Sure, at one point it was, but this plan didn't skip straight from completely open to express lane tolls. Twice as many people live here now as 30 years ago, an

Sure, at one point it was, but this plan didn't skip straight from completely open to express lane tolls. Twice as many people live here now as 30 years ago, and this road no longer has the capacity to support that kind of totally unrestricted use. Traffic in the area had become a problem, and the only real remedies are to incentivize less driving, incentivize more efficient driving (more occupants per vehicle), or build more road capacity (and find a way to pay for it, since existing revenues don't). At least to some degree this plan does all of those: preserves existing incentives to share vehicles by keeping HOV free and maintaining reasonable traffic speeds in HOV lanes, creates new disincentives to drive single-occupant in the form of high tolls, and funds a roadway expansion.