According to a recent New Haven Register/Sacred Heart University poll of about 800 south-central Connecticut residents, traffic is such a pressing issue that almost half the respondents would be willing to pay highway tolls if they funded transportation improvements.

While a Register editorial looked bleakly on this statistic as an indication that "people’s views about their cars are firmly set in Connecticut" and predicted tolls would have a hard time making a comeback, in fact the numbers seem major progress in toll-allergic Connecticut, which demolished its last toll booth years ago.

In response to the findings, Connecticut Fund for the Environment attorney Roger Reynolds contended that tolls would have further benefits. "If the money were applied toward measures that would actually reduce congestion, such as investment in the radically under-funded Metro-North New Haven Line, I suspect the support would have been even higher," he told MTR last week.