Oregon: ready to go with OReGO

The US state of Oregon’s new pay-by-the-mile road usage charge program, OReGO, took a step forward last month.
June 23, 2015 Read time: 2 mins

RSSThe US state of Oregon’s new pay-by-the-mile road usage charge program, OReGO, took a step forward last month with the announcement that three private business partners are ready to go.

8156 Azuga, 4757 Sanef and 7127 Verizon Telematics have been technically certified to manage accounts and collect road-user fees from those accounts for deposit into the State Highway Fund.

“Oregon is pioneering the nation’s first pay-by-the-mile road usage charge system,” said Jim Whitty, manager of the 2648 Oregon Department of Transportation’s Office of Innovative Partnerships and Alternative Funding. “We now have three trusted private partners on board that Oregonians can choose from when they volunteer to enrol their vehicles in OReGO.”

Up to 5,000 volunteer participants in OReGO, which was created in 2013 and begins on July 1, will be charged a per-mile fee. They then receive either a credit or a bill for the difference in fuel taxes paid at the pump.

Several states, including Washington, California, Idaho and Colorado are considering similar pay-by-the-mile road usage charge systems. California - facing an annual $5.9 billion backlog in state highway repairs - recently enacted legislation to start a pilot of its own.

Washington State has studied road usage charging over the past three years and is moving to a demonstration test that may also test inter-jurisdictional exchanges of mileage information and interoperability between states.

Highway & Network Management

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • Show me the money at Australian Summit
    September 4, 2012
    The question of how to finance and fund major road infrastructure projects in Australia – including the potential role of user-pays charging as a funding solution – was top of mind at the recent Roads Australia National Summit in Sydney. The two-day summit, organised by peak national body Roads Australia, is the largest and most influential annual gathering of industry decision-makers in the country. This year’s summit was held against a backdrop of concern over the future of a raft of major road projects t
    Read More
  • ARTBA predicts growth in transport construction
    December 2, 2016
    Modest growth in transport construction is predicted in the US in 2017 by the American Road & Transportation Builders Association (ARTBA). According to a report by ARTBA chief economist, Dr Alison Premo Black, total transportation construction and related market activity is expected to grow 1.3% in 2017, driven largely by increases in highway and bridge private construction activity supporting residential and commercial developments. In 2017, the market is expected to reach US$247.8 billion, up from $244
    Read More
  • Germany: Foreign users to pay toll
    June 23, 2015
    Foreign road users could be paying up to €130 (US$147) a year for using Germany's autobahn motorways starting in 2016. The plan was given the go-ahead by the German government last October but implementation could be delayed if it faces a legal challenge by European member states. Bavarian state transport minister Alexander Dobrindt said he was convinced that the draft law does not discriminate against foreign motorists, an issue if the law were to be challenged in any European court. He called the infras
    Read More
  • East End Crossing Project—Availability payment P3 in action
    July 14, 2017
    Indiana exercised its authority to use a P3 contract when it partnered with Kentucky for new bridges across the Ohio River. Barney Allison and John Smolen* explain the groundbreaking availability payment deal. Earlier this year, traffic began rolling over the new tolled Lewis and Clark Bridge spanning the Ohio River from northern Kentucky to southern Indiana. The cable-stayed bridge is part of the award-winning Ohio Bridges Project to untangle traffic within the greater metropolitan area of Louisville, Kent
    Read More

Highlighted Content