Healey: No tolls on Cape bridges

BOSTON (SHNS) - Gov. Maura Healey shot down the idea of charging tolls on the Cape Cod bridges on Wednesday, after a local official raised the idea earlier this week.

Mashpee Select Board Vice Chair David Weeden floated the idea at a meeting Monday.

"I'd advocate for tolls to be imposed at the bridges," Weeden said. "Over 35 million vehicles come across those two bridges combined annually. Even if you did $2 an axle, only calculating cars, you'd bring in about $70 million a year. That money should be earmarked specifically to leverage [state revolving fund] funds and go towards coastal and water quality issues."

Weeden suggested the state could look into just tolling people coming from off-Cape, using EZ Pass technology to identify residents so they could get on and off the bridges without paying tolls.

"Massachusetts reaps the benefits of Cape Cod tourism, and it's a significant amount of money that comes into the state through the tourism that we receive here, and on the Cape they come over here and they leave their stuff behind, and then we're left to deal with it. So, you know, charging a modest rate," Weeden said.

Asked about the idea after an unrelated event at the State House on Wednesday, Healey immediately shot it down.

"I don't support the tolls on the bridges," she said.

Healey talked about her administration's efforts to replace the Bourne and Sagamore bridges. The Healey administration is eyeing 2027 to start work, beginning with the Sagamore Bridge, though the state has so far only secured just half of the two-bridge project's more than $4.5 billion price tag.

"I hope to make continued progress on the bridges," Healey said. "That's been something that we've prioritized, to move ahead on. But, no tolls on the bridges."