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The 40-mile stretch of Interstate 95 that serves as Rhode Island's transportation backbone is falling apart, despite several ambitious projects by the state to relieve congestion and improve safety on the well-traveled route between New York and Boston. Conditions on one I-95 bridge are bad enough that heavy trucks must find a different route to cross the Pawtucket River. A major viaduct in Providence needs replacing.

The needs are piling up. A recent study shows that Rhode Island must spend about $300 million more a year just to keep its current roads and bridges in good repair. That is twice as much as the state typically spends.

There is an obvious way to pay for the needed upkeep — make Interstate 95 into a toll road as it crosses the state. But that idea may be illegal. Ever since the interstate system was built, Congress has prohibited states from charging tolls on highways built with federal money. The constraint posed fewer problems when transportation money was easier to find. But now almost every other source of road funds is drying up, and several states are eyeing the possibility of collecting tolls on interstates that drivers now use for free.

Rhode Island is one. The state, says Michael Lewis, the director of the Rhode Island Department of Transportation, is running out of alternatives. "The tolling option," he says, "is what we think of as the least painful, most equitable, least impacting option to raise additional revenues that can be invested back in states’ infrastructure."

Virtually every state, like Rhode Island, faces a funding crunch for roads. The federal piggy bank for highway maintenance, a major funding source for states, is nearly empty. The bulk of its money is raised through the federal gas tax, which has not been increased since 1993. Despite several moves by Congress in the last three years to replenish the Highway Trust Fund, that money is expected to run out again by late 2012.

The consensus on Capitol Hill, where Congress is drafting a new highway funding bill, is that the new highway plan will have less money than in the past for transportation. That puts further pressure on states to find other sources for road repairs. States have been hesitant to raise their own gas taxes, too, and their poor fiscal conditions leave them with few options for finding money elsewhere in their budgets.

In Rhode Island, which has one of the highest state gas taxes in the country, the governor has tried to find more money for fixing roads by calling for increased vehicle registration fees and by pushing lower borrowing levels, which would free up money now spent on interest.

Exception to the rule

Adding tolls is nearly as unpopular with the public as raising the federal gas tax, but states are betting that motorists will pay higher fees if they get specific improvements in return.

Under current law, states are allowed to toll interstates if the roads had tolls before they became part of the national network, which is why so many states in the Northeast already charge tolls for driving on I-95. They also are allowed to put tolls on new roads that are not part of the Interstate Highway System. States can even add new carpool lanes to existing interstates, and charge money to use the faster lanes. But they generally cannot put tolls on previously toll-free interstate stretches built with federal money.