Crrrash!: Over 2,000 vehicles with deactivated ETC cards collide with barrriers

TOKYO April 2, 2005; Japan Today reported that more than 2,000 vehicles with deactivated electronic toll collection cards collided with barriers at ETC toll gates Friday across Japan as the drivers were unaware that one type of ETC card was no longer valid, Japan Highway Public Corp said.

The barrier in an ETC lane is designed to lift automatically when a vehicle with a valid ETC card approaches it. But information that a discount ETC card for large-lot users was abolished at the start of fiscal 2005 on Friday was apparently not disseminated to all drivers, the highway operator said. (Kyodo News)