A Future Free From Gridlock, For a Price

Michael Kulper, vice president for the Australian firm Transurban, said his company "has taken the view that Virginia really is our primary market focus." The firm is a leader of the Beltway and I-95 projects and is one of the groups vying for control of the Dulles Toll Road.

Kulper said Washington and other cities across the country are ripe for these kinds of highways because of congestion brought on by "20 or 30 years of under-investment."

Almost everything about these new highways will be different from what drivers have grown accustomed to and how roads have been built.

For the past 50 years, highways have grown out of the traditional governmental process. Communities cited needs, political leaders approved projects, and state transportation agencies drew up plans according to well-established guidelines. The money to pay for roads -- and later for maintaining them -- came from taxpayers, largely through a levy on gas.

Privately backed roads will be conceived, designed, built and operated by companies according to their ability to make money, a criterion that may not reflect the most pressing traffic needs.

Users, meanwhile, will have to get used to a whole new kind of toll. Rates will be market-driven and will change every few minutes according to traffic conditions. During rush hour, drivers might need serious money, while they could pay for a midnight ride on the same road with loose change.

Drivers will pay with E-ZPass-style transponders and will never have to slow down to pay tolls. There are several ways to charge drivers who slip onto the lanes without transponders, including photographing their license plates and mailing them bills.

Drivers will be charged in increments, say five or 10 miles at a time. Electronic signs will advertise prices before motorists enter stretches of roads, and users will be able to exit if they're unwilling to pay for the next section of highway.

One complication is that there isn't yet a foolproof way to enforce the roads in Virginia, where carpoolers would travel free and others would have to pay.

Supporters said such things are mere details. The future, they said, will be filled with a traveling experience that will give drivers a chance to escape the daily strain of traffic.

"I could see the day," said Orski, the newsletter editor, "when paying for a congestion-free trip will be really accepted as nothing extraordinary, just as we accept paying more for first-class air travel or for taxicabs instead of buses."