Muscovites have a special chord – Newspaper Kommersant No. 206 (7407) of 11/08/2022

The first toll road in Moscow will work immediately after the New Year. The fare on the Moscow High-Speed ​​Diameter (MSD), the former North-Eastern Chord, will be 950 rubles. regardless of the distance traveled and the type of vehicle. Owners of passenger cars with Moscow and Moscow Region numbers, as well as taxis with licenses issued in the capital region, will be exempted from payment. MSD will also be free for non-residents if, after entering the Central Ring Road, they stay in the capital region for more than a day. Experts interviewed by Kommersant believe that limiting transit is the only right decision, since the diameter is already in traffic jams today, while others fear the introduction of fares for Muscovites in the near future.

Since 2012, we recall, the city authorities have been building a system of chords to bypass the city center. Already open to traffic, the North-Eastern (it can be used to cross the city from north to south-east in half an hour) and the South-Eastern chord under construction are united under the name “Moscow High-Speed ​​Diameter”. Last July, the Moscow City Hall stated about plans to introduce paid travel for transit transport here. The MSD, representatives of the city authorities explained, is an intracity highway, and after the completion of the construction of the southern part of the diameter and joining it in the east of the M-12 Moscow-Kazan highway in 2023, a sharp increase in traffic is expected.

From January 2, 2023, transit users of the route will have to pay 950 rubles. regardless of the type of vehicle and the place of entry to the MSD. The fixed amount of the fee was chosen, since the main flow through the MSD is passenger cars, the press service of the department of transport explained to Kommersant.

• Free travel will be for all passenger cars and public transport with Moscow and Moscow region numbers, for taxis with a permit to work in the capital region and intercity buses.
• Trucks on MSD will only be able to drive with a pass, in which case no fee will be charged.
• Passenger cars with license plates of other regions will be able to pass for free if the car has spent more than a day within the borders of the Central Ring Road, and at least two hours have passed between entering the MSD and leaving it.

“In this way we will be able to determine the purpose of the trip: is it transit or not transit,” explained “Kommersant” in the department of transport. The same logic will allow Muscovites who use cars with non-resident registration to move around the city for free, assured Kommersant in the department, since they will not be considered “transit workers” (the probability that they will call in the Central Ring Road zone and leave it within a day, extremely low).

The passage will be controlled by cameras that read the numbers (free flow system). The driver will be able to pay using contactless transponders, through the application “Parking of Russia” or at “other sites”, they say in the deptrans.

The general payment scheme repeats the one already used on the Central Ring Road: road users will be given five days to voluntarily pay for the trip, then a fine is imposed, and if the car owner repays it within the next 20 days, the decision is canceled.

Sanctions for non-payment are described in the Code of Administrative Offenses, Kommersant was told in the deptrans: 1.5 thousand rubles. for passenger cars and 5 thousand rubles. for trucks or buses. The money collected for the fare will go to the city budget, Kommersant was assured, and the fines will go to the federal budget. The mayor’s office promises to regularly publish relevant reports.

“Transit through the city must be prevented,” says Alexander Shumsky, head of the Probok.net expert center. Traffic jams are already forming at MSD during peak hours, and after the launch of the southern part of the diameter and the connection of the M-12 to it, the situation may become more complicated, Vladimir Karulin, the author of the roads.ru project, believes. “The withdrawal of transit is a necessary measure,” he says. “In general, I have a negative attitude towards any restrictions. But it’s better to have paid travel on a high-speed intracity road than its absence.”

There are many alternative routes for transit – the Central Ring Road, the large and small concrete roads, the Moscow Ring Road, the Third Transport Ring, says Blue Buckets traffic coordinator Petr Shkumatov, the introduction of a fee will not cause serious inconvenience for car owners. The Moscow mayor’s office, he believes, could add to the list of taxis exempted from payment with permits, for example, the Kaluga region. Passenger taxis from other regions, as a rule, carry passengers to Moscow airports using the Central Ring Road and the Moscow Ring Road, says Stanislav Shvagerus, head of the Competence Center of the International Eurasian Taxi Forum. “Using paid transit through the MSD would be logical if the passenger is late, but then he himself will have to pay extra for it,” he says. “The number of out-of-town taxis (with permits from other regions.— “b”) in Moscow is minimal, since this is prohibited by law, except if the taxi carries a passenger from its region.

Vice-President of the National Automobile Union Anton Shaparin is sure that for Muscovites and residents of the region the new road will subsequently also become paid. “We have already seen this in the example of paid parking, when at first it was cheap and within the Garden Ring, and then they did it throughout the city,” he recalls. “The tariff itself is 950 rubles. need to be corrected. It is very expensive”.

MSD will be the first highway in Moscow with a paid fare. In 2023, the mayor’s office promises to open traffic along the Northern understudy of Kutuzovsky Prospekt, which is now being actively completed: an 11-kilometer highway will run from Moscow City to the Moscow Ring Road and is being built at the expense of the concessionaire New Concession Company LLC, which must also determine the tariff. The Moscow region, in turn, is building the Mytishchi chord, the Novolytkarinskoye highway and the understudy of the Yegoryevskoye highway, the Avtodor state company, the M-12 Moscow-Kazan highway. All these roads will also be paid.

Ivan Buranov