E-ZPass transponders with cartopped canoes

This winter I've returned to scouting girl's high school basketball players for the first time in 10 years, and last week I drove into Middle Village, Queens, New York City, to watch Olivia Vukosa at Christ the King High School and to eat some real pizza at Rosa's.

However, I was shocked to find out that the tolls on the MTA bridges into NYC have risen to an astronomical $11.19 USD and that you now have to pay the toll in both directions. So, I decided to get a New York State E-ZPass transponder in order to get toll discounts in the ~20 states that recognize E-ZPass.

Which made me think of all the times I've traveled the toll roads, bridges and tunnels in those states with one or more canoes on the roofs of my vehicles. Since the E-ZPass transponder is supposed to be mounted near the top of the windshield about an inch to the side of the rear view mirror, I'm sure a boat on the roof would block the path of the RF signal from the transponder. I have no idea whether an E-ZPass RF signal can pass through the various materials canoes are made of, but I doubt it.

Do any of you have experience with, or work-arounds for, making sure an E-ZPass transponder works while cartopping a canoe. Us poor folks who've been on the dole for 15-25 years have so save as many pennies as we can. Uh, make that nickels now.

Glenn MacGrady said:

This winter I've returned to scouting girl's high school basketball players for the first time in 10 years, and last week I drove into Middle Village, Queens, New York City, to watch Olivia Vukosa at Christ the King High School and to eat some real pizza at Rosa's.

However, I was shocked to find out that the tolls on the MTA bridges into NYC have risen to an astronomical $11.19 USD and that you now have to pay the toll in both directions. So, I decided to get a New York State E-ZPass transponder in order to get toll discounts in the ~20 states that recognize E-ZPass.

Which made me think of all the times I've traveled the toll roads, bridges and tunnels in those states with one or more canoes on the roofs of my vehicles. Since the E-ZPass transponder is supposed to be mounted near the top of the windshield about an inch to the side of the rear view mirror, I'm sure a boat on the roof would block the path of the RF signal from the transponder. I have no idea whether an E-ZPass RF signal can pass through the various materials canoes are made of, but I doubt it.

Do any of you have experience with, or work-arounds for, making sure an E-ZPass transponder works while cartopping a canoe. Us poor folks who've been on the dole for 15-25 years have so save as many pennies as we can. Uh, make that nickels now.

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Use mine al the time with canoe on top and no issues, for Royalex, Kevlar or aluminum.

I don't know about any such Ezpass experience, since I tend to avoid or rarely travel where such is necessary. But I do know that with a carbon canoe overhead that satellite radio signal has a difficult time punching through to the roof mounted antenna. Not had any problem with wood or kevlar. I think there was a thread regarding that some time ago. I would be surprised if a windshield mounted transceiver had problems, unless I was transporting a long overhead forward extended carbon C4 or voyager canoe

Never had a problem with either my car or truck.

I’ve driven through EZ Pass tolls in PA and NY with fiberglass and royalex canoes without issue.

That said, your account and transponder is also referenced to your license plate, which they take a picture of every time you pass the toll station. If the transponder isn’t picked up, and they rely on your plate, they would theoretically still charge your EZ Pass account.

Two EZ pass stories:

Roll back the calendar to pre-pandemic years. Remember, paying cash for tolls was an option? Maryland used to charge us to maintain an EZ pass account, so my wife and I shared a transponder. Our local travel patterns didn't have tolls, so we'd just grab the transponder if we were traveling through tolled areas. Once I left home and thought I’d forgotten the EZ pass. I pulled up to a toll booth to pay the human, but an electronic sign flashed "toll paid, EZ pass," and the attendant waved me through. It turns out the EZ pass was in the console, beneath other stuff, but the EZ pass reader still picked it up. So, the transponder signal is robust and does not need line of sight to the reading device.

About two years ago, MDOT turned off the electronic signs at the Baltimore Harbor Tunnel, the ones that displayed the "toll paid, EZ pass" message. At the time, I was making a lot of trips through the tunnel with a boat on the roof, and after a few times not seeing the message I assumed the system wasn't reading the EZ pass. I kept the EZ pass in a little detention at the center of the dashboard. I thought maybe that was the problem--the boat was blocking the signal to the reading device--so I began picking up the EZ pass and holding it in different positions as I passed through the unmanned toll booth. Still, I wasn't getting the "toll paid..." display. MDOT charges more for the toll when they have to look up your plate, and I started seeing the higher rate applied on our account. My conclusion was that there was something wrong with the EZ pass. So, I visited the MDOT office to try to rectify the problem. The MDOT lady pulled up a photo of me behind the wheel, EZ pass in hand, as I passed through the toll area. She told me the device is working fine, it just wasn't properly mounted in the specified spot under the rear view mirror. Upon questioning, the MDOT lady told me the "toll paid..." sign hadn't been working for months. When asked, "when will MDOT fix it?" her reply was "it's not broken, they just turned it off." I was dumbfounded and a little pissed off. To add insult to injury, on the trip to visit the EZ pass office, you have to pay the toll at the tunnel, take an exit immediately after the toll station, and then the only way to get back on route is to enter south of the toll and pay the toll again. Applicable to Glen's question, the system was reading my EZ pass, sitting on the dash, boat on the roof, it just didn't read it when I picked it up and held it to the windshield. I don't know why, but apparently a boat on the roof was immaterial.

When I bought my Hornbeck I was concerned about this too. But despite being directly over the transponder it has no effect.


On a related issue there is now a scam going around that involves ez-pass, I’ve gotten it twice. It claims your transponder wasn’t working when you went through a toll and you must visit the linked website within 24 hours or face huge fines. It was a no brainer to me that it was a scam as my number is not linked to our ez-pass and although the grammar wasn’t too bad it ended with something like ‘have a wonderful day’ checking the origination phone number it started with ‘63’ which is the country code for the Philippines. The usps scam about a customs problem that I’ve gotten had the same ‘63’ code. They obviously have my number. Be careful out there.
Jim

Just adding on to what's already been said...I've never had an issue with my EZ-Pass when a canoe is overhead. That said, I do need to position the canoe properly if I'm going to receive satellite radio reception while traveling. Just my 2 cents on the topic.

That's all for now. Take care and until next time...be well.

snapper

Multiple canoes and thousands of miles delivering canoes with my ez pass and never had an issue.

Toll roads usually use RFID chip technology, the receiver is located very close to the vehicle, for example on the structure of an overhead signs/cameras at at the average height of the transponder. It's similar to the anti-theft devices used by stores, those are RF, they just detect a "chip" passing, no other data can be obtained. RFID as the name indicates can transmit data to identify the vehicle.

I've been driving with a canoe up top and E-Z pass for years and never had a problem anywhere that the pass is useable.