Angry drivers’ road rage may be lessened by new Illinois State Toll Highway Authority projects.

The authority began selling its I-PASS transponder through its Web sites, www.illinoistollway.com and www.getipass.com, in June, said Joelle McGinnis, press secretary for the authority.

The online access to I-PASS seems to have boosted sales of the transponder.

“We’ve seen a steady increase of folks taking advantage of this since then,” McGinnis said.

The authority received about 300 applications per week in July, and averaged about 500 per week in August.

Rebecca Mabis, a junior textiles, apparel and merchandising major, uses the tollway to go home to East Moline. She has been looking into getting I-PASS and she said with the possibility of purchasing it online, she would probably get it pretty soon.

“I’m a big online shopper,” Mabis said.

Purchasing I-PASS online is the first phase in the authority’s new interactive I-PASS Web site, McGinnis said. The second part will follow toward the end of the year; it will allow customers to access their I-PASS account information online.

“We don’t have a go-date yet, but we’re projecting by the end of the year,” she said.

McGinnis sees online shopping as a big trend, and she thinks that the posters the authority has placed has helped boost sales.

“We have more than 950,000 transponders issued – that’s both passenger vehicles and commercial trucks,” she said. “We anticipate within the next few weeks that we’ll pass a million.”

McGinnis said by spring 2004, 37 new I-PASS-only lanes will be added to 22 locations across the system.

These new lanes, along with those already in place, will allow people to travel the system without stopping. The cost of this project will be about $8 million, with the funds coming from savings from other constructions projects this year.

“We’ve had some projects come in under budget,” she said.

The new lanes will be both mainline and ramp lanes; however, I-PASS-only lanes only will be included if the ramp already has three or more lanes, McGinnis said. This does not include the Peace Road ramp, which only has two lanes.

On Aug. 19, Gov. Rod Blagojevich signed an Illinois Senate bill that allows other uses for I-PASS. McGinnis explained that these other uses may include using I-PASS on the Chicago Skyway, at parking garages such as those at O’Hare and Midway airports and possibly even for purchasing gas.

Subhash Sharma, manager at the DeKalb BP Amoco, 920 W. Lincoln Highway, said using I-PASS probably would boost sales.

“It would be very handy,” he said.

He said many times people don’t want to carry cash, and this would be another easy way of purchasing gas.