When trip preplanning, how do you accurately calculate tolls?

Google and Hammer knows. It's 2021. I don't need to know.

Then don't worry about them. Just run. Tolls are so F'n insignificant... People make them out to be a big deal, but they don't amount to the change you got in your couch cushions.

 

Hee hee hee. I get it lucky!! As a company driver, I just pay the toll then send in a macro on my fancy tablet and company reimburses me. Then when I submit paperwork for the load, just scan in the toll receipts with the rest of the load paperwork. Easy peasy! Basically do the same with lumper fees, except once I find out how much, I send in the request, get the funds on my card first, then pay them.

 

The way I figure it, if I can make an extra $40 per hour at at least $2 per mile and still deliver on time, I'll usually take it.

US 30 across Ohio and Indiana pays like $90 per hour at like $8 per mile vs taking the tollway. I'm wearing ruts into that sumbich.

 

I only bother calculating toll vs. non-toll routes when I'm near NYC or in Southern PA. For the most part, anywhere else toll road avoidance isn't worth your time to figure out.

If you are a local driver and can figure out the safe shortcuts, that might change, but most OTR drivers aren't going to have the in-depth road knowledge required to know if a toll-avoiding route really saves time and/or money.

 

US30 across Ohio and Indiana takes more miles, FAR more stopping and starting. Far more speed changes. Far more distractions. I will take I-80 over US30 every single time unless I know in advance there's a gigantic clusterfork on I-80.

If you are making $8 per mile, you should be on I80 and screw US30.

 

Delete

 

It adds about 24 miles, which works out to $4 per mile (95/24), not $8, my mistake. The lights, extra miles and lower speeds add about an hour total additional travel time using my numbers. Still, $4 per mile for an hour of extra driving ain't bad, even with a few traffic lights thrown in.

I'm governed at 65 for Canadian compliance but usually keep it at 62 for mpg anyway, so I'm not getting the full benefit of the higher speed limit on the tollway. Someone who is getting that full benefit will have different numbers. For sake of argument, say they're doing 90 mph on the tollway. In that case, US 30 would take an extra 90 minutes instead of 60 minutes, to harvest that $4 per mile. So that's $60 per hour for 90 minutes of taking US 30 instead of $90 per hour for 60 minutes, which is still not too shabby.

 

when i was working, i never worried about tolls. i had EZ Pass.

 

I have EZ Pass too. But the person who pays the EZ Pass bill, is me.