New Jersey – Two members of the state Assembly have sponsored legislation to allow commercial advertising and sponsorship on the state’s toll plazas, including the Turnpike, Garden State Parkway and Atlantic City Expressway.

They say sponsors would line up to place commercial advertising and signs at plazas on some of the nation’s busiest toll roads, bringing in revenue without an increase to the gas tax.

Co-sponsored by Assemblywoman Pamela R. Lampitt (D-Camden) and Assemblyman Craig J. Coughlin (D-Middlesex), the bill was approved, 10-0, by the Assembly’s transportation committee last month. It now goes to Speaker Sheila Oliver (D-Essex), who will decide if and when to post it for a floor vote.

Under the bill, the New Jersey Turnpike Authority and the South Jersey Transportation Authority would be authorized to place commercial advertising and sponsorship signs on any equipment or materials related to the collection of tolls on the Turnpike, Parkway and Atlantic City Expressway.

Lampitt, from the Boston area, got the idea during trips back to Massachusetts. On the Massachusetts Turnpike, she saw “clean looking, very tastefully designed signage.”

“When I found out it was a way to raise revenue without having to raise the gas tax or tolls, I thought it was a win-win situation,” she said. “We are looking for some creative ideas to bring in new revenue.”

Lampitt’s vision for the signage is not of a crowded mass of advertisements, like on a race car driver’s uniform, but an unobtrusive curved sign above a toll booth.

She said the state could bring in “millions of dollars.”

“We have a lot of potential,” she said. “We have many miles of toll opportunities.”

It is not the first time in this tight budget year that a government official has discussed ways to squeeze more money from the state’s heavily traveled highways.

Transportation Commissioner Jim Simpson is exploring the possibility of selling naming rights to service areas on the Turnpike and Parkway, and having money-draining rest areas along Routes 80, 78 and 295 maintained by coffee or donut franchises that would pay rent to the state.

(Source: NJ Star Ledger)