Q COSTARICA — The removal of the toll booths at Rio Segundo, Alajuela, on the autopista General Cañas, east of the San José airport, is expected to begin tonight, Monday, April 27.
Toll collections stopped on September 1, 2025, but the toll booths remained.
Many have expressed concerns about the risks of traffic slowing down to get through the tight tollbooth lanes. What’s even more concerning is that some drivers might not realize the tolls aren’t active and could stop unexpectedly, leading to accidents.
It wasn’t until last week that Costa Rica’s president, Rodrigo Chaves, directed the Ministry of Public Works and Transport (MOPT), led by Efraim Zeledón Leiva, to dismantle the toll booths.
From the perspective of this writer, as someone who drives that stretch of the autopista every day along with thousands of others, tearing them down should have been months ago. In fact, it ought to have been included from the moment the decision was made to stop charging tolls.
Nightly closures
The work will be carried out at night, from 9:00 pm to 5:00 am, with traffic in the San José-Alajuela direction suspended during those hours.
Complete closure of the San José-Alajuela will be at the Cervecería Costa Rica (Costa Rica Brewery, now Heineken) intersection, with traffic routed through Río Segundo, via route 3, to the Juan Santamaría International Airport intersection.
In the opposite direction, from Alajuela to San José, traffic flow will not be affected and will continue to operate normally.