|
Post by schedboy on Dec 1, 2006 10:46:34 GMT
There's a new report out about this today saying most people would be up for it with drop in other motoring taxes.
|
|
|
Post by chris on Dec 1, 2006 10:55:50 GMT
If it is a pay per mile system to replace the road fund licence, great. This could also be linked to pay as you go insurance, even greater, if you don't drive much.
|
|
|
Post by foggy on Dec 1, 2006 11:00:22 GMT
Although I would want details on how they planned to monitor your movements...
|
|
|
Post by dirtydavey on Dec 1, 2006 11:34:25 GMT
great idea, might motivate me to ride into work more often
|
|
|
Post by duncan74 on Dec 1, 2006 11:54:14 GMT
Somehow it's got to be related to the fuel economy of the car. At least fuel tax did that.
|
|
|
Post by foggy on Dec 1, 2006 11:57:11 GMT
Somehow it's got to be related to the fuel economy of the car. At least fuel tax did that. Agreed
|
|
badger
Sprint
Kneel before Le Blaireau
Posts: 127
|
Post by badger on Dec 1, 2006 11:57:39 GMT
Wouldn't that make the "I pay taxes on this road" argument worse? Drivers would complain even louder that we're using "their" road.
At least I know my council tax goes towards keeping Croydon's roads nice. 'Cause it sure doesn't go to help Lambeth's. (Is there any road there that isn't full of potholes? Bl**dy Borough of Arenberg Forest, more like.)
Businesses would pay through the teeth. Companies would pay more to drivers to compensate. The disparity between rich and poor gets larger.
On the other hand it could lead to a boom in working from home, and less congestion that way, as the telecoms rake it in. Buy your shares now!
|
|
|
Post by bigbopper on Dec 1, 2006 12:10:29 GMT
Plus the people in the countryside, who have to drive longer distances anyway, would get drilled even further up the 'arris. Townies would pay less for their journeys as they only have to drive a few miles (even though their cars would still be belching out fumes for the two hours it took for them to travel that far).
BB
|
|
|
Post by p00key on Dec 1, 2006 12:43:29 GMT
mmm i only tend to use the car maybe once a week as i use my mountain bike for commuting but then depending on the price what would happen on a weekend away....
|
|
|
Post by shelly on Dec 1, 2006 12:47:39 GMT
Only if the money goes to improving alternative transport and cycle paths. Driving is the only practical way for me to commute because public transport is a joke and costs more than the fuel I use and takes three times as long - its quicker to cycle!. I cycle to work as often as I can, but a 52 mile round trip makes it impossible to do it both ways every day. No option to car share either.
|
|
|
Post by duncan74 on Dec 1, 2006 12:57:54 GMT
One of the problems with improved roads is that people move further away from their place of work. Nobody enjoys sitting in their car for periods every day so if people have to drive less miles they will - there's no need to tax it directly. I guess it's not practical but I'd like to see a tax that relates to how far you live from your place of work - that would gradually move us back towards living in the same town as we work in. Everyone used to walk to work you know.
At the moment affluent middle class people don't really care about the town where they work, only the town where they live. This leads to the work towns becoming dumps.
|
|
badger
Sprint
Kneel before Le Blaireau
Posts: 127
|
Post by badger on Dec 1, 2006 13:02:46 GMT
One of the problems with improved roads is that people move further away from their place of work. Nobody enjoys sitting in their car for periods every day so if people have to drive less miles they will - there's no need to tax it directly. I guess it's not practical but I'd like to see a tax that relates to how far you live from your place of work - that would gradually move us back towards living in the same town as we work in. Everyone used to walk to work you know. I think with the advent of VPNs and the like, we'll get back to rural living - for the white collar set at least. They wouldn't have to commute, thus would live and shop local. I hope it's nothing like the States where you need a car to do anything. A lot of new property development doesn't include pavements.
|
|
badger
Sprint
Kneel before Le Blaireau
Posts: 127
|
Post by badger on Dec 1, 2006 13:05:08 GMT
It reminds me: today was the worst tailback I've ever seen on the A23 - from the end of our street through Thornton Heath, Norbury, and well into Streatham - 5 kilometers. No accident or anything to cause it ...
|
|
|
Post by ray on Dec 1, 2006 13:24:34 GMT
yep pay the money
|
|
|
Post by chris on Dec 1, 2006 13:41:27 GMT
I would imagine that it would not be a simple system. Driving through london would probably be more expensive - rolling in the current congestion charge in effect. I've heard that some routes would be more expensive than others, the M25 being a prime target. The risk of putting tolls on motorways is that the A roads become more congested as all the pikeys who want to avoid paying 4 quid pile off them and go postal through rural dorset. Suddenly it become very complicated, and seeing as the current authorities have trouble recognising the difference between bum and elbow, you can guarantee that come H hour, you'll get a bill saying you have driven to Sgirl thingyhorpe and back via Badgers Mount and that you owe six million golden pennies.
The bleeding liberals will start bleating about monitoring movements and civil liberties, which will scupper the whole thing. I don't care if central government know that I have driven to see my parents in Lower Licking Bottom, I have nothing to hide.
|
|
|
Post by andys on Dec 1, 2006 13:42:44 GMT
It's another tax to get more money out of drivers. They'll introduce the £/mile scheme but it won't replace the other methods of taking money off you.
1. They've moved the super markets out of town so us townies still have to drive to get there. 2. All the parking around the station is permit parking, so you can't drive to the station and get a train. 3. The money won't go on public transport/improving the roads. What improvements have we seen since congestion charging came in? 4. The railways are private, why do I have to pay tax to improve them?
|
|
|
Post by chris on Dec 1, 2006 13:46:14 GMT
4. The railways are private, why do I have to pay tax to improve them? Funny that. The prices go up, the bonuses go up. If I wanted to give my money away, I'd pay someone to poke me in the eye.
|
|
|
Post by andys on Dec 1, 2006 14:00:43 GMT
"If road charging was introduced, the government would be able to examine the option of whether it could raise enough revenue to replace fuel duty and the car tax disc."
It doesn't say it'll replace current tax. A few lines below it says:
"Road pricing on this scale is new and at this stage has unknown implementation costs," Sir Rod said in the report. "There are very significant risks and uncertainties involved in delivering a pricing policy, particularly around the technology needed for its delivery."
Which means they'll charge you for everything.
"The draft Road Transport Bill, announced in the Queen's Speech, gives councils more freedom to bring in their own schemes in busy areas."
And councils will get in on the act and charge some more.
|
|
|
Post by chris on Dec 1, 2006 14:06:03 GMT
"The draft Road Transport Bill, announced in the Queen's Speech, gives councils more freedom to bring in their own schemes in busy areas."
Oh Lord help us.
|
|
|
Post by doug on Dec 1, 2006 14:17:55 GMT
It all depends on how it is done, one worry is that the back roads which are at the moment pleasant places to cycle will become rat runs as people are priced off the main roads
|
|
|
Post by andys on Dec 1, 2006 14:26:42 GMT
No problems doug, that's been thought of:
"Smaller projects, including an expansion of the UK cycle network, received strong backing."
So lots more of the unusable cycle lanes we now have. Probably more unusable as they'd have put them in place by now if it was easy.
|
|
whisk
Couch potato
Posts: 15
|
Post by whisk on Dec 1, 2006 15:06:00 GMT
I only use my car once or twice a week and I'm on the bike for the rest of the time, so I'm all for it as it should in theory save me money. I just can't help thinking that any electronic measuring system would be open to abuse. I'm sure the 2nd hand market in cars with Polish plates would go through the roof and there's bound to be a big market for fake plates or cloned transponders or whatever else they use to track our movements. It's fine if everyone plays by the rules, but there's bound ot be loads of people out there who either go to measures to avoid incurring the charges or simply run up big bills which they won't settle.
|
|
glove
Couch potato
Posts: 10
|
Post by glove on Dec 1, 2006 22:33:47 GMT
Same Old Same Old .. Mr & Mrs Average tax-paying law-abiding people will fund the the whole thing, because the baddies don't register or insure their vehicles so don't pay, those who drive for a living (not knocking them by the way) will pass the cost on to the end user, so Joe Soap pays to do all the essential journeys that public transport will never be able to provide for
|
|
|
Post by wiganer on Dec 2, 2006 10:48:02 GMT
When we talk congestion...are we talking London and the major motorways or does every town/city in the UK really suffer.....I tend to think that it really applies to London and the M6/M25/M1/M62/M4/M5.....and a lot of that is in the peak times......
I dont think it is any worse than 10 years ago, when you look locally....certainly round my neck of the woods it hasnt really got worse, if anything the roads have got better, the traffic measures are better and it is easier to get from A to B.
|
|
|
Post by duncan74 on Dec 2, 2006 11:31:27 GMT
I dont think it is any worse than 10 years ago, when you look locally....certainly round my neck of the woods it hasnt really got worse, if anything the roads have got better, the traffic measures are better and it is easier to get from A to B. It's definitely busier than it was 10 years ago. The period of peak traffic has extended earlier into the morning and later into the evening. It's very busy on our motorway network all through the day now, which wasn't the case even a few years ago. Traffic jams are more frequent now - it seems to require less of a problem to create a major tailback.
|
|
|
Post by bruiser2 on Dec 2, 2006 12:19:07 GMT
When we talk congestion...are we talking London and the major motorways or does every town/city in the UK really suffer.....I tend to think that it really applies to London and the M6/M25/M1/M62/M4/M5.....and a lot of that is in the peak times...... In a recent funding round a number of local authorities received pump priming from the govt to research implementation of local road pricing schemes, so towns / cities / local major routes may become road priced in the future. Edinburgh looked into it a couple of years ago but I believe that a local referendum voted against it so the idea was dropped. There are various ways they could do it - London being one example. The London scheme runs weekdays only from 7am - 6.30pm currently and will nearly double in size in Feb 07. It has reduced the volume of traffic but a frequent driver told me a couple of weeks ago that it hasn't made journeys any faster cos they've changed road layouts and traffic light synching, etc. I imagine central govt would be looking into road pricing on the larger scale (e.g. motorways). Then there's the issue of whether they introduce differential pricing schemes dependent upon vehicle emissions...
|
|
|
Post by veganpower on Dec 2, 2006 12:35:38 GMT
Let the fat wallets have the road, I'm gonna bike, run, bike my way through life
|
|
|
Post by bruiser2 on Dec 2, 2006 12:38:14 GMT
Let the fat wallets have the road, I'm gonna bike, run, bike my way through life You'll probably be faster that way!
|
|
|
Post by rustyjim on Dec 2, 2006 17:33:18 GMT
I vote yes for all the right reasons. However...... As with the congestion charge it will all go on expenses so the only impact will be on my social conscience (oh and the fact that there'll be less people on the road) Which, I guess, isn't the most popular answer but there must be some perks to working in London!
|
|
|
Post by chrisg on Dec 2, 2006 17:50:46 GMT
One of the things about road user charging is the rate will vary by time of day, so people would make choices about their journeys so less people will be on the road during peak times causing congestion. It can also be based on the amount of congestion present, they do this in some other countries, or air quality. I'm all for it, but only because my job is linked to it.
|
|