Driving north on Interstate 95 and approaching the Fort McHenry Tunnel, I find it interesting that so much effort was paid to mark the pavement in the left lane “E-ZPASS ONLY.” It seems like this creates a number of problems as those in the lane without having one of the electronic toll payment transponders begin to panic. This occurs as the roadway is about to divide and probably leads some to think they need to get ALL the way over to the right or risk getting a ticket for non electronic-payment of their toll.
It seems to be like there is plenty of space between the end of the tunnel, and the toll booths for someone to move over a lane or two to pay their toll the old-fashioned way. It seems like there are a lot of crashes on the northbound side before the tunnel and one has to wonder if this unnecessary alert isn?t partly responsible.
Robert writes: “I read with interest your article ?New Technology …? in the April 14 edition of The Examiner. However, the notion of a parking meter which resets itself is true American Capitalism, trying to stamp out any notion of a ?free lunch? for the American consumer. By God, we?ll squeeze every penny out of ?em! What won?t they think of next!?
“That?s actually what got me thinking about what I?m interested in discussing with you. As you?re well aware, escalating gasoline prices have been getting lots of ink since the Arab oil embargo back in the early ?70s and the ?I remember when…? is an inevitable part of that as well. I, for one, pine for the days when regular leaded was 33 cents. However, we?ll probably see little of any significant reduction in gasoline prices for the rest of my and your lifetime. And that?s related to this mystery: the Toyota Eco-Spirit. Have you heard of this little item? I can?t remember how I heard of it, but boy was I disappointed to learn that Toyota, a car manufacturer that makes one of the best-selling cars in the world, the Corolla, had also come up with another model which, if put into production probably would dwarf the Corolla in sales. Why? Because the little Eco-Spirit was said to have achieved more than 100 mpg!”
The Eco-Spirit is (was?) a diesel-electric hybrid that Toyota scratched in 2002 for the Prius hybrid. One would think that there might be a pretty good market these days for a four-seat car that could get that kind of mileage.
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