The 90th anniversary of the U.S. Congress’s consent to the Delaware River Joint Toll Bridge Commission’s formation will occur on August, 30.
The Congressional action – completed on August 30, 1935 — was executed in accordance with the U.S. Constitution’s Compact Clause — Art. I, §10, cl.3. The ratification effectively codified respective identical state agreements establishing the Commission that were signed by New Jersey Governor A. Harry Moore on December 18, 1934 and Pennsylvania Governor Gifford Pinchot on December 19, 1934.
Although not yet fully empowered, the new Commission formally organized on December 28, 1934 in a meeting of representatives from New Jersey and Pennsylvania at the Bellevue-Stratford Hotel in Philadelphia, PA. The Commission’s formation was the final agenda item for a predecessor body — the former Joint Commission for Elimination of Toll Bridges – Pennsylvania-New Jersey – that the two states established in 1916 to facilitate the acquisition and freeing of private toll bridges that once operated along the river.
The former “Joint Commission” was immediately disbanded upon the creation of the new “Bridge Commission,” which was bestowed powers that exceeded its predecessor agency’s narrow service mission. The most notable changes included authorization for issuing bonds to construct new highway bridges and collecting tolls to retire bonding debts and offset operating costs. Indeed, the newly constituted Bridge Commission had a broader and more future-oriented purpose: maintaining 19th century and early-20th century river crossings while constructing new high-volume bridges to handle rising levels of motor-vehicle traffic between the two states.
The driving force behind the Commission’s creation was the pressing need for a modern-highway bridge between Easton, Pa. and Phillipsburg, N.J. The Northampton Street Bridge – nearing 40 years old at that time — was the lone vehicular crossing linking those two Industrial Age communities. That three-lane structure increasingly was overwhelmed by crippling traffic backups – even during the depths of the Great Depression. (Digitized film footage of the Depression-era traffic jams at Easton and Phillipsburg has been posted on the DRJTBC’s YouTube channel and may be viewed here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lWwXWEu0Cfg&t.)
Once established, the DRJTBC quickly endeavored to build a second vehicular bridge between Easton and Phillipsburg. Construction began in 1936 and the resulting structure – originally called the Bushkill Street Bridge – formally opened January 14, 1938. After “superhighway” approaches were constructed through Easton to the bridge in the 1950s, the structure was renamed the Easton-Phillipsburg Toll Bridge. The bridge, which carries U.S. Route 22, has retained that name ever since.
Over the ensuing 33 years, the Commission constructed five additional highway-speed river toll bridges. Like Easton-Phillipsburg, all of these bridges had accompanying facilities where cash tolls could be collected in both directions. They were with their respective opening year:
- Trenton-Morrisville (Route 1) in 1952
- Portland-Columbia (Routes 611, 46, 94) in 1953
- Delaware Water Gap (I-80) in 1953
- Milford-Montague (Route 206) in 1953
- New Hope-Lambertville (Route 202) in 1971
Although constructed through the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation, the I-78 Toll Bridge between Williams Township, PA. and Phillipsburg, N.J. opened as the Commission’s seventh toll bridge in November 1989. The Commission has operated and maintained it ever since. The Commission also is responsible for the bridge’s approaches in Pennsylvania (2.25 miles) and New Jersey (4.2 miles).
Unlike the prior toll bridges, tolls were collected only in the PA-bound direction at I-78. The Commission had initiated a multi-year process of converting its toll bridges to PA-bound collections-only in June 1989 – at Easton-Phillipsburg, Portland-Columbia, and Delaware Water Gap. Another toll-collection advancement occurred 13 years later – in late 2002 – when the Commission augmented its cash toll collections with E-ZPass electronic toll paying at all tolling points.
Under a series of changes made to its Compact between 1984 and 1987, the Commission also owns, operates, and maintains 12 non-toll bridges that were once jointly owned by the states of New Jersey and Pennsylvania. The two states purchased each of those river crossings from respective former local shareholder-owned companies with the assistance of the former Joint Commission for Elimination of (Private) Toll Bridges. The acquisition of these former private toll bridges occurred between 1918 and 1932. Under the Compact changes of the 1980s, the states conveyed ownership of these bridges outright to the Commission and directed that the Commission operate and maintain them by using a portion of the revenue it collects at its toll bridges.
Prior to the Commission’s ownership, the costs of operating and maintaining the non-toll bridges were financed by appropriations from the two states. Since toll revenues currently provide the sole source of support, the Commission now refers to these non-toll bridges as “toll-supported bridges.” (Note: There is no such thing as a “free bridge;” someone is paying for the bridge somewhere.)
These legacy bridges are (from south to north): Lower Trenton (“Trenton Makes”), Calhoun Street, Washington Crossing, New Hope-Lambertville, Centre-Bridge-Stockton, Lumberville-Raven Rock (pedestrian), Uhlerstown-Frenchtown, Upper Black Eddy-Milford, Riegelsville, Northampton Street (Easton-Phillipsburg), Riverton-Belvidere, and Portland-Columbia (pedestrian).
During its nine decades of operations, the Commission also cared for – but never owned – the following bridges (listed south to north):
- Yardley-Wilburtha – decimated by 1955 flood, shut down in May 1961
- Lumberville-Raven Rock covered bridge with one steel span – closed for safety reasons June 1945
- Point Pleasant-Byram – destroyed by 1955 flood
- Upper Mount Bethel-Delaware – removed from service April 9, 1954
- Portland-Columbia covered wooden bridge – closed to vehicular traffic in 1953; destroyed by 1955 flood
- Milford-Montague through-truss bridge (13-feet-11-inch-wide road deck) – closed 1953
The Commission also controlled and maintained the former highway bridge at Scudder Falls (I-95) from June 22, 1961 to June 30, 1987. Ownership of this bridge was assumed by the Commission on July 1, 1987 through its 1987 Compact reauthorization. This bridge was removed from service shortly after the Commission completed construction of the first span of its eighth toll bridge – the Scudder Falls (I-295) Toll Bridge – in July 2019.
Unlike its prior seven toll bridges, the one at Scudder Falls was outfitted with a cashless highway-speed all-electronic (AET) toll-collection facility – an open-road overhead gantry outfitted with cameras and other toll-assessment equipment to collect tolls through E-ZPass and TOLL BY PLATE license plate billing through the U.S. Mail.
The Commission is now amid its 90th year of operations and is advancing a multi-staged transitional process to convert all of its former cash-collection tolling points to highway-speed cashless AET facilities — like at Scudder Falls – in the coming years.
Photo of top of 74th Congress’s Delaware River Joint Toll Bridge Commission Act – c.833, 49 Stat. 1058:
