CHICAGO — Commuters will soon be paying more when they pass through the Skyway.
Starting Jan. 1, the Skyway will raise its toll for two-axle cars to $5.60 — a 30-cent increase. Workers have already taped over toll rates on signs in anticipation of the change.
The Skyway has a full list of toll rates and how they’ll change online.
The Skyway, which is run by a private vendor, will continue to accept cash, credit card and I-Pass payments.
The City of Chicago leased the 7.8-mile Skyway in 2005 for $1.83 billion, the first of a series of controversial privatization deals under then-Mayor Richard M. Daley. It was the first privatization of a toll road in the country.
The lease runs for 99 years and allows the operator to increase tolls on the road, which was built by the city in 1958 to connect the Dan Ryan Expy. to the Indiana Toll Road.
The initial lease was with a group called the Cintra-Macquarie Consortium, a Spanish-Australian investment partnership that operated it as Skyway Concession Co.
In 2015, Skyway Concession sold the lease for nearly $1 billion more than it paid. Three of Canada’s largest pension plans bought the lease for $2.8 billion.
When the city first leased the Skyway, tolls for cars were $2.
Under the agreement, tolls were allowed to be hiked to $2.50 by 2008, $3 until 2011, $3.50 until 2013, $4 until 2015, $4.50 until 2017, and $5 in 2017. Later adjustments can be equal to the greater of 2 percent per year or the annual increase in inflation.