DRIVERS of public passenger vehicles have been listed as the chief offenders identified in toll evasion violations, Ivan Anderson, group chief executive officer of TransJamaican Highway Limited, has said.

Anderson told the Jamaica Observer that the concessionaires for the TransJam Highways tolled motorway running between Portmore and Kingston and Kingston and Manchester are still grappling with the problem they identified previously and attempted to crack down on.

He was responding to queries from this media house regarding several cases seen on the court list of the St Catherine parish court naming individuals who are answering to charges of toll evasion.

According to Anderson, while the culprits — a number of whom are now being prosecuted — represent a small fraction of the customer base of the authority, their cheating ways have translated into millions in losses.

“Ninety-nine per cent of our customers pay — but we have little less than .5 per cent of our customers who violate. But, given that we have so many customers, we have about 80,000 to 90,000 customers every day, so .5 per cent is hundreds of people every month and obviously it translates into millions of dollars for us,” Anderson told the Observer on Wednesday.

According to the CEO, the practice is a “growing pain” with some individuals facing multiple charges.

“It is a growing situation, it’s getting worse. We are increasing the amount of people who use our tag lane. Right now, we have maybe almost 60 per cent of people using tag lanes and the violations tend to occur in the tag lanes, they don’t occur in the manual lanes. They occur in the tag lanes themselves. There are also people with multiple toll violations, we have people with 20 to 30 violations,” Anderson explained.

He added that the violations, primarily involving taxis and buses, have many other negative impacts.

“There are many facets to it, one is obviously the lost revenue, but we also have a lot of unsafe practices taking place, people just pushing through the barriers, breaking the barriers, and damaging the equipment itself. So that is the other side of the violations, not just the people tailgating but the majority of the violations come from tailgating which is where they go up behind a vehicle and go through right behind it without paying the toll,” he noted.

Anderson said an alliance with Jamaica Constabulary Force has led to prosecutions.

“We have a partnership with the police; we have additional cameras in place now recording these violations which are then handed over to the police. So, even when people believe that they got away, the police are using this information to stop people subsequently and to take them to court,” he told the Observer.

He, however, believes more needs to be done to dissuade violators.

“I think we need to increase the number of people who are actually being prosecuted and charge both the offence as well as be required to reimburse the cost of the tolls. I think once we can get that up then we can dissuade people from taking that course of action,” Anderson said.

Toll evasion in Jamaica is a criminal offence under the Toll Roads Act resulting in fines up to $10,000 or 30 days’ imprisonment per count for non-payment. Authorities, including TransJamaican Highway, use surveillance and police enforcement to target offenders, especially those tailgating or using stolen tags, which can lead to higher penalties.

Anderson said those caught by the long hand of the law still manage to evade the harsher punishment.

“I am not aware of anybody who has actually spent time, most people pay the fines. Sometimes all they do is pay the fine and try and avoid the court process. We are making it easier for people to pay the toll, so there is no excuse, there are many different ways to top up your T-tag account; we have added a number of payment partners, you can top up via
WhatsApp, via the T-Tag app… there is no excuse for this practice [toll evasion],” Anderson stated.

TransJamaican Highway Limited is the concessionaire of TransJam Highways (formerly Highway 2000 East-West), Jamaica’s first toll road and the largest infrastructure project in the English-speaking Caribbean. The entity’s core business activity is the development, operation and maintenance of a tolled road network in Jamaica known as the “TransJam Highways” a 78.4km tolled motorway with two distinct corridors: T1 – 71.9km between Kingston and Williamsfield and T2 – 6.5km between Portmore and Kingston.

The motorway corridors are supported by six toll plazas: Portmore, Spanish Town, Vineyards (in Old Harbour), May Pen, Toll Gate-Main Line, and Toll Gate-Ramp.

In December 2019 TransJamaican Highway became fully Jamaican-owned, after having been owned by the two French companies, Bouygues Travaux Publics and VINCI Concessions.

The Vineyards Toll Plaza in St Catherine. Authorities, including TransJamaican Highway, use surveillance and police enforcement to target offenders, especially those tailgating or using stolen tags.

ANDERSON… It is a growing situation, it’s getting worse.