No photo, no bill.

That is the approach more Americans are taking to dodge toll fares, as scofflaws increasingly avoid highway cameras with doctored or covered license plates.

Mechanical devices that can hide a driver’s tag at the push of a button are sold online for a couple hundred bucks. Other drivers are getting creative on the cheap, jury-rigging their plates with face masks or duct tape.

“There’s a lot of inventive people with a lot of time on their hands,” said Robin Bramwell-Stewart, a deputy director at the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, whose facilities include the George Washington Bridge and the Lincoln and Holland tunnels.



This type of toll evasion has cost government agencies millions, prompting officials to push crackdowns like increasing fines. Toll avoidance has jumped in several areas of the country since a broad shift to all-electronic tolling early in the Covid-19 pandemic, agency figures show. Unless a car has a transponder like E-ZPass, a camera must photograph the license plate to invoice its owner by mail, as fewer places have people at toll booths collecting coins and cash.

Authorities in the Dallas and San Francisco areas say they missed out on more than $33 million combined in tolls last year due to such tactics. The hit to MTA Bridges and Tunnels, which operates seven bridges and two tunnels in New York City, was nearly $21 million, a 137% jump from 2020, the agency says.

Some drivers have power-washed paint off their plates or covered them with a range of household items such as leaf-shaped magnets, Bramwell-Stewart said. The Port Authority says officers in 2023 roughly doubled the number of summonses issued for obstructed, missing or fictitious license plates compared with the prior year.


A toll plaza at the George Washington Bridge in Fort Lee, N.J. PHOTO: TED SHAFFREY/ASSOCIATED PRESS
Bramwell-Stewart said one driver from New Jersey repeatedly used what’s known in the streets as a flipper, which lets you remotely swap out a car’s real plate for a bogus one ahead of a toll area. In this instance, the bogus plate corresponded to an actual one registered to a woman who was mystified to receive the tolls. “Why do you keep billing me?” Bramwell-Stewart recalled her asking.

The Port Authority says it figured out the ruse and arrested the freerider in September on charges including tampering with public records and possession of burglar’s tools—and billed him for tolls mistakenly sent to the woman. The same man had been arrested in February 2023 after police saw a remote-controlled electronic curtain being used to cover his license plate, the authority said.



A variety of flippers are sold online. “Our Motorized Stealth Plate Flippers, allows you to flip your license plates 180°, James Bond style!” one site says, adding that the $220.49 gizmo is meant for off-road only, not public roads.

Cathy Sheridan, president of MTA Bridges and Tunnels in New York City, showed video of a flipper in action at a recent public meeting, after the car was stopped by police. One minute it had New York plates, the next it sported Texas tags. She also showed a clip of a second car with a device that lowered a cover over the plate like a curtain.

A license-plate flipper. CREDIT: MTA
“This is about fairness for all drivers,” she said.

Obstructed or covered plates have become far more common, along with unregistered vehicles and fraudulent plates, over the past four years, Sheridan said.

Most motorists pay their way, but officials say losses from obstructed plates add up.

While just 1.5% of all transactions were unbillable last year, Sheridan said, that is money unavailable for electric buses and needed upgrades. The tactics also thwart security and traffic cameras, she added.



The MTA said 1.6 million transactions were classified as obstructed in the first 10 months of 2023, up from 923,000 in 2020. Although toll cameras operated by the agency capture front and rear plates, some states don’t require front tags, and some drivers obstruct both plates, officials say.

“It’s only going to grow if people believe they can scam the system,” said Mark Muriello, policy and government affairs director at the International Bridge, Tunnel and Turnpike Association, a trade group. He likened toll dodgers to shoplifters.

New York State Thruway cameras recorded a motorcyclist reaching around to cover his bike’s license plate and spotted a car whizzing by with a Cheetos bag taped over the Florida-issued tag.



TAP FOR SOUND
New Yorkers lose an average of 117 hours a year in traffic according to the MTA. Now, New York City is turning to congestion tolls to help unclog its roads. WSJ’s George Downs explores if these tolls actually reduce traffic and whether other U.S. cities will adopt them. Illustration: George Downs/The Wall Street Journal
The thruway’s overall volume of rejected plate images has declined in recent years, thanks to enhanced image review and quality assurance processes, a spokeswoman said. But the number of obstructed plates reached a three-year high in 2023, data show, fueled by a sharp uptick in so-called malicious obstructions—such as when a plate is bent back, or a C is turned into an O with a marker.

Some people are open about freeloading. “Just paid $900 in tolls, I am furious. How do I block toll cameras?” someone in the New York area posted on Reddit. “What are you guys using that has been working for years? I am thinking of glueing [sic] two pieces of leaf to my back and front plates. Or using dark tape to modify some of the letters. U -> 0 and J -> U” The post generated more than 250 comments and several suggested tricks.

Not all obstructions are done on purpose, some officials note. Bulky bike racks can block a camera, even if a motorist isn’t trying to cheat. But intent doesn’t matter in states like New York, where drivers are legally required to ensure their plates are fully visible.

A device to lower a cover over the license plate. CREDIT: MTA
Officials are looking for ways to crack down. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul backs state legislation that would allow police to arrest drivers for theft of services if they were caught using a mechanical or electronic device like a flipper. Hochul, a Democrat, also proposes upping the maximum fine to $500 from $300.

The Pennsylvania Turnpike encourages motorists to use a tip line to report violators.

In December, someone submitted a video of a gray Jeep SUV with a device that covers the tag at tolling points, a spokeswoman said. The Jeep has been added to regional “hot lists,” she said, for license-plate readers in Pennsylvania and surrounding states.

Write to Scott Calvert at scott.calvert@wsj.com

LINK https://www.wsj.com/us-news/sn..._pos1&cx_testId=3&cx

The magnet idea would work, or a few strips of tape matching a letter.

Not saying what’s right or wrong, just saying.

Power washing the plates reflective material? How creative

Worked with a guy in college that daily'd a GSXR600. He'd pop a wheelie through the toll booth to avoid tolls.

More often than not, if you're on a motorcycle you can just ride the dotted line between lanes and the cameras wont see you.

$900 in tolls or $300 in fines?

$600 would buy a lot of creativity.

I have an adhesive 3" retro-reflective letter set that is made by the same company that prints my state's plates.

I have made a few for car shows that read 67SS396, AUTOBOTS, LO'N'SLO, 000 000, or making it blank, but when I bought my last truck I tacked on a plate from 1971 before driving it home with a signed title and bill of sale. So I got the most expired tag of the year award for '23 (and a friendly chat).

quote:

Originally posted by ZSMICHAEL:
This type of toll evasion has cost government agencies millions,

Boo hoo.

These liberal states would be better off using transponders affixed to the windshield, such as EZ Pass found in many more southern states.

Polatician speak. It's not "costing" anything. Not getting isn't the same as losing.


They have EZ Pass. But if you don't have it, they send you a bill in the mail.

Getting rid of the toll booths in places like the bridges in the city has a huge effect on keeping traffic moving.



On a slightly related note, my place of employment is going to plate reader for parking enforcement. My thought is, I need license plates on my car to drive on the road. Not to park in a parking lot. My plate number is none of your business. Want to check my parking permit status, get out and run the number off the windshield registration.


Getting ready to play games.

They’re not out a penny. Not one red cent. What they are out is charging you to use something you already paid for.

Put me in "boo hoo" camp. So people have one small way to not get fleeced by the government, one way out of the many ways every day they make a cushy living off our backs. Cry harder.

People hate tolls as you can see. When the toll booths were staffed drivers would keep the change for the toll on the dash. They would then use a glove and dump the tolls into the hand. Nice and hot handoff.
In the past Honda accords with Michelin tires would deliver a shock to the toll booth attendant.

Tolls on some roads like the PA Turnpike and all of the bridges in/out of NY have become ridiculously expensive so its no wonder people try and evade paying tolls. Bridges in NYC are 17 dollars to cross, if you don't have EZ-Pass or even if you do the tolls on the PA turnpike can take a deep bite out of your wallet especially if you have to use it daily. While I don't condone avoiding tolls I think government has motivated people to cheat because tolls are excessively high and go up every year.

1.5% unbillable. Quite a problem! And what happened to the jobs that were lost when the booths were shut down?

quote:

Originally posted by nhtagmember:
They’re not out a penny. Not one red cent. What they are out is charging you to use something you already paid for.

Exactly.

Who does a guy call to find out what percent of the funds collected went where ?

Down to the dollar.

Giving it all away that's where.

"...the George Washington Bridge is one of the most extensively used suspension bridges in the world, with 51 million annual vehicle crossings, equivalent to 100 million people per year. When a second lower level was added in 1962, the bridge totaled 14 lanes. Eastbound crossings are subject to a toll, which generates a revenue of about 1 million dollars per day and 350 million dollars per year.."

^ ($115 toll by mail for a tractor trailer)


" According to the New York State Department of Transportation (NYSDOT), approximately 105,000 vehicles use the Throgs Neck Bridge each day."

^ Passenger cars: $10.17
Five axel trucks: $55.05



"The MTA's seven bridges -- including the Triborough Bridge -- and two tunnels transport about 300 million vehicles each year. In turn, they generate over $1.6 billion in annual revenues (2017)"

I think we're forgetting there are 2 different topics here. Tolls being skipped is a bit like shoplifting. The rest of us eventually pay to make up for it. I am not in the camp that is amused.

The other part is the money collecting grift that is ever-increasing tolls without much voice or accountability. That portion sucks. One example; Many years ago here, Ed Rendell (remember him?) tried to sell TP to raise money which he was spending for the shithole that is Philly. That was stopped, but he did get the aforementioned TP to pay $300 mil into the general fund EVERY Year! Act 44 Plan started 2007 and in 2013 it was raised to $450 mil, and TP has never recovered and tolls go up every year now. Perhaps the most expensive fixed-price road in the country by mile (not bridges...).

quote:

Originally posted by ZSMICHAEL:

Some drivers have power-washed paint off their plates

I think people here in PA are starting to do that. I'll see license plates where half the paint is gone on a regular basis.