The toll-booth plan floated by Ward 8 Councilmember Marion Barry et al. is pretty much a farce on its face, so I almost hate to give it any further credibility by talking about it here. But the idea that you’d only put booths on major commuter routes is the reason that guarantees this plan will fail—commuters would end up cutting through residential neighborhoods full of prickly old folks who love calling their councilmembers to complain.

So, to do it right, you’d have to erect booths on every strip of pavement connecting to the city’s road network. How many is that? I went to Google Maps and started counting—-there’s about 170 border-crossing throughfares that commuters could use. I was going to write them all down but I got to about 40 before I gave up. (So that my work isn’t wasted, see the first 40, moving counterclockwise from Blue Plains, after the jump)

Assuming you actually need at least one human being at each of these booths, and assuming you’ll only staff them during commuter rush hours (7-10 a.m., 4-7 p.m.) and pay these bozos the $7 D.C. minimum wage, you’re looking at $1.9 million a year right there. And I don’t know how much it takes to build a toll booth.

Interstate 295
South Capitol Street
6th Street SE
Galveston Street SE
Barnaby Road SE
Bonini Road SE
Chesapeake Street SE
HR Drive SE
9th Street SE
Wheeler Road SE
12th Street SE
13th Street SE
Greater Southeast
Mississippi Avenue SE
22nd Street SE
23rd Street SE
24th Street SE
25th Street SE
Suitland Pkwy
30th Street SE
Naylor Road SE
Branch Avenue SE
Erie Street SE
34th Street SE
36th Street SE
36th Place SE
Suitland Road
Pennsylvania Avenue SE
Fort Dupont Street SE
41st Place SE
41st Street SE
42nd Street SE
Massachusetts Avenue SE
Beck Street SE
Stanley Street SE
Burns Street SE
Ridge Road SE
Bowen Road SE
46th Street SE
Reed Terrace SE
Easy Place SE