It’s not hard to find a reason to use North Texas’ tollways. On a good day, motorists on the Dallas North Tollway can make the drive from Plano to downtown Dallas in about 30 minutes and avoid congestion on U.S. Highway 75.

The only downside is the price: That trip downtown from Plano can cost up to $6 under the current toll rates.

Toll roads have existed in North Texas since the 1957 opening of the Dallas Fort Worth Turnpike, more commonly known as Interstate 30. That road, which at the time stretched 30 miles between Dallas and Fort Worth, was built by the Texas Turnpike Authority, a state agency tasked with transportation planning and development.

On New Year’s Eve 1977, the TTA ended fees on I-30, and North Texans gained a toll-free highway between and stretching beyond the two cities. The Dallas North Tollway opened about a decade after the DFW Turnpike, but over 50 years later its tolls remain firmly in place.

A reader who wondered when or if that might change consulted Curious Texas, an ongoing project from The Dallas Morning News. The idea is simple: You have questions, and our journalists are trained to track down answers.

“When will the toll roads in North Texas be paid off?” asked Mike Hernandez, a reader who hopes to one day travel the tollway, the Bush Turnpike or Sam Rayburn Tollway free of charge.

According to the North Texas Transportation Authority, it's no longer a statewide policy to deem roads toll-free after they've been paid off. (Vernon Bryant / Staff Photographer)

It’s no longer a statewide practice to deem roads toll-free after they’ve been paid off, the North Texas Transportation Authority says on its website.

The NTTA owes roughly $9.3 billion in bonds across its entire system of roads, said Michael Rey, a spokesman for the agency, which upon its creation in 1997 inherited the Texas Turnpike Authority’s toll roads. The NTTA’s debt, he says, is no longer calculated by specific toll road.

A 2018 NTTA financial dashboard lists the debt payoff date as 2052. While that answers our reader’s question, it doesn’t mean the roads will ever be free.

If anything, tolls will keep going up rather than go away. According to the NTTA website, toll rates increase “every year at 2.75%, compounded and are reset in odd-numbered years.” The additional money is needed to maintain existing roads, Rey said via email.

NTTA oversees eight toll roads: the Dallas North Tollway, Bush Turnpike, Chisholm Trail Parkway, Addison Airport Toll Tunnel, Mountain Creek Lake Bridge, Sam Rayburn Tollway, Lewisville Lake Toll Bridge and 360 Tollway. The agency operates over 1,000 miles of toll lanes, primarily throughout Collin, Dallas, Denton and Tarrant counties and in small parts of Ellis and Johnson counties, Rey said.

Sixty percent of tolls collected on those roads goes to repay bonds, 23% is used for continued operation and maintenance of the roads, and 17% is reinvested in system expansion and projects. Current projects include widening the Bush Turnpike and adding a fourth lane to the Sam Rayburn Tollway.

No new toll roads are planned for the near future, Rey said. But the agency is investing nearly $2 billion on existing roads in the next decade, and the plan is to complete those reinvestment projects without issuing more bonds or otherwise incurring more debt.

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