The Gazette’s centerpiece last Monday was “Why doesn’t Iowa have toll roads?”. It starts out: “Thirty-six U.S. states have toll roads, including Iowa’s neighbors Minnesota, Nebraska, Missouri and Illinois.”
Nebraska and Missouri do not have toll roads.
Nebraska has two toll BRIDGES: the old US 34 and old IA 370 bridges across the Missouri River from Iowa. The operators still charge tolls although most traffic from both has moved to the new US 34 bridge.
Missouri had one toll bridge, at the Lake of the Ozarks, but it became a free bridge in May 2024.
Minnesota technically doesn’t have toll roads. It has some High Occupancy/Toll (HOT) lanes in the Twin Cities that use E-ZPass. Minnesota is the only state (mostly) west of the Mississippi River that uses E-ZPass and is compatible with the eastern half of the country. Minnesota has one toll bridge, which is at International Falls.
The bulk of the Gazette story focuses on where money for Iowa roads comes from, the Road Use Tax Fund. It touches on a proposal a little while back to toll I-80 to upgrade it across the state but that was shot down immediately. Iowa doesn’t have toll roads because, as stated near the end of the article, creating the system would be expensive and it’s not feasible in a state that has a lot of alternative routes (avoiding toll roads is known as shunpiking).
But once you pass the west end of the toll part of I-88 in Illinois, there are no more true toll roads until either the Kansas Turnpike or the E-470 loop in Colorado.
