Tolls are getting more expensive

Mexican Economics; If you have a hotel ( or trailer park) and your occupancy rate has dropped from say 80% to 40 % the simple solution is to double the rates. The next year the occupancy drops to 20% as the clients go elsewhere. You don't have enough customers to cover expenses so you just close!

Moisheh

briansue wrote:
I have a theory and I am sure there are lots of holes in it. But it seems with the high tolls there are relatively few Mexicans using the cuotas - and many of the RVers we know avoid them as well. So they charge more since they are not getting a return on investment so now even fewer people use these roads - so even less revenue. Maybe if they lower the tolls then more would use the roads and overall revenue would increase. Then again - with more traffic there would be higher maintenance costs. But all in all it seems to me lowering the tolls would bring in more money than raising them. Our experience has been that traffic on the cuotas is still very light compared with libres.

Not part of Mexican economics. The thinking is, if I can't make 300% profit, I will close the business. I know they can't close the business on toll highways so they will just continue to increase.

The SCT calculator has always worked for us and has been on mark almost 98% of the time. We're not a dually or a motorhome with tag axles, simply an auto with ejes excedentes (ligeros) so it is easy to calculate and dispute if need be.

I am surprised at reading on other forums here about all the toll expenses that are appearing now in the U.S. and how some feel they are not being charged correctly. Hmm, sounds familiar and I guess we are not alone.

We are for "libres".

I have a theory and I am sure there are lots of holes in it. But it seems with the high tolls there are relatively few Mexicans using the cuotas - and many of the RVers we know avoid them as well. So they charge more since they are not getting a return on investment so now even fewer people use these roads - so even less revenue. Maybe if they lower the tolls then more would use the roads and overall revenue would increase. Then again - with more traffic there would be higher maintenance costs. But all in all it seems to me lowering the tolls would bring in more money than raising them. Our experience has been that traffic on the cuotas is still very light compared with libres.

Yeah when the autopistas begin to cost more than the Pennsylvania Turnpike, you have to blame the higher land cost, labor, imported asphalt, the usual...

SCT has a route and toll calculator online you can use to determine what the tolls are going to be - if you can figure out how to use it. If you have more than one unit you have to calculate for each and add them together. Where it gets tricky is if they charge you as a bus and car or just how many axles - and then there is the per wheel rate if you have more than 2 wheels per axle - and then it depends and the person in the booth - we keep records of previous years and know the tolls have gone up - and we also use this calculator to try to plan ahead - though we can get a close guess we never know for sure - so we do use the libres when we can but if time matters we use the quota - we just drove from Valle de Juarez to Patzcuaro and paid no tolls as we were on the libre all the way. Use the following website to try to figure the best route and what the tolls might be........

http://aplicaciones4.sct.gob.mx/sibuac_internet/ControllerUI?action=cmdEscogeRuta

We have been using the libres over the last six months. Just as good and in my opinion just as safe. We see patrols on the libre as well. No issues whatsoever.