Raytheon HTMS tailors vehicle tracking technology to meet the specific needs of a worldwide clientele that includes motorists, concessionaires, and public agencies. Raytheon’s strengths in design, system engineering, system test, and program management result in high value, low risk solutions to the most challenging highway transportation projects.

Constructing New Toll Roads
Adding Tolls to Existing Roads
Upgrading a Toll Road System

In today’s business environment, constructing new toll roads is generally a Design Build Finance Operate (DBFO) or a Build To Operate (BTO) effort. Raytheon has collaborated extensively with toll road construction consortiums on both DBFO and BTO projects.

Depending on the size of the toll road project, total construction costs may range as high as US$1 billion. The consortium and its financial backers depend heavily upon the new toll system to recoup this huge up-front investment. With its emphasis on quality performance and reliability, Raytheon HTMS has proven its electronic toll systems meet the challenge. Furthermore, Raytheon HTMS has the backing of a large company, ensuring the kind of financial commitment that these types of contracts require.

Raytheon HTMS is proud to have provided systems for the Highway 407 program in Toronto, Canada and the Cross Israel Highway in Israel. Both projects were awarded to a concession to construct and operate the toll road. In each case Raytheon engineers worked with the road designers to provide the toll system on time for a successful toll road opening.

Limited public funding for new road construction has created an opportunity for the private sector to add additional road capacity. In the United States, one innovative method for generating revenue is the High Occupancy Toll (HOT) Lane. The concept is simple. Most of the existing high occupancy vehicle (HOV) lanes around the nation tend to have excess unused capacity. By adding a toll collection feature to these lanes, other motorists (who would not normally qualify) can now drive in the HOV lanes. Traffic congestion diminishes and the new toll fees help fund road upgrades that benefit everyone.

The HOT lanes toll system in Minnesota is based on elements of Raytheon’s open road Electronic Toll Collection (ETC) system. Consequently this new application uses proven technology. Installation on existing roads requires minimal infrastructure changes. Raytheon is providing a very reliable system, including mobile enforcement. A key characteristic is maintaining public confidence in the hot lane concept.

Often there are unique constraints placed on a public sector road operator. Raytheon HTMS understands these special needs and will tailor an innovative solution to fit each customer’s particular needs and restrictions. In the process of installing, testing and integrating a new system, Raytheon offers unrivalled flexibility.

For most of the 20th Century toll roads were a strictly manual operation, highly dependent upon attendants to collect the required fees. Technological improvements proved few and far between. The drawbacks to this collection method were obvious. Constant personnel training and turnover, attendant error, and lost revenue added up to high operating costs, but there was simply no viable alternative.

In the late 1970s, technology offered an exciting new approach: the electronic tag. A vehicle bearing one of these tags could be driven through a special unmanned lane, allowing an automated system to record the toll and issue a monthly bill to the vehicle’s owner. In the decades that followed, every major toll operator in North America and around the world implemented this lane-based type of Electronic Toll Collection.

That technology has been proven for many years now, producing a multitude of improvements in all aspects of ETC. Significant advances in the quality and reliability of hardware and software, from cameras to roadway sensors to optical character recognition (OCR) programs, translate into dramatic gains in total system performance. These improvements increase revenue generation and lower the costs of collecting tolls. For a road operator who is looking to upgrade an existing lane-based ETC or cash toll lane to an all ETC or hybrid (both cash and ETC) system, Raytheon can help make the transition. From generating the system’s specifications to its final sell-off, Raytheon can provide a superior product while minimizing the impact to the customer’s ongoing revenue collection.