Hank Silverberg, wtop.com
WASHINGTON – A call to investigate toll prices on the Dulles Greenway by a Virginia congressman may not go anywhere.
One-way tolls on the full 14 miles of the privately owned Dulles Greenway run $4.80 at peak hours. It’s a sum Rep. Frank Wolf, R-VA, calls “highway robbery.”
Wolf says the deal that allows an Australian company, Macquiare Group Ltd., to operate the Greenway is flawed and does nothing to protect consumers from rate increases. He’s asked Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli to investigate it.
But Cuccinnelli tells WTOP that’s there’s little he can do about the tolls.
“The setting of prices isn’t a consumer protection issue,” says Cuccinelli. “That’s a regulatory issue.”
Tolls on the Greenway are regulated by the Virginia State Corporation Commission and are handled just like rate hike requests from utility companies.
“To get to the level of aggressiveness that he [Wolf] would like to see would require substantial changes in Virginia law,” says Cuccinelli.
The Greenway, between Dulles Airport and Leesburg, connects directly to the publicly owned Dulles Toll Road, which is run by the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority.
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