Rhode Island will receive around $200,000 out of the $9 million in legal fees it had requested from the association that sought to topple the state’s ability to toll large tractor trailers on its highways, a federal judge ruled Friday.
John J. McConnell, chief judge of the U.S. District Court in Providence, rejected a motion by the American Trucking Associations (ATA) seeking to recoup $21 million in attorney fees from its 2018 lawsuit challenging the overall truck tolling system created under the Gina Raimondo-era RhodeWorks program.
Rhode Island’s tolling system went live in June 2018 with each of its 13 highway gantries charging an average toll of $3. A truck paid a toll only once in each direction, could not pay more than $40 per day, and could not pay more than $20 for making a single “through trip” from Connecticut to Massachusetts…