has been changing. The implementation of new technology, such as electronic toll collection (ETC), has increased public convenience and user satisfaction levels with tolls. It is understood by today’s society that there are no "free" roads and that established funding sources are insufficient to meet growing transportation needs in the state of Texas. Tolling is a more sophisticated and concentrated way to meet these increased needs rather than just implementing higher fuel taxes.
The integrated, comprehensive solution proposed is an electronic toll collection system that follows an innovative strategy targeted to motorway toll management and other toll related applications. It promotes interoperability through an open service oriented architecture based on standards, and it follows the intelligent transport systems interoperability architecture. The implemented strategy facilitates a multi vendor participation that, in conjunction with the simplification of service development and deployment, contributes to reduce the total cost of ownership of an electronic toll collection technological and management infrastructure.

Figure 4 Manual VS Automatic Tolls

The Lane Management Service is responsible for the coordination of a manual lane road system. By pressing a button a car driver gets a ticket delivered by a ticket dispenser machines. These equipments can be mounted in pairs on the lane for redundancy - Tandem Machines.

Functional steps - The ticket dispenser machines is qualified to give tickets when a vehicle is detected by the automatic vehicle detector. When the driver presses the machine button, the date, the hour and entry plaza identification is magnetically recorded in the ticket. When the driver takes the ticket the lane barrier opens and the traffic green light goes on.

Lane equipment - traffic lights; alarm signs (visual and acoustic); lane barrier; Automatic Vehicle Classifier; two ticket dispenser machines

The Ticket Reader is only used in closed system exit lanes in order to read the data written in the ticket delivered to the user at entry point. The AVCD (automatic vehicle Classification and detection) connected to a Metal Detector, a Height Detector and two or three Axle Counters are used to determine the vehicle class.

Functional steps - The toll operator classifies the vehicle and processes the payment operation according to the network topology (open or closed). The price is displayed. The barrier is raised and the traffic light goes to green. After the payment the vehicle is classified by the AVDC. This classification is used to compare with that given by the operator.

Lane equipment - lane signs (traffic lights); alarm signs (visible and acoustic); lane barrier; lane display; AVDC - metal detector, height detector and axle counter; lane management system; ticket reader (only in closed systems); operator’s console; Lane printer; emergency phone.

2.3

The efficiency of a toll plaza mainly depends on the type of toll collection mechanism that can be offered with the arrival rates at the toll booth, says a study conducted by the government in alliance with the School of Planning and Architecture. The institute studied the nature of traffic at various toll roads, like Chennai Bypass, Bilaspur, Hapur, and also Delhi-Noida-Delhi (DND) Flyway. According to the study, 1.5 times the total traffic can be handled at the semi-automatic toll collection mechanism compared to manual collection. On the other hand 3.5 times the traffic volume can be handled at the electronic toll collection (ETC) lanes compared to its manual counterpart. A separate survey was conducted by the institute, according to which total traffic arriving at the toll lane, equipped with ETC, was the highest at 9600 vehicles per hour. The toll lanes with manual and semi-automatic collection systems managed to get 2640 and 3360 vehicles respectively. On roads with ETC mechanisms, 90% of the people are frequent users of the exclusive lane, whereas the frequency of travel via other lanes are 45% and 49%, respectively. On an average the transaction time taken per vehicle on this road is 10 to 15 seconds and in case of other toll collection mechanisms it ranges between 30 and 45 minutes. According to the observations made in the study, traffic on toll roads depends on the adequacy and conciseness of the toll plaza information signs, which helps the user make advance decisions before entering into the lane for payment. Besides, it also depends on the road users’ familiarity with the toll facilities at toll plaza. The attitude and efficiency of the individual toll collectors also matter a lot.

Manual Compared to Automatic Toll

The Benefits - Convenience for Patrons, Efficiency for Owners and Operators The advantages of the I-Cube system compared to older technologies are clear: Traditional manual or mechanical transactions require drivers to stop, roll down their windows, fumble for change, swipe a magnetic stripe card, wave a proximity card, or punch a keypad to gain access. But our non-stop system

lets vehicles flow quickly through gates and controlled entrances. Quicker entry and exit from facilities means more convenience for parkers. And more convenience can mean more parkers in your facility – and a greater opportunity for increased revenue.

Toll-collection facilities generally include at least one of five main lane types. These lane classifications are manual, automatic, mixed, dedicated AVI and express AVI. Manual is a conventional lane type where the toll is paid in cash to a toll collector. Automatic is a conventional lane type where the exact toll is paid to an automatic coin machine (ACM). Mixed is a combination of a manual or automatic and AVI in which the patron may either manually pay or can travel through with an AVI-equipped (E-PASS) vehicle. Dedicated AVI is a lane accepting payment only from AVI-- equipped (E-PASS) vehicles. Express AVI lane is a dedicated AVI lane without plaza structure or barriers, which permits drivers to travel through the plaza without any reduction in speed.2
Manual Toll collection: A toll, requiring the driver stops to pay the fee (tollgate or tollbooth in America). A booth is equipped with bank card and toll ticket system reader and is operated by a person coordinated locally by a toll manager.
Figure 5 Manual Compared to Automatic Toll Equipment
Electronic Toll collection (Via Verde): A free-flow toll, were the driver doesn’t stop to pay the fee. When the vehicle passes through the toll plaza an electronic transaction is automatically generated. Electronic Toll Collection (ETC) uses various technologies that allows the manual in-lane toll collection process to be automated in such a way that customers do not have to stop and pay cash at a toll booth. With ETC, an actual toll plaza is not even a requirement to collect tolls. The ETC equipment can be mounted on overhead gantries and/or in the pavement, which allows vehicles to be charged while they proceed at highway speeds.

For an ETC implementation to be effective, reliable and achieve maximum throughput and customer acceptance, three major in-lane/roadway components are required:

Automatic Vehicle Identification (AVI) uses a radio Frequency (RF) device located in the vehicle to uniquely identify the vehicle to the toll equipment.

Automatic Vehicle Classification (AVC) uses various sensors in and around the lane to determine the type of vehicle so that the proper toll can be charged.

Video Enforcement Systems (VES) capture images of the license plates of vehicles that use the facility without a valid tag so that the owners can be identified and notified that a toll is due. All of these systems are tied together by what is commonly referred to as a lane controller.

Advantages of the On-Line system

1. 
   Fully on-line system
   
2. 
   All transactions are logged at a central database, allowing management to:
   
   1. 
      Generate financial reports
      
   2. 
      Generate statistical reports
      
   3. 
      Monitor any user/operator activity
      
   4. 
      Query Transactions
      
   5. 
      View transactions occurring in real-time
      
   6. 
      Modify system status from a central point (e.g. modify tariff structures)
      
   7. 
      Access the system from a remote location and perform all management functions
      
   8. 
      Receive reports automatically via email.
      
   9. 
      Be contacted via SMS in the event of a security breach
      
   10. 
       Control the Monthly parkers, monitor violations, block/unblock users etc.
       
3. 
   One of the most important features of an on-line system is the Automatic Synchronising of the clocks of the various devices.
   
4. 
   An on-line system allows remote system access for both the owners for reporting and control, the Operator for site management and I-Cube for system maintenance purposes.