Lower-than-projected use and revenue could trigger rate increases on the Dulles Toll Road in advance of the previously anticipated 2028 time frame.
Total toll road revenue for 2025 was down 2.3% year-over-year to $198.4 million in 2025, according to figures presented yesterday (Wednesday) to a Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority (MWAA) board of directors committee.
Though the road’s usage rose from 70.9 million vehicles in 2024 to 72.3 million in 2025, last year’s total was 4% below forecast. Shortfalls were greatest in the final three months of 2025.
“It’s not getting better,” Kate Hanley, a former Fairfax County board chair who now represents Virginia on the MWAA board, said at the finance committee’s May 19 meeting.
Hanley said she took the Dulles Toll Road from her home to attend the meeting in Arlington, and “there was nobody on the road this morning.”
MWAA last increased toll road costs in January 2023, with the expectation — but not guarantee — that they wouldn’t need to rise again until five years later.
At the finance committee meeting, MWAA board member Taylor Chess, another Virginia representative, said that, given tepid revenue levels, bringing the rate increase forward at least should be open for consideration.
“We should just look at that,” he said.
Andrew Rountree, the authority’s vice president for finance, said timing of a rate increase is one of the topics being studied by a consultant, with a report slated to be released later this year.
Despite sluggish revenue growth, there’s no imminent threat to the 14-mile toll road’s economic stability, Roundtree told the committee.
“We have significant reserve funds on the toll road side, and we can draw upon those funds as needed,” he said.
Rountree said fees charges to drivers would be just one element of the consultant’s report. It also would look at transportation changes that have occurred in recent years.
Among those changes: the widening of Route 7 from Reston to Tysons, completed in 2024, has resulted in some drivers commuting to and from Loudoun County to use that free road rather than the Dulles Toll Road.
By one measure, the toll road is a cash cow. Net operating income for 2025 was $152.4 million, up 1% from a year before, according to data presented at the meeting.
Annual operating expenses for 2025 totaled just $31.1 million, down 11.1% owing largely to lower transaction fees charged to MWAA by the Virginia Department of Transportation for E-ZPass management.
Last year also saw revenue from ticketing violators rise to $8.4 million, an 8% increase, and investment income increased from 2024 to more than $34 million.
But the operating budget only provides a partial picture. Some of the excess revenue from toll road operations provides funds needed for interest and principal payments on road bonds, significantly cutting into annual financial surpluses.
While MWAA operates the Dulles Toll Road, it does so using a completely separate fund from airport operations. Funds from the two are not commingled, Rountree said.
For the first four months of 2026, total toll road revenue was $64.6 million, 0.1% above 2025 figures but 0.5% below budget. The number of vehicles using the road for the quarter totaled 23.3 million, up 2.8% from the same period during 2025 and up 2% from forecast levels.
Current toll road rates for two-axle vehicles, a category that includes most passenger vehicles, are $4 for E-ZPass and $5.60 for pay-by-plate at the main plaza, while ancillary ramp use costs $2 and $3.60.
The vast majority of toll road travelers use E-ZPass as opposed to the pay-by-plate option. Cash options and tollbooths themselves were eliminated in 2023.
