WINDSOR, Ont. – Medium-duty truck operators were facing a whopping 300 per cent increase in Ambassador Bridge tolls this spring until bridge management was deluged with calls from angry carriers and the offices of local mayors.

It all began when new tolls, to take effect May 1, were posted in mid-April at tollbooth windows. But the rates for two- and three-axle vehicles were inappropriately based on figures for larger trucks, bridge management said.

“It was a segment of our business which our auditors didn’t understand and kind of overlooked,” Ambassador Bridge president Dan Stamper admitted. “We started with a four- or five-axle base number and went up from there. And if you allocate that to two and three axles, it was a huge increase.”

After complaints, it didn’t take long for management to reverse gears. Revised lists were quickly tacked up. A two-axle vehicle will now pay $3.25, while three axles will face a $6 charge to cross. Four- to five-axle vehicles will pay $9.50, which is the amount originally set for the smaller trucks. Vehicles with a higher number of axles will pay incrementally more, up to $21 for 12 axles.

Stamper said the increase was to adjust for the continuing differential in the Canada/U.S. exchange rate. “It still isn’t adjusted,” he said. “On the trucks it’s (still) like a 15 per cent exchange rate in Canada.” The last increase was “several years ago,” he added.

Stamper said the money pays for bridge improvements, such as the construction of a new truck ramp into Windsor. That work is to begin late this year, although the plan is contingent on acquiring one last piece of property.

The company has also enlarged its offsite Windsor inspection facility by five or six acres, and intends to construct a building as large as 90,000 square feet to house Customs officers and brokers.

Warren DeWolfe, general manager of Windsor-based Thompson Emergency Freight, said the initial increase caught his 175-truck company unaware. “I was pretty upset about it.” And he said it was difficult getting answers from bridge management.

“Apparently nobody wanted to talk to anybody from the trucking companies. Maybe they had to pay for all that new paint they’re putting on the bridge,” he joked. (The bridge is in the middle of a dramatic repaint to change its color to a shade of teal.)

Thompson’s fleet consists of Econoline to five-tonne trucks and specializes in just-in-time loads. One of its main customers is General Motors.

“We probably have a minimum of 120 trucks cross the bridge a day. That 300 per cent increase would have severely hurt us,” DeWolfe said.

For his part, Stamper said that, when protests arose, he spent “a considerable amount of time” on the phone with truck firms and “understand their business a lot better now.” The bridge processes 10,000 commercial vehicles a day, a “very small” per cent of which are smaller trucks. “And that’s one of the reasons that was overlooked.”

The toll change is just for payment in Canadian currency. There was no change for payment in U.S. funds. n