SAN ANTONIO, TX. — If you want to get some place fast, go via Austin. On Wednesday they opened a new toll road with an 85 mph limit. (136 km/h).

The new highway provides an alternative to the often-congested I-35 and travels about 41 miles between Austin and San Antonio. According to the Texas DOT, the new road can cut the trip between the two centers in half.

And the cost for an 18-wheeler to make the one-way trip? $24.50

There is no minimum speed limit on the new highway; and Kelli Reyna, a DOT media-relations officer told todaystrucking.com that she expects truckers to definitely use the alternative route.

(To give the locals a taste of driving at 85, the road is open for free until November 11.)

Reyna says she has driven a car on the new stretch of highway and thoroughly enjoyed it.

“Because of the design of the road and because it’s so well engineered, when you’re going 70, it feels like 40,” she says.

“When you speed up to 85, of course it seems a lot faster but it’s not like you get anxious or anything; you’re not going ‘oh my goodness this is too fast.’”

By the way, neither bicyclists nor pedestrians are allowed on the road.

For more information; check here and here. (Half the highway was built by the government; half by private sector, hence the two information sources.)