BY STEFANIE BOWMANN, Eastern Shore Post
Just as the tunnel boring machine nicknamed “Chessie” performed its work on the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel’s nearly $756 million parallel tunnel, so the bridge’s traffic and revenue numbers climb: slowly and steadily.
Although the most recent traffic numbers dipped slightly — nearly 4.24 million vehicles crossed in 2024, compared to about 4.32 million vehicles in 2023 — the numbers are trending up overall, said Tom Anderson, bridge-tunnel deputy executive director of finance and operations.
For example, only about 4.04 million vehicles crossed in 2019, around a year before the COVID-19 pandemic began.
The numbers do not include vehicles that are exempt from tolls, such as bridge-tunnel and Virginia State Police vehicles.
The effects of COVID-19-era travel restrictions were evident in 2020, when around 3.35 million vehicles crossed — a drop of about 17%.
The travel restrictions made a “major impact on traffic … particularly, in April and May of 2020,” Anderson said.
But the bridge-tunnel recovered quickly, with more than 4.2 million vehicles crossing in both 2021 and 2022.
The quick recovery was due in part to the bridge-tunnel’s business being based more heavily on commercial and tourist travel than on commuters, many of whom switched to working from home during the pandemic, Anderson said.
Revenues are similarly on the rise. The bridge-tunnel collected nearly $64.8 million in tolls in 2019. That number dropped to about $52.4 million in 2020 but recovered to more than $67 million in both 2021 and 2022.
“Once vaccines were widely available … our traffic really jumped up. There was obviously a lot of pent-up demand from people that wanted to go out and take vacations and … enjoy themselves,” Anderson said.
“Since that time period, things have been relatively stagnant,” possibly due to “high inflation … higher gas prices and just higher prices for everything in general,” Anderson said.
He noted that although fewer cars and light trucks are crossing, activity by commercial vehicles has increased.
Drivers paid nearly $68.9 million in bridge-tunnel tolls in 2023. Despite a slight decrease in traffic in 2024, revenue increased to nearly $76.7 million due to toll increases.
On Jan. 1, 2024, the cost of a one-way trip across the bridge-tunnel rose from $14 to $16 during the off-peak season and from $18 to $21 during the peak season of May 15 through Sept. 15.
Overall, bridge-tunnel traffic gains have met expectations. “If you go back and look at the longer-term trends … traffic growth in the 1-to-2% range is pretty typical,” Anderson said.
These trends align with predictions made in a traffic and revenue analysis that was completed prior to financing the construction of the parallel tunnel at Thimble Shoals, he said.
Anderson noted that the analysis predicted continued incremental growth but “did not include any growth in traffic that’s induced by the completion of the parallel tunnel project.”
The project is now expected to be completed in early 2028.
