Sneaky (and confusing) E-Z Pass Lanes

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Though this happened during my visit last October, I’ve been too busy to write about it until now. After I got home, I received three letters from Dollar Rental Car forwarding State of New Jersey “Notice of Enforcement Action” notices to me. First of all, Dollar Rental Car charged $25 to my credit card for handling each one.

Then I had to pay NJ E-Z the missed tolls, plus a $25 “administrative fee” for two of them. (They put two violations on one notice, whereas Dollar Rental Car split them into three violations and charged me $75.

If I had been attempting to evade the tolls, I would have accepted it as getting what I deserved. But I never even saw the signs, not once, but at three separate toll plazas on the Parkway on two different days. Where do they put the signs, on the moon?

For years, if you wanted to take the express lanes, you got into the left lanes. That is now apparently, the E-Z Pass lane. What if you don’t want to take the local lanes? I could see no way to avoid the E-Z Pass lanes without getting all the way over to the right and taking the local lanes. I could see making this mistake once, but according to them it was three times. I can only guess about the other two plazas.

I think they deliberately make this confusing in order to collect more revenue. I emailed E-Z Pass and told them I have been a loyal Jerseyan in exile all these years but that I now felt like burning my Giants cap! (I know, JD thinks I should do that anyway!)

It’s a shame when a visit to your home state leaves a bad taste in your mouth because of a highway authority that puts collecting revenue over the well-being of motorists.

Has anyone else here inadvertently gotten into the wrong lanes on the Parkway and been photographed by the “Big Brother Is Watching You” cameras? I’m not a dense, inattentive motorist. Isn’t this setup very confusing?

Source: http://forum.aboutnewjersey.com/showthread.php?t=1231