The Pennsylvania Turnpike implemented its E-ZPass system in 1995.

Now it apparently has a Free Pass system.

More than $104 million in turnpike tolls went uncollected last year as the agency fully converted to all-electronic tolling.

According to the Associated Press, half of the millions of motorists who don’t use E-ZPass can travel without paying under the “toll-by-plate” license plate camera system.

“We, as an organization, are leaving no stone unturned in the way in which we’re going after that leakage,” explained turnpike Chief Executive Mark Compton.

Maybe someone should have considered a possible “leakage” before the system was implemented.

Electronic tolling has been a problem across the nation.

Toll evaders nationwide have been creative, using grease to obscure plate numbers and installing devices that deploy to cover up plates when drivers go past plate cameras.

Weather conditions and camera malfunctions also can make plates impossible to read.

Revenue loss also can result from faulty equipment, such as a dead battery in an E-ZPass transponder; from failure of the camera systems to capture a plate number properly; or from an inability to pursue out-of-state drivers.

About 41% of the image failures were blamed on an obstruction such as a bike rack.

State Transportation Secretary Yassmin Gramian, who leads the turnpike commission, said the state’s overall toll collection rates are consistent with those in other states and slightly better than the national average.

In June 2020, the commission decided it would permanently switch to cashless tolling immediately and begin laying off about 500 toll collectors and office personnel who process the cash payments.

The agency had been operating without toll collectors since March 16 of that year because of the COVID-19 virus.

It said three reasons factored into its decision to eliminate the collectors: the cashless system worked well during the pandemic; it has suffered huge financial losses due to reduced traffic; and it would be problematic to reopen cash tolling since an interchange would have to be closed for two weeks if a fare collector tested positive for the virus and the entire ticketing system would have to be shut down across the state if one interchange couldn’t operate.

Members of the commission argued the layoffs would save the state $42 million this year and $65 million next year, which are net numbers after unemployment and health insurance is paid.

That’s roughly the amount of revenue lost due to motorists skating on their bills.

Maybe the commission should have kept the toll workers.

— JGG