Toll collectors look back on a near

There, the former Turnpike toll collector can view any of 62 toll plazas on the Turnpike and adidas obuv 2015 Garden State Parkway, including the one 22 miles away in Jersey City where he used to breathe exhaust fumes in a tiny booth.Being a toll collector was part change maker, part tour guide. Once, a New Yorker with his family wanted to know how to get to some lake in Michigan.It also helped to have extra layers of skin when dealing with co workers who had more zingers than Don Rickles.”It was like abuse city during the day,” Quirk recalled. “It could be about your weight, about your looks, about your current girlfriend, about your vehicle. But it made your day go by.”Pretty soon, memories will be all that are left. Full time Turnpike toll collectors, once part of a more than 800 strong army they even wore military style uniforms and reported to superiors who wore stripes now number 200, as drivers increasingly opt for the shorter lines they get with E ZPass electronic tolling. Turnpike.About three of every four drivers on the Turnpike and Parkway use E ZPass, a trend that points to toll takers going the way of the ice truck. Unions agreed to salary cuts of about 25 percent from around $65,000 a year to $49,500 annually by the end of the contract.Turnpike officials could eliminate toll collecting jobs when the contract expires June 30, 2013, but admit it will be harder to go to all electronic tolling on the Turnpike a ticketed system highway where half the traffic is from out of state and much of it includes 18 wheelers than on the Parkway.Quirk has left the tollbooth, but the tollbooth hasn left him.”It was a great life experience at the time,” he said.A daily rider would be short 50 cents, and the toll collector would say, “I put in for you, give it to me the next time you see me.”There was a sense of community. Newspaper delivery truck guys would ask the collector how many people were working that shift, then leave copies for all.Collectors had phones in the booth that they could use to call operations supervisors to report accidents, intoxicated drivers or roadway debris.After rush hour, the phone was used as a party line.”You could talk to the other collectors in the other booths,” Quirk said. “So in the morning, you be talking: Hey, the Mets. The Giants. What did you do last light? Where did you go?”Collectors found out which celebrities paid their tolls at the various exits. Yankees greats Yogi Berra and Phil Rizzuto were often seen at Exit 14. Bayonne boxer Chuck Wepner came through 14C frequently, bantering with toll takers who called him “Champ.”Robert Sciarrino/The Star LedgerA section of the the New Jersey Turnpike by Exit 14 Newark Airport.Collectors went to each other weddings and the christenings of their children. Quirk, 56, didn have weekends off for 25 years until he got his current job in 2003.Then there were the personalities of the toll takers. Jimmy Herrera over at 16W used to be known as the “Candy Man” for giving out hard candy to patrons. Oddly, a woman at Exit 13A changed her rubber gloves after seemingly every transaction. Others would adorn their booths with mini Christmas trees, and occasionally a startled traveler around Halloween would look up to find a toll collector wearing a mask.Michael Rockland adidas obuv velkosti experienced characters of another sort on the Turnpike. “Like the time I drove from Exit 9 to Exit 8A and all I had was a $20 bill. This guy glowers at me and says, do you think I running here, a bank? previously wrote to Gov. Brendan Byrne and suggested it would be better for the image of New Jersey if toll collectors said thank you.