End of the Road - Why We Stopped Stopping for Tolls

In this episode Alex and Kelly pull over to the side of the road to examine one of the most visible victims of the digital age: the toll booth collector. Once a fixture of the American commute—the gatekeeper of the interstate who traded small talk for quarters—the human in the booth is rapidly becoming a ghost.

We explore the "pointlessness" of the manual role in an era where stopping a 4,000-pound vehicle to hand over a piece of paper is not just a bottleneck, but a major source of carbon emissions and highway accidents.

Join us as we explore the death of the toll plaza and what it tells us about our relentless pursuit of friction-less living. It’s a journey through the history of the highway, the rise of E-ZPass, and the quiet disappearance of the people who used to stand between us and the horizon.

Drop us a quick text and we’ll reply in the next episode!

Support the show

Dirt Nap City is the podcast about the most interesting dead people in history.
Subscribe and listen to learn about people you've heard of, but don't know much about.
Someday we'll all live in Dirt Nap City, so you should probably go ahead and meet the neighbors!