Should You Take Toll Roads in the USA? Time, Cost & Travel Advice

Should You Take Toll Roads in the USA? Time, Cost & Travel Advice

In this episode of TravelEssary, we’re diving into the world of American toll roads, a topic that sparks plenty of debate among road trippers. Whether you’re a U.S. resident or an international traveler planning a road trip, understanding toll roads can save you both time and stress.

We kick things off by sharing a fun audience update, highlighting the incredible number of listeners tuning in from outside the U.S., including Australia, India, and the UK. Then we hit the main road (pun intended): toll roads in America.

Here’s what we cover:

• The pros of toll roads – faster travel times, smoother driving conditions, and scenic perks along the way.
• The cons of toll roads – costly fees, limited exits, and the confusion of navigating different state systems.
• Smart strategies for travelers – how to decide when toll roads are worth it, plus practical tips for international visitors hitting the U.S. highways.

By the end of this episode, you’ll have a clear picture of whether toll roads fit your travel style, and how to make the most of your next American road trip.

Transcript

  We're the Essary family and we're exploring America one destination at a time on today's episode of TravelEssary, we're going to share all things toll roads.

Let's chat.

Welcome and thank you for joining us on this episode as we talk about toll roads, all the good and all the bad. But before we get into this episode, it's, wow, it's been, it's been an amazing ride so far. We're already into season four. We're a couple episodes into it. A lot of things are moving, a lot of things are changing, and , I believe you have a little interesting tidbit for us.

Yeah. So the last three or four episodes. Of our Travel RY podcast, we have actually had more non-American listeners than American listeners. And yes, I want people in America to listen to it, but I also think it's awesome that we're building such a big audience outside of the US because I want people to come and experience what we have.

And I love that they're using us as a source of information before they come and travel here, before they plan their trips. I think that's just amazing and a little bit humbling. Oh, absolutely. I mean, to know that. People that may or may not come visit here this is still good information for just anyone.

It doesn't matter how you travel or which way that you go and what country that you're in. It's specifically made for us travel, right?, I love hearing that information. Mm-hmm. That other people outside the US are listening to us and that Yeah. I wanna share information to anybody who wants to travel here, whether you're foreign or domestic, like, I want to be informational.

I think it was around 65% of our last two episodes, the listeners and the downloads were from countries outside of. North America, actually. That's really awesome that, you know, our non-American listeners have picked up and that's something that I'm really excited about. Yeah, and here's an even more interesting statistic out of all of our non-American listeners.

More than half of those are from Australia. That's awesome. So we have a huge Australian listener base and I, I think that's so cool. So our top one underneath America or the United States is Australia, and then way under Australia is India. Oh, that's cool. Is our, it's our next highest listening base and then the United Kingdom.

So what you're telling me is we need to plan a trip to the land down under, I guess I would love to make that happen. That would be pretty sweet. Yeah. That'd be awesome. So first of all, thank you to everyone. , Foreign or domestic. Yes. Who listens. To our podcast in order to get information on traveling throughout the United States.

And secondly, shout out to all of our Australian listeners because we just think you're pretty amazing. You are amazing. . And for some people knowing now that we have such a huge falling outside the United States mm-hmm. It kind of changes this podcast just a little bit. Because , I don't know if they have tolls or not. Okay. So I actually researched this before our podcast, not extensively by any means, so please correct me if I'm wrong, but most. Developed countries have toll roads of some sort. They don't always look the same. A lot of them will have like the epass system similar to ours, but they don't have different ones.

You know, ours sometimes vary from state to state. Oh, yes. Which we can get into in a little bit, but , I believe it's France and Germany that I read. I can't remember, I do remember reading France, but I think Germany, they actually still have the. The toll boost systems where you put the money in, you put the coins and stuff in the money.

Like the old kind. Yeah. And so, I think for the most part, most of our listeners, if not all, are going to be familiar with some form of toll roads. Well, good, because that's gonna help us a lot. So we don't have to fully explain how this whole system works. Now, there are places in the United States that steal.

They have lanes available for people that are gonna be paying cash only. . Or using some type of credit card. Wait, there are, there are, yes. And I haven't seen one in a long time on I 80 in Ohio. But you travel more than I do. , I 80 , in Ohio. They have several going down the road. The cash ones, is it like, but they have options where you can scan or you can Oh yes.

Oh yes. Okay. But it's really weird because. Before we start getting into all the te tech stuff about it is , because of how large America is . The different systems that each state have is really interesting, right? It's actually, as people who travel frequently from state to state, it's actually kind of annoying.

It's absolutely annoying whenever , you're looking to pay those tows. And then the process of doing that changes from state to state, changes from state to state, and , it's always different. , The most typical one that we have here that is easy up and running is. Electronic.

Yeah. So it's all done electronic. So they scan your license plate or they scan a barcode or a system that's on your vehicle? Mm-hmm. So for Texas, uh, north Texas, we have a little sticker that we put on NTTA. Yep. In Oklahoma, they have a sticker in the northeast around, uh, Indiana, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Maine, that area, they have what's called an epass.

Mm-hmm. And so all their systems are linked together. Where you can do everything electronically. Man, it would be so lovely if there was like a universal one for the lower 48. Like if EZPass was just all of the totals. Oh yeah. All of them takes care of it. And so what these systems do is, number one, they don't talk to each other, which makes it a pain.

There's no general database that you can go into. So whenever you have to pay these and you wanna pay these online, you have to go to each of their websites. They all have their different logins, all their different ways , of going on. So to me, the biggest pain about that. It's not so much that there are different forms.

I mean, yes, that's slightly annoying, but to me, the thing that is the worst is if we're going across, say, five or six states on one trip, we do not get all of that at the same time. Like it we'll get. Some of it taken out automatically from the Epass, and then we'll get a toll bill in the mail from one state and then like five days later, get another toll bill in the mail and sometimes three weeks later, get another toll bill in the mail and you'll be way past this trip on another trip already and you're still getting toll bills.

In the mail and it's so annoying. Yeah. , The systems are not constant all the way through in the United States for sure. In every state. It's pretty consistent. Mm-hmm. As far as how they're gonna bill you, like each state doesn't have its own little, it doesn't have two or three.

Like if you go on, um, I 44 in Oklahoma, that's not gonna be different from I 40. Okay. They're gonna be the same systems, not for Texas. Now Texas, because it's so large. Yeah. We have a north and we have a south. So, so if you are traveling from DFW to Austin to Houston in one day or one weekend, you're gonna get three, three separate systems and toll roads or toll bills.

So yeah, Texas and it's aggravating. It's, yeah, , and we did that. We went from DFW to Austin in one day, and I think our DFW tolls were like $12. And then our Austin bill came in a week later and it was almost. 40 bucks. Yeah. For one day. So let's get into, now that we've kind of talked about the systems and how each state differs across America and you know, I don't know how that works for our foreign listeners.

, If you're coming and you're renting a vehicle, so how does, that's something I guess we need to look at. If you're renting a vehicle, or even if you're flying from one state to the other and then you're renting a vehicle to travel around that area, where would that toll be meld to? Is it meld to the.

Company that you rented it from, or do they have some sort of automatic thing where it's mailed to you, like set up through the rent a car? So , from what I understand from other people that have done this, is. , Of course you have a credit card on the accounts, on file of wherever you're Oh, so they would just take it out of that.

So they, they send the bill of course, to the company because that's where the card of, like when you're at a hotel and you order extra things, yeah, you order extra. You get, okay, that makes sense. Food service or whatever. Then that just automatically gets billed to you. That makes sense. That's how they kind cover their bases.

, There are some places that. Well, let's just get into it. Yeah. So if you're not from America, we're about to go through the pros and cons of American toll roads and that will help you decide if you wanna take them or you want to avoid them. So let's talk about to toll or not to toll. We starting with the good or the bad.

You know, I always enjoy ending on a good note. So let's start with the cons. Okay. We'll start with the, with the bad stuff. We'll start with the very first thing that. Everyone knows about toll ropes. The easiest. They cost money. They cost and sometimes they are uber expensive. Yeah. We're talking about you, Austin.

We see you. Oh, Syracuse. Syracuse was expensive too. New, New York and Pennsylvania, we're pretty expensive. Yeah. , And it's, not nothing against them because, you know, , they're doing what they can do to bring in some extra revenue in order to help their state or whatever, but they are expensive.

And how much it costs you depends on so many different things, right? So there's no easy formula to this. No. So if Jeremy is pulling our fifth wheel in his truck. And I'm right behind him. In our vehicle, we're gonna get a toll bill for both vehicles, but his is going to be significantly larger than my little SUV.

So the way that I'm gonna say most tows, because I'm not a hundred percent sure, but most tows work is they charge you for whatever vehicle goes. So if I'm just driving Darth Hall and you're driving the car, we're gonna get charged the same. But if I'm hauling or if I'm pulling, or if I have a trailer, a boats, anything that has more axles, I'm gonna get charged per axle after that.

Really? So that's where price 18 dealers are really charged. They pay. Well, I mean, they only have two axles . Sometimes it'll have three axles, but , they only get charged the two axles. So it's similar to our fifth wheel.

To our fifth wheel. Yeah. But , it's almost a spike hike for those , that pull a trailer. Mm-hmm. Or an rv. Oh. It's a massive increase. , It's a huge increase from what a regular car is because of the wear and tear that that trailer is putting on the road. And so they're making up their costs so they can keep up their maintenance, if we're going somewhere and we're not in a hurry, then we are probably going to avoid toll rows when pulling this fifth wheel, because if not, there are places that in one trip we could easily pay $200 in tolls if we take this fifth wheel.

Absolutely. Another thing that gets factored into the expense of it is how long you travel on that road. Right? If you get on and get off, you may spend, well, it depend on where you are. You could spend like 50, 32 cents. I mean,, it's not gonna be very expensive if you're on it for miles upon miles.

That's whenever the 30, the $40 fees kind of kick in depending on how far you are on this. Mm-hmm. On, on the toll road. Right? So number one con to anything as far as tolls go is expense. Expense.

Right now at this stage of life that I am in, uh, having a toddler, this part is difficult for me. , Not just toll roads, but interstates in general, but especially toll roads is there are less exits. And it's not very convenient when you need to make a lot of pit stops. Oh yeah. Most of the time, whenever you get on the road, unless it is a major intersection or it is a major exit onto like another highway or interstate, you're not gonna get off very easy.

No, I mean, once you get on. Some of them, especially going through town, are gonna have like walls on both sides. Mm-hmm. So you're kind of walled in, , you've kind of had this main corridor, this thoroughfare and getting off of it. Is a challenge, right? And I have a 2-year-old and we have to have emergency stops sometimes.

We have diaper changes, we have accidents. , There's just so many reasons. And if you're a parent of a toddler, you a thousand percent understand this, of why you would need to pull off somewhere when you have a little one in your car. And so, being on a toll road for a long time, it's not easy to make those pit stops.

And because , once you get on, you're kind of stuck on as well because you don't have , those extra easy accesses to get off. . If there is a traffic delay on a toll road, it will take longer for that to get cleared up and for that to be taken care of than if you're on a regular highway.

Yeah, for sure. Now there's not as much traffic, but like you said, when it does happen, like if a wreck happens, if it, yeah, if it happens and it happens right before an exit. And your last exit was three miles ago. , You can't turn around. There's no way of getting into the opposite lane.

Mm-hmm. To go in the opposite direction and turn around. Usually if you're on a highway or you're on a frontage road or something like that, usually there's another road that you can take. And you can get off, you'll see a bunch of traffic all flowing in one direction and they're trying to get off to get around the wreck because it could be a lengthy wreck.

Now is that gonna say that every highway is gonna be super easy to get on and off if there's a delay? No. But it's less likely for you to get off or to have that easy access to get out of the way if a wreck is to happen? Yeah. I feel like. You know, I mostly think of DFW because that's where I have the most experience when it comes to large cities.

I feel like there's exits every few feet. There's like so many exits and. If there is an emergency, it makes it so much easier for the first responders to get to a situation and people to get out of the way. They can pull off on the shoulder, right? They can pull off on the grass sometimes, like there are places for people to or to exit out of an order to make a pathway for the first responders on a toll road.

That is a lot. More difficult, especially 'cause most of the time the first responders, depending on what they are, are gonna come in the opposite direction. And then there's gonna be a turnaround that they're gonna do in order to get to the wreck so they can get closer so they don't have to mess with all the traffic that's backing up.

'cause that is a nightmare. Usually there's a barricade between the two directions and you're just stuck. Mm-hmm. And then you're just there. So it's not the most ideal place if an emergency, and not only just accidents, flat tires, anything to get like to a shoulder and get outta the way for someone to come help you, that's where the delay comes in. Well, and I'm trying to picture most of the toll roads that we've been on frequently, and I don't know if they have very many shoulders. There's not a whole lot of like shoulder space to pull off on if you do have a situation.

Some of 'em do every so often. Especially in the DFW or even in in Austin, it's pretty slim because they expect everything to go smoothly, I guess. , But I do know that traveling kind of up in the northeast and northeast people, if you've been around, , I 80 and 90, pretty much from Chicago East, you know exactly what I'm talking about.

It's very well laid out. But as far as getting off and getting off to an exit, it is few and far between. Yeah. And I've been in those situations where, I drove by a car that was on fire on the toll road, on the toll road on I 90. Oh man. And it was like, , where's the fire trucks? And they were coming up behind me, but their access to the toll road is limited.

Because there's not a whole lot of exits , and on-ramps. Mm-hmm. So it takes a while for, , the first responders to get to you , and take care of you and to deal with those situations just because of the excesses. So, but there are pros to, to toll roads. There are definitely pros to toll roads and it almost, depending on how you travel , or what you're going for or where you're going.

Definitely offsets it. Yeah. I mean we're like 50 50 on tolls, like you said, , it really depends. There are days where we need those toll roads, , for the main reason, which is to save time. Save time. They save so much time. If you're really in a crunch. Yeah, , if you're going through a metropolitan area, especially during high traffic times, during rush hours.

Toll roads are life savers. I mean, we have been in an instance where that toll road saved like an hour and 15 minutes off of our drive time because , the traffic was just that bad. So the biggest pro is obviously you're saving time. Oh, yeah. Because you're getting from one side to the other side.

Usually if you're going through a large city, you know,, you're traveling through, this is one you're trying to get to the other side of town as fast as possible. Toll roads will save you so much time, mainly because.

There is hardly any slowdown, right? So when there is traffic, the rare occasions on a toll road, it's awful, but it's so rare. Very rare. I think like my favorite toll road is Chisholm Trail. I love Chisholm Trail. It's just so handy. And that's in Texas, by the way, but. I think out of all the years we've been taking it, and all the times we've had to go through there, we've only had two traffic situations.

Mm-hmm. Because other than that, it is smooth as butter, it's smooth. , I guess another pro and con is there's faster speed limits. There's faster speed limits and there's less cops on the roads. Yeah. There's no way for them to get on and off.

There's no way for 'em to get on and off. So , that's so true. It does have one of those things where, you know, usually they're around the 65 mark. People are usually doing around 75, 80, especially here in Texas. But because of that, and usually it's three lane, so you don't have to worry about two lane, three lane, four lane.

Mm-hmm. Lanes coming in, lane's going out. It's usually three lane all the way through, and it's usually it. It's just smooth. Yeah. And because there's less junctions, there's no. , Every now and then, but there's not really stoplights or stop signs or reasons for you to have to slow down or stop. And that's another reason why they save so much time, I guess, is because , you're just flowing.

You're setting your crew and you're not taking that cruise off for hours. Yeah. You don't have to worry about, and , this is a pet peeve of mine. If anyone wants to know the stoplights. The traffic lights that are on highway in the middle of the nowhere, on highways that are on highways speed limit 75.

And then you just stop , and then a red light appears on around a corner and you're going, why are we doing this? Oh my gosh. Jeremy yells every time, why is this red light here? It makes no sense. You're on a highway at 75. If you wanna put a red light in, you need to drop that speed limit to at least 55, 55, if not lower.

Mm-hmm. Depending on, you know. What's going on. All you see is like 20 cars in front of you, slamming on their brakes, slamming on brakes, and I'm like, what are we doing there? There's no wreck up here. I don't see any lights or anything. And so, wait, is that just like a Texas thing or has that been, , on a lot of your travels that you see?

, But you mostly stay on interstate? I mostly stay on interstates, so, and we see that mostly on highways. Correct. Like state highways. And so that's just one of those things that , whenever you're not . On a toll road and you're hitting those highways.

Mm-hmm. That's what you're gonna run into. And that's where tow roads save you time. Yeah. Is, , you don't have to hit those stoplights in the middle of nowhere. , I've come along a lot of four-way stops. They don't even do lights anymore. They just do four-way stops. Mm-hmm. Everyone stops.

Um, I've come up upon several of those on highways, not really interstates, but highways. , It's one of those things that irks me, like, okay, the speed limit's so high, . I mean, some people have to slam on their brakes. Mm-hmm. In order to stop in time or not, you're gonna run a stop sign or a stoplight, which means , more than likely your chances of hitting someone who's not paying attention to the cross traffic you get, there's too many collisions.

Yes. That's probably Jeremy's favorite thing about toll roads is never really having to touch his Oh my goodness. And just going Absolutely. I found it in other places too, like especially Interstates, but being able to set a cruise. And just rolling with it. Mm-hmm. And watching the traffic around you either go by you or you pass people is so nice.

Compared to the stop go gas up to 50, slow down to 20, all the the stop and go traffic mm-hmm. That you normally have on regular highways that you can get around and it's gonna save you time. There's no slowdowns. And another great thing that it does is it saves on mileage. . Majority of the time.

Majority, right. It's gonna save on mileage because, well, when I think of the ones through the larger cities that we've been on, which are there toll roads on small cities? Is it just a large city thing? Like I don't, I've never truly thought about that till just now. The only ones that I've actually seen even traveling into like the Buffalo, Ohio.

Syracuse area is big cities, just large cities. I don't see them in the smaller cities. One of the reasons why I think that it saves on mileage a lot of the times is because. They're not having to go around anything. Like when they make those toll roads, it is like they cut straight through.

Like in DFW, the toll roads go over everything and they just go straight through. There's not a lot of winding, there's not a lot of, yeah. They don't have to wind around other highways or water and. You know, they're just trying to figure out how they're gonna connect, you know, from this to that is like, they're just, they're just going, you're absolutely right.

, I didn't notice that until now, but even in, , the last one that I went on was Chicago. Mm-hmm. Even in Chicago, like it takes you up above everything. Yeah. It takes you above everything and you just roll all the way through everything. Yeah. Because with the regular interstates, you have all these junctions and so they're having to make them work and fit together with all of the turnings and the.

The weird mix masters and stuff that they do, , but with a toll road, it just goes right over all that you don't have, they don't have to have all those junctions so they don't need all of that extra length on the road. Right? And so the regular highways and byways that you go , are gonna kind of take you around.

They've been there for a while, so there were some rules and regulations that they had to adhere to that. Toll roads apparently don't have to, follow now. Mm-hmm. Or they've changed a few things where, you know, safety, they can go over houses or whatever I'd never even really thought about how it just kind of takes you up and over and yeah, it takes you out above everything.

So that's actually really nice when it gets you up outta the way. Less traffic less. Stoppage, less mileage. I mean, those are really good pros. One of the other great pros that will not only help you mentally is the physicality of your vehicle.

if I'm not paying attention and I'll look up and immediately notice that the road has become so much nicer. Our surroundings look so much more aesthetic and there's less bumps and potholes, and I'm like, oh, we must be on a toll road. Oh yeah, , most of them are so well maintained. I mean, you're paying for it.

You would hope that they're well maintained, but it usually has some type of nice. Art or color or even greenery that's on the highway that you can look at. That's really nice. , If there is a bridge or something that goes over, it's like decorated. It's decorated and it's got some type of saying whether whatever city they're going through, whatever the street is that it is, it has like masonry designs on them and they have the prettiest like shrubbery and trees on the side and, and they're usually really well lit.

Yes. At night. Yes. Yes. You don't have to worry about, you know, seeing your surroundings because , they're lit up and , I love how well maintained they are, but sometimes I think that they're taking budget away from something else to maintain those roads so well. Mm-hmm. Because some of the other roads need a whole lot of love.

Oh yeah. We're talking about you, Memphis. Yeah. Talking about you. Memphis is one of them. Every single one of your highways needs some love, and I drive through there and I see you working on 'em. You can work a little faster, but usually they're not under construction because usually they've been built and , they're just doing in the maintenance part.

Mm-hmm. So there's not a whole lot of construction to 'em either. It's kind of really up to you. What your needs are, what your style is. Yeah. , What pertains to your trip. Every trip is different and what you're gonna need for that trip. If you're a slow going, I wanna pull off the road every few minutes type of traveler, you're probably not going to want to hit a toll road.

I mean, there is several times that even interstates that we're like, no, we're gonna take a highway because we wanna see the scenery. Right. And to me. I think interstates are ugly. They can be, other than Florida and Georgia, I have not been on an interstate that was scenic. , I have not taken you to Missouri or Pennsylvania yet.

Okay. They're pretty, but , I'm a highway girl unless I need to get somewhere fast. I prefer highways, over interstates and toll roads just because I. One, have the baby, I need the pit stops. And two, I enjoy the scenery. , I enjoy the scenic route. That's to me part of a road trip, part of a travel journey, you know?

Oh, absolutely. And if you're one of those people that don't mind paying the fee and you need to get somewhere quick and you wanna save the time, then. Definitely take the toll road. Yeah. If I suggest it, if you're coming to America, if you're not from America and you're coming and you trying to hit as much of the stops as possible, then you're gonna, yeah.

Big tourist areas, you're gonna wanna jump on interstates, hit and toll roads. And the toll roads, and so that you can shave off hours off of your drive time. , Okay. Listen, I know we've said this before, but I'm gonna say it one more time just for those who do not understand. America's very large. You are not going to drive across it in one day.

Even if you do hit the interstates, it will take you several. So please, please consider that in your drive time. Um, toll roads are not, , it will take you a considerable amount of time if you're trying to see things that are on, not even just opposite ends of the coast, but you know, several states away.

It is a little mind boggling for some people depending on what country you're coming from. Unless you're in the northeast and you've come to look at New York, Pennsylvania, and Virginia. You can do it, but if you come to look at anything else, anything out west, anything in the Midwest, , you're gonna take an entire day just to drive across one state sometimes.

In Texas it might take two. So those tow roads can be worth it. Kind of up to you, your style. How you want to drive, how you wanna ride, what you wanna look at, what kind of stops you want to do. Just take all of those in consideration whenever you, you get Google Maps or you get whatever that, that map app.

Out and you go, wait a minute, do we want to take tolls or not? Yeah. When you do hit it on Google Maps, it usually shows you how much that toll is going to be. You know, they average it like this is generally how much it's gonna cost you $12 or $1 or no tolls, and it gives you three different route options.

So that's really. Really nice. I do like that. For the most part, you have a general idea of  📍 what you're gonna spend and tolls before you take those robes, and that will help you decide whether you wanna take them or not. So always ask the question to toll or not to toll. Oh my goodness. Thank you guys for listening and tuning in with us every week.

We are very , appreciative of it, and we just can't wait to share even more.