So good on the subject of road pricing that they printed it twice. Hope that didn’t happen in the dead tree version.
The Booker Column
2 responses
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Booker is to be congratulated on finding a new angle on this issue, but he has got this one wrong I’m afraid. I know the draft EU tolling systems interoperability directive fairly well. It does not require EU member states to charge for road space, nor does it require them to use the Galileo system.
It’s actually a regulation designed to avoid unnecessary proliferation of different electronic systems that would require drivers to have umpteen different gadgets in their cars. The main pressure for it is coming from drivers and businesses in and around the Alps, where different governments have set up their own various charging systems for tunnels and motorway networks, and the systems of course don’t talk to each other.
Whether the bureaucrats and techno-bods can make it all work without being a terrible restraint on innovation is another issue. But the principle is not unreasonable. -
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/02/19/nroads19.xml
A blueprint drawn up by the Department for Transport showed it could cost £62 billion to set up and £8.6 billion a year to run.
Every motorist could end up paying nearly £300 just to cover the expense of collecting the charge
I’m guessing that should be £300 per year. How many miles of new motorway could we get for £8.6 billion a year? How much is congestion reckoned to cost the economy per year?
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