Between I-494 and Burnsville Parkway, the MnPass lanes will be open to carpools, buses, motorcycles and MnPass users on weekdays from 6 a.m. to 10 a.m. northbound and from 2 p.m. to 7 p.m. southbound. At other times, the lanes will be available to general traffic. Signs over the lanes will show a diamond when they're in MnPass mode.
The northbound shoulder lane north of 42nd Street in south Minneapolis will operate as a MnPass lane during rush hours and other congested periods. When it's not open, it will revert to a shoulder and carry no traffic. It'll have a green arrow overhead when it's open and a red X when it's closed.
When the reconstruction of the Crosstown Commons is finished in about a year, MnPass lanes will extend uninterrupted between 42nd Street and Burnsville.
To sign up for MnPass, visit www.mnpass.org or call 1-866-397-4334. Transponders are leased for $1.50 a month, and drivers who sign up before the end of October are eligible for $25 in toll credits.
WHERE THE TOLL MONEY GOES
By state statute, MnPass revenue first goes to pay for the operation of the lanes, including fees to the private contractor that oversees the MnPass accounts. Any money beyond that must be used for highway and transit improvements in the corridor where the lanes are. On I-394, which has had MnPass lanes since 2005, such revenue is a couple of hundred thousand dollars a year, according to MnDOT.
Tolls are priced to keep traffic in the MnPass lanes moving at 50 miles per hour or faster, said Nick Thompson, the MnDOT engineer who headed up the project on I-35W. "It's not intended to maximize revenue," he said.
JIM FOTI
