NJ Drivers Pay $27 Per 1,000 Miles in Tolls, 2nd Highest in U.S.

New Jersey drivers already know the drill: merge, pay, repeat. But now there’s a number attached to the pain. At $26.92 per 1,000 miles driven, New Jersey ranks second in the country for toll burden, more than three times the national average of $8.57 among toll-collecting states, according to a new study.

That figure comes from the Toll Burden Index, compiled by Missouri law firm Beck & Beck using 2023 Federal Highway Administration data on highway revenue and vehicle-miles traveled. By dividing each state’s total toll revenue by total miles driven, the study puts a per-mile price tag on what commuters absorb without necessarily thinking about it as a line item.

Only Delaware costs more, at $41.12 per 1,000 miles. New York comes in third at $22.10, and Pennsylvania sits fourth at $18.68. So every state bordering New Jersey lands in the top five. Not a coincidence. This is the Northeast’s toll corridor, and it runs right through our backyard.

New Jersey pulled in $2.1 billion in total toll revenue in 2023, third nationally behind New York ($2.65 billion) and Florida ($2.40 billion). What’s striking is the density. The state logged 78,007 million vehicle-miles traveled, a moderate number compared to larger states, but the Turnpike, the Garden State Parkway, and the Atlantic City Expressway pack enough toll infrastructure to generate revenue that rivals states with far more road miles. That’s a heavy load squeezed into a small footprint.

The timing stings. At the start of 2026, drivers were already absorbing a 3% toll increase on both the Parkway and the Turnpike, a bump in E-ZPass fees, and a scheduled gas tax hike of 4.2 cents per gallon. So the per-mile toll burden in next year’s data could climb even higher. Not a small thing for someone commuting from Toms River to Newark five days a week.

Danielle Zanzalari, assistant professor of economics at the Stillman School of Business at Seton Hall University, said larger companies operating in the Northeast already price tolls into their cost structure alongside taxes, wages, and real estate.

“However, for industries that rely heavily on transportation such as logistics or distribution, higher toll costs can raise overall costs and affect routing or location at the margin,” Zanzalari said. “Most visibly is on the consumer side of things, as commuters effectively bear these recurring expenses, which can influence commuting decisions, job choice and where people choose to live.”

That last part matters. Central Jersey has spent years pitching itself as a reasonable alternative to Manhattan’s costs. Companies like Johnson & Johnson in New Brunswick and Merck in Rahway anchor a serious commercial corridor. But if the workers driving Route 1 every day are quietly doing the math on whether the commute pencils out, toll burden is part of that calculation. So is the question of where the next distribution center or regional office lands.

Still, 27 states collect tolls at all. The other 23 don’t. California, with its massive road network and sprawling commuter population, charges just $2.01 per 1,000 miles. New Jersey’s burden is more than 13 times that. Thirteen times.

ROI-NJ first reported on the study’s findings and their implications for the state’s competitiveness.

The counterargument from Trenton has always been that tolls fund infrastructure, and the Turnpike and Parkway are generally in better shape than roads in states that fund nothing through user fees. Fair enough. But the workers paying those tolls aren’t getting a rebate because the pavement is smooth. They’re just paying. Every exit, every commute, every year the rates edge up.

For anyone riding NJ Transit and feeling smug about it, don’t. Fares are their own story. The toll data just quantifies what drivers in this state have known for years. Moving around New Jersey costs money. A lot of it.