Economy 2 April 2025, 1:40pm

Hungarian toll road operator was a goldmine in 2024

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In 2024, more than HUF 656 billion was paid into the Hungarian budget as tolls from vehicles over 3.5 tonnes. According to Tamás Bartal, President and CEO of the National Toll Payment Services Ltd. (NÚSZ), the majority of this amount was paid by drivers of foreign vehicles: on average, they paid HUF 4 billion more e-toll per month than drivers of vehicles with Hungarian registration plates.

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According to the national toll road operator, operators of foreign lorries using Hungarian roads paid almost HUF 350 billion to the Hungarian budget in 2024.

By far the highest amount, almost HUF 132 billion, was paid by foreign companies for Romanian lorries to use the Hungarian road network last year.

Polish lorries came in second with HUF 48 billion paid, followed by Bulgarians with over HUF 33 bn paid into state coffers via NÚSZ.

The e-toll system, which is pay-as-you-go, underwent its biggest overhaul since its introduction at the beginning of last year. In line with the EU's 'polluter pays' directive, an external cost charge was introduced on 1 January 2024 to recover the costs of air, noise and CO2 pollution caused by road transport.

Last year, the external cost charge accounted for approximately 26% of the total toll revenue collected from vehicles above 3.5 tonnes.

The other element of the e-toll, which is designed to recover the costs of constructing, maintaining, operating and developing tolled sections of primary roads, accounted for 74% of the revenue.

Buses

Also last year, buses with a maximum permissible weight of more than 3.5 tonnes were transferred to the electronic toll system, and from 1 April 2024, their operators can no longer pay for their tolls by purchasing an e-vignette, but have to pay the HU-GO e-toll system based on the distance travelled by their vehicles.

In 2024, operators of buses and coaches, which are classified as heavy goods vehicles, contributed just over HUF 16 billion to the domestic toll revenue, of which 2.5% came from these vehicles. The largest share of toll revenue, 97.5% was generated by tolls levied on lorries.

Total e-toll and e-vignette revenue of NÚSZ soared by over 80% last year to HUF 804.05 billion,

with e-toll revenues up 114% at HUF 656 billion and e-vignette revenues up 16.3% year-on-year at HUF 148 billion.

New toll roads ahead

The Ministry of Construction and Transport has submitted a draft decree for public discussion, according to which express roads to be completed this year will become toll roads from May, which is expected to bring the state an additional 1.95 billion forints in revenue, 444.hu reported on Tuesday.

The draft decree published on Tuesday, which is open for comments until 8 April, lists in detail the motorways on which tolls will be charged from 31 days after the publication of the law, probably from the first half of May.

The Ministry explains that this year

the inclusion of almost 81 kilometres of public roads in the toll system has become timely.

The new toll sections include

the M44, which will soon be open in its entirety between Kecskemét and Békéscsaba, and
the final section of the M85 to Sopron.
Some previously toll-free sections of the main roads 5, 53 and 54 will become toll roads for trucks, as will the 103 in the Zsámbék basin.