http://www.scotsman.com/news/transport/charge-tolls-on-scotland-s-roads-say-engineers-1-3122698
CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Debate!
"Charge tolls on Scotland’s roads, say engineers"
(18 posts)-
Posted 11 years ago #
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I Pay Road Tax...ers out in force!! :O)
Posted 11 years ago # -
Nice of the ICE to point out that current levels of road building are realistically unaffordable.
Posted 11 years ago # -
"What other European country lets its main arterial North-South route be reduced to a crawl like this? With its tragic toll of lost live due to predictable traffic accidents."
Yes, certainly is predictable. Though I fear for different reasons than the commenter thinks (the rest of his post is an SNP party political broadcast).
Posted 11 years ago # -
"The tax disc money should only be spent on roads, new an maintenance, that's why we pay it."
No, that's not why you pay it, which is why you're compklaining that that's how it should be spent. Engage. Brain.
Posted 11 years ago # -
I wouldn't toll them. We are all indirect users of the infrastructure whether we own and use a car or not.
If more money is required for their upkeep then we will ALL pay regardless of the method used to collect the funds, Tolls, Council Tax, Tax, or VAT.
Either everyone pays directly, or everyone pays indirectly via increased prices on everything.
Should path/pavement users have to pay tolls to use that infra even though the sums are less? Course they shouldn't. It's a shared resource just like everything else, schools, hospitals etc etc. Free at the point of use, regardless of whether you use the resource or not.
*EDIT. I couldn't open the article so may be on a soap box for no reason.... ;)
Posted 11 years ago # -
I'd say a hospital and school is somewhat different to a road, and a pedestrian causes somewhat less damage to a pavement than a car or truck does to a road.
Seems to work in other countries. Have driven extensively in France and a bit in Italy and Spain, and all have roads that you pay for. The big difference is that there are also roads that are essentially to the side that go to the same places, but they weave about a bit more and go through small towns and have slower speed limits. But they're free. The big, direct roads you pay for.
It's not clear from the article if they're suggesting we build roads to the side, or simply charge for using the existing roads, which I can understand people being more annoyed about. I actually agree with one of the commenters. Get rid of the tax disc, and simply add taxes onto fuel (and reinstate the fuel duty escalator). Truly paying according to how mcuh you use the vehicle, and potentially more likely to change attitudes around big gas guzzlers.
Posted 11 years ago # -
"Either everyone pays directly, or everyone pays indirectly via increased prices on everything"
Road Tolls (or congestion charges) are not just (or, in theory, mostly) about raising money - it's about discouraging the use of something regarded as 'free' or 'already paid for'.
Many of the costs of driving to work, or other places where the result is 'too many vehicles trying to use a finite resource (road space)' are externalised.
I.e. however much car/fuel tax the individual has paid its unlikely to cover the (real - if hard to calculate) costs to others - noise, air pollution, delayed buses, danger, discouragements to walk/cycle. Etc...
Posted 11 years ago # -
Get rid of the tax disc, and simply add taxes onto fuel (and reinstate the fuel duty escalator). Truly paying according to how mcuh you use the vehicle, and potentially more likely to change attitudes around big gas guzzlers.
This is how I would do it. Make it cheap to own a car but really expensive to drive it. Then people would consider whether they really need to drive or not. At the moment, if you own a car it really makes no sense to ever use any form of public transport. And all those really short journeys don't use any noticeable petrol so no need to walk or cycle or anything.
Posted 11 years ago # -
"Make it cheap to own a car but really expensive to drive it"
Agreed, as long as you mean. -
'Make it cheap to own a car but really expensive to drive and park on public roads'
Posted 11 years ago # -
Yes that's true. I'd like to think that the people who found they didn't really need a car would just sell theirs and join a car club but I suppose in reality they would all just lie around in the streets causing problems.
Posted 11 years ago # -
@chdot
+1
Posted 11 years ago # -
"but I suppose in reality they would all just lie around in the streets causing problems"
And that's just the drivers ...
Posted 11 years ago # -
Haha!
Posted 11 years ago # -
"
Truly paying according to how mcuh you use the vehicle, and potentially more likely to change attitudes around big gas guzzlers.
"Yes.
"
Road Tolls (or congestion charges) are not just (or, in theory, mostly) about raising money - it's about discouraging the use of something regarded as 'free' or 'already paid for'.
"For the most part, in this country at least there is no issue, users aren't competing for diminishing space. If they were introduce a congestion charge in 4, maybe 5 cities for 2 hours a day Monday to Friday and the problem is gone. This is only about paying for the resource.
Posted 11 years ago # -
Min said "I'd like to think that the people who found they didn't really need a car would just sell theirs and join a car club but I suppose in reality they would all just lie around in the streets causing problems."
Exactly!!
I was speaking to a collegue this week who has had problems with his 3 yr old Audi. He has now sold it and is car less. He was wondering what new care to get. I suggested that as he lives local (we work in the city centre), he could do without a car FULL STOP! He has City Car Club nearby (he agreed), he had to pay to park outside his flat (or nearby) - he agreed, and he can either have food from Supermarkets delivered, or use CCC - he agreed. He did say he liked having his large car as he drives to Turkey once a year with presents etc.. and its handy to have a car whilst there - for a month or more. I suggested he look at hire prices whilst at his home town, - which he liked. He may be a convert. Also another Turkish collegue has taken up cycling and rode the Edin - St Andrews and does the 20 miler club stuff, was chatting to him also this week about how good Edinburgh is for cycling around!
Success??
Posted 11 years ago # -
Either everyone pays directly, or everyone pays indirectly via increased prices on everything.
Spot on.
That leads us to the question of what's fair and what's in the best interests of the country.
The general assumption seems to be that encouraging people to use public transport would be better for the roads, environment, finances, avoiding oil wars with China... etc.
In which case, usage taxes for vehicles would make sense, either via tolls, congestion charges, fuel tax...
As we probably want to be fair to those who aren't properly served by public transport, it might be fairer if the taxes were more for city driving than for driving longer distances.
Posted 11 years ago # -
@gibbo - agreed. The problem with just using fuel tax is that it does disproportionately affect rural dwellers who have fewer alternatives. When you've only got 4 buses a day into the nearest town and then trains only every 2 hours at best, public transport doesn't really cut it as an alternative. I'm happy to cycle 8 miles into town but that's not always practical for everyone. Tolls can at least be restricted to those journeys for which there is an alternative.
Posted 11 years ago #
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