BOSTON — Gov. Deval Patrick tried to answer his critics by appearing on conservative talk radio.

Patrick, a Democrat, on Thursday visited Howie Carr’s talk show on WRKO-AM. They clashed over how quickly the state can remove toll booths from the Massachusetts Turnpike – a pet cause of Carr’s.

Carr complained that a reorganization of the state’s transportation bureaucracy, including the elimination of the Turnpike, was a “shell game” because the booths remain.

Patrick vigorously defended the move.

“It is absolutely not a shell game,” said Patrick, his volume rising to meet Carr’s. “The toll booths will come down when the bondholders say they can come down.”

Carr opened with a question he asks on the air and in his column in the Boston Herald: “Where’s my property tax cut?”

Patrick replied, “It’s coming.”

He noted he has tried many means to let cities and towns cut their property tax burdens.