Pay as You go Road charge plans

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Post by rbruce1314 »

Any system 'they' introduce will be by-passable (is that a word?) by those with enough knowledge. Although I have absolutely no connection with that industry I am still stating it as a fact not an opinion (but cannot go further).
So, as with other things before, the lawless will profit- although if a fix were posted on the internet by some lunatic (who would of course get arrested himself) the whole thing would fall apart.
You want proof? Just look at the UK news today about the hacker who got into the US defense AND NASA's computers.
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Post by Homer »

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by AlWilliams</i>


I understand the views here but is it really fair to expect someone travelling a couple of K per year getting to and from the shops to pay the same road tax as a travelling salesman?
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">
Road fund licence is a piffling sum to a travelling salesman compared to the ammount he will pay in fuel tax.
The proposed system is to replace both.
<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">From what I have seen on this road tax based on milage issue, i'd expect an offical milage check to be taken from the elclectronic MOT documentation, now that it's being rolled out to test centres.<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">
I can see that being used as a check against the GPS system but the whole idea is to charge people different ammounts per mile depending on where/when they drive. The idea being to encourage people to use reletavely unsafe routes on rural B routes and through quiet villages instead of the safe but congested motorway.
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Post by bikeboyz »

I have to add on this, the public transport system for long haul should go back to the 80's. Gone are the days when in south of the country you could drive to the railway station in the evenings - drive your car on to the train, and eat, be merry in the bar, sleep and awake in the north. Motor-rail was a fantastic system. The whole luxury elements have vanished making rail just a shed on wheels.
I would use rail more, but its so uncomfy. Last long journey on a Virgin express was terrible, hard seat, less leg room than easy jet! Cramped and really poverish service, also adding to it you cant always choose who you sit next to, ...... they had wind for 2 hours....yuk. No its vintage pug power for me!
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Post by CitroJim »

I have been giving the whole subject of road congestion and the Governments plans to combat it a great deal of thought.
The plans, as unveiled, appear to be attacking the symptom rather than the root cause and going quite the wrong way about it. The Government are wrong if they think they can simply price the motorist off the road or make it difficult for the motorist to get about. It simply will not work as witness the massive cost of fuel, the numerous "calming" schemes and everything else they have tried to do to get us out of our cars. It just does not work. People will pay whatever is demanded for fuel and some day a company with a little more street cred than Citroen will reinvent hydropneumatic suspension and hail it as the unviversal release from the pain of speed humps and poorly surfaced roads. Us Hydraulic Citroen owners don't feel them at all..
There is no doubt that the roads in this small, overcrowded island of ours are terribly overcrowded and no-one doubts that something needs to be done. Hi-tech satellite based systems will not do the trick and such a system is still 15 years off. Something needs to be done before then. It can be done by changing attitudes and some fundamental changes to how things are done now. None of this need involve any technology whatsoever. In fact, the current fad to throw technology at a problem needs to be discouraged.
Fundamentally, there are too many vehicles making too many journeys. Many journeys are unnecessary. People are generally very lazy and will drive rather than walk. Typically, running the kids to school. They should walk. A quick trip to the shops. walk. People say they run their kids to school because it's not safe for them to walk, either because of the traffic or the supposed weirdos out there ready to pounce on the kids. The first is easy, the kids walking will reduce the traffic and if the Police get out of their cars and pound the beat, the second problem can be eradicated. Now there is no excuse. Parents should also choose their schools to be near them or move near enough to their chosen school so the kids can walk. Finally, ban parking in the vicinity of schools. Safer still.
People seem to do massive journeys going to and from work. Why? I work where there is no public transport so I have to drive but I've moved as close as I can so the journey is as short as possible. Encourage people to live near their place of work. Reduce the massive and unnecessary commuter rush. Encourage flexitime working to spread the traffic out. Why are so many companies so adamant about the 9-5 day?
Why do people insist on living in houses where there is no off-road parking and then clutter the street up with their vehicles? Why do developers still build new houses with no off-road parking? A condition of car ownership should be that you have somewhere to park if off-road and on-street parking banned. People who insist on parking on-raod and creating a hazard as a result are in my opinion anti-social.
Make the driving test much more difficult. Remove the attitude that a driving is a right and make it a privilidge that has to be worked hard to achieve. Test on much more than now and include driving craft, physological attitude and basic mechanics. Cars have an annual MOT test and so should drivers. Test everyone annually both for driving proficiency and attitude. Revoke if they fail on either. Also, any driving offence committed that is in any way dangerous should result in a life ban. No question. I also belive the minimum age should be raised to 20 and phased in such a way that new drivers are restricted to small, low power vehicles until they show they have the proficiency to move to something larger and more powerful.
Encourage small, fuel efficient cars by giving attractive tax breaks to those and penalising drivers of the huge mosters we frequently see today. Encourage a long service life from a car by giving sliding tax reductions to older vehicles.
MOT tests should be run by the government and not by garages with a vested interest in failing a vehicle for profit. High standards need to be imposed to ensure only safe vehicles in good condition are allowed on the road. This is not the case now judging by some wrecks running around. heavily modified vehicles should be subject to an expensive and difficult SVA test to ensure safety and to discourage such things as "body styling" and transplanting massively over-powerful engines into unsuitable vehicles.
Cars should be less luxurious and more functional. Some seem to like getting stuck in traffic so they can enjoy the luxury of their lounge on wheels in peace with their drink in their drink holder. Don't make being in your vehicle more pleasant than being at home.
Reduce the number of lorries on the road and ban all left-hand drive lorries from the roads. Why are there so many lorries these days and why can freight going from one end of the country not go by rail? As much freight as possible should be moved on rail and small lorries only used for local distruibution. The Government should put a massive amount of investment into rail freight and build new lines where necessary. All industrial estates should have sidings and all major towns should have a freight yard. Lorries arriving at ports of entry should be off-loaded onto rail and then returned immediately back to their home country. The haulage industry may whinge but there'll be loads of job opportunities for lorry drivers on the railways. To cut lorry journeys even further, essentials such as dairys and bakeries should be local thus obviating needing to transport, say milk, across the length and bredth of the country. Push freight onto rail by making the use of road transport punative and rail attractive.
It should be recognised that many people have to drive as part of their work and these should not be penalised by any measure to reduce congestion.
Forcing people onto public transport will not work. people like their cars and will not give them up readily. The measures outlined above will free up plenty of space for people to enjoy their cars and for those who cannot will have to use public transport. The additional demand created for public transport will naturally improve it because many more people will need to use it and will demand good standards. The Government should invest heavily in proper mass transit systems and not just more useless buses. Trams and light railways are the only solution. Buses only make the congestion problem worse.
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Post by Oscar Too »

Jim
Hear hear! Are you sure you wouldn't like to join a cycling forum?
What you have described is an integrated transport strategy such as the one the Government signed up to in 1997.
Common sense? 100% Chances of being implemented? 0%
This govt is a hostage of the first lobbyist that comes along from big business.
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Post by CitroJim »

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by Oscar Too</i>

Jim
Hear hear! Are you sure you wouldn't like to join a cycling forum?
Oscar
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">
No way Oscar. I love my cars dearly and cycling holds no fascination at all!!!
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Post by Kowalski »

Jim, you may dislike boy racers fitting body kits to their cars but for the most point they aren't a problem in the least and banning them would just be oppresive. Why do people live in houses with no off road parking? I don't have a choice where I live, with the housing market being how it is I'm one of the first time buyers who can't afford to buy.
The real problem has been that cars have got more affordable and more reliable so their numbers have increased whilst no new roads have been built, the green lobby don't like new roads. The road network is generally free flowing but it has choke points. Choke points are the little restrictions in the network that cause bottlenecks and tail backs, if these are removed the network just works. It would take very little road building to sort out a lot of congestion but there is now a backlog of roads that need to be built and it will take years to sort out, government policy has caused the congestion we see today.
Light railway is not a solution. The way councils implement light railway is to put tram tracks on what used to be road and then take the cars and buses off that piece of road, i.e. reducing the road network capacity when the light rail isn't an alternative for a lot of the traffic that would otherwise use that road. I've seen areas where bus lanes have caused tailbacks that the buses end up caught in because they can't even reach the bus lane any more. There is one particular piece of bus lane in Gateshead, where the road was free flowing before it was put in, now there is a big queue for cars and a nearly empty bus lane (nearly empty because cars occasionally use it).
The problem with lorries is that free enterprise is allowed on the roads but rail is either a monopoly or far too expensive to get into. Anybody can buy lorries, hire drivers and run a delivery company EFFICENTLY AND CHEAPLY, rail has to be made as accesable, efficient and cost effective as trucks are. The fact that rail was taken into state ownership meant there was no drive to adapt it as the country changed. Branch lines made a loss so there were closed, new lines weren't created to serve expanding populations in new towns, the railways carried a lot of coal and steel but we don't make a lot of either now and nothing has been found to replace them. The Royal Mail used to run trains and has stopped, that should be an indication of the state of railways, far to expensive and not reliable enough.
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Post by martyhopkirk »

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally written by Ben Elton</i>It is every motorists right to own and use a car, but public transport can only cut poloution and congestion if it is cheap enough, clean enough and convenient enough to use so that it is used as a priority over the car for munane tasks such as commuting, shopping and visiting. <hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">
We are a LOOOOOONG way from this.
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Post by CitroJim »

Kowalski,
Very good points. I have no problem with bodykits fitted properly and I don't advise banning 'em. We'd be on a slippery slope if we did. Personal choice and all that goes with it. That is what I want to see preserved. I just suggest they're properly fitted, safe and abide by C and R Regs.
<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">I don't have a choice where I live, with the housing market being how it is I'm one of the first time buyers who can't afford to buy.
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">
I agree that a lot are in this situation and there is no easy way out of it. I believe such areas of housing without parking space should have secure parking available nearby, built and protected by the local authority to a good standard. Japan, I believe, forbid on-road parking and provide residential parking where necessary.
<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">The real problem has been that cars have got more affordable and more reliable so their numbers have increased whilst no new roads have been built, the green lobby don't like new roads. The road network is generally free flowing but it has choke points. Choke points are the little restrictions in the network that cause bottlenecks and tail backs, if these are removed the network just works. It would take very little road building to sort out a lot of congestion but there is now a backlog of roads that need to be built and it will take years to sort out, government policy has caused the congestion we see today.
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">
Very true and a lot of these choke points are deliberate and poorly conceived to "calm" traffic. Yes, it WOULD take very little to resolve these problems. As drivers I think, in our localities, we all know where and what needs to be done.
<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Light railway is not a solution. The way councils implement light railway is to put tram tracks on what used to be road and then take the cars and buses off that piece of road, i.e. reducing the road network capacity when the light rail isn't an alternative for a lot of the traffic that would otherwise use that road. I've seen areas where bus lanes have caused tailbacks that the buses end up caught in because they can't even reach the bus lane any more. There is one particular piece of bus lane in Gateshead, where the road was free flowing before it was put in, now there is a big queue for cars and a nearly empty bus lane (nearly empty because cars occasionally use it).
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">
This is so farcical it is incredible that anyone in authority can get away with schemes like this. Light rapid transit would work but it's got to be properly engineered in a way that does not rob road users of space. I propose the use of Trams and LR's to take public transport off the roads, not share it.
<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">The fact that rail was taken into state ownership meant there was no drive to adapt it as the country changed. Branch lines made a loss so there were closed, new lines weren't created to serve expanding populations in new towns, the railways carried a lot of coal and steel but we don't make a lot of either now and nothing has been found to replace them. The Royal Mail used to run trains and has stopped, that should be an indication of the state of railways, far to expensive and not reliable enough.<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">
Totally agreed. The state of the railways can be reversed and made to work. We are all missing out on our greatest asset and OK, it'll take a wad of money and time but then so will the satellite tracking scheme. I'm sure massive investment in the railways, as the French have done, will pay far greater dividends in the future than that currently proposed.
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Post by Kowalski »

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by citrojim</i>
Totally agreed. The state of the railways can be reversed and made to work. We are all missing out on our greatest asset and OK, it'll take a wad of money and time but then so will the satellite tracking scheme. I'm sure massive investment in the railways, as the French have done, will pay far greater dividends in the future than that currently proposed.
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">
It'll take a wad of money, how big a wad and whether its worth spending it is another question. The railways haven't really significant investment since the second world war, they've not grown for half a century they've only had cutbacks. My point here is that its a lot of money, so much in fact that it would be political suicide to spend what is needed and would take years of spending to get things to how they should be. The private sector won't be willing to spend their own money on the project unless they clearly see the return they'll get, so in short it will never happen and would take years to show whether or not it is helping with the problems.
The railways are all organised a radially from London, so you've got to go through London to make a connection, there needs to be some high speed cross country routes to link things up. New towns need linking into the network too.
I think even if you make the network wonderful, as you mention they have done in France, you have to consider that even though we have some of the worst public transport in Europe we also have the lowest car ownership too i.e. where the public transport is better, car ownership is higher too. You've got to convince the public that public transport is better than the car, forcing people to use public transport makes people resent having use it and when you stop forcing them to use it, they'll stop.
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Post by Chrispy »

Move closer to work? Have you not seen house prices recently? I work in York and live in Wakefield, and would need a lottery win to move closer to work. Also, why should I? If I lose my job I'll end up commuting again so what's the point? The only reason I'll move house is to live in a nicer area and with a bigger home. The 35 mile journey I have to do each way takes 45 mins at the mo and costs about £3.50 each way. Public transport will triple that length of time (on a good day), give me leprosy from all the other scruffy passengers and cost me even more! Great plan labour!
I know, I'll quit my job and sponge off the dole. That way I don't have to worry about getting to work simply to fund the governments silly plan and skinting myself. I can be well off with 8 kids and a plasma telly. Nice....
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Post by Forth »

We very much need cars here in Cumbria -- they are essentials, not some kind of luxury. And where I originally came from it is even more so the case (by comparison, even here is semi-urban). Yet we are the ones who will be most penalised for the problems of the decadent south. They get ill, so we get forced to take their (poisonous) quack medicine.
Personally, I'd favour turning off the water supplies from the rurally located reservoirs from which these cosmopolitan poseurs leech "their" water, let's see how they like getting a dose of their own megalocentric attitudes for a change.
<font color="red"><i>Not saying more on it for now coz I'm presently too furious about the Stazi State's new totalitarian political correcter so-called "Religious Hate" bill... any comment I'd incline to would make make hellfire, brimstone, Gengis Khan, horsemen of the apocalypse and Thor's lightning bolts seem like mere bumfluff on Prescott's braincell.</i></font id="red">
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Post by Chrispy »

My sentiments exactly mate. Living in Yorkshire, a car is essential not a bloody luxury. We don't all live in London ffs. Public transport? What public transport? Stupid knee-jerk reaction to a problem that wont be fixed by ripping people off. People need to get to work to keep the economy running and if they can't afford to do that then it's recession time again well and truly. Nice one to whoever voted labour. Bloody fools....
What am I supposed to do? Cycle to work? Yeah right.....35 miles down the M1....great idea there. Move house? Fine....give me £200k and I'll do it....otherwise make houses ridiculously cheap and I'll consider it again. Also, guarantee that I'll never lose my job ever and it'd be worthwhile. Otherwise, get stuffed.
I already car share to get to work so I'm already doing my bit with my fellow car-sharer.
They SERIOUSLY need to fix the other dependant issues before tackling this one. Give people a viable alternative first then discourage them from using their cars. Doing it the other way around is just plain lunacy, a very naive approach. So if we all give up our cars, then what do we do in the mean time? Until public transport is fixed (never) then do we just sit at home? Are my employers going to let me leave early/ come in late to avoid paying loads of £££? In my dreams. Also, are they going to let me work from home? Once again, in my dreams. Are they going to pay for me to get to work, kind of subsidising it? You must be joking.
This plan will KILL the British economy and cause chaos. Public spending will plummet as people wont be able to afford to get to work, let alone anything else. Businesses will close as they wont have any staff. Haulage firms will collapse. Sales reps will have to quit their jobs, etc etc etc.
This CANNOT happen. If it does, then I'm emigrating, plain and simple. The government can kiss my ar5e as I board the ferry to France.
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Post by CitroJim »

Perhaps I did not explain it too well but that's my whole point, for the vast majority of us a car is not a luxury but is essential and always will be. It is for me and I live in a large new town where one would have thought the public transport would hev been designed in at the outset and excellent. In fact it is just the opposite. I ran some ideas around my head for a bit and voiced them because as I see it, a car is essential to get around in all areas except perhaps London but whats the point of having a car if it is unusable due to gridlock and crazy legislation. Something has to give somewhere and the Government cannot just keep on doing as they are and sticking bits of filler in the gaping holes emerging. Some radical thinking is needed to get on top of it if we are ever to have a decent country to leave to our kids. I believe there has to be a real ground-up rethink in all manner of ways, not just roads but everything and yes, Crispy, you make some very valid points. House prices are another national scandal that need to be addressed and some deep and radical thinking is needed there too but this is a car forum and not a house forum so I'll say nothing more on that. I do however know and understand that it's not possible to simply move closer to work but the idea was thrown in from a personal observation of the daily scramble in and out of this town here with it's attendant rat-run problems and snarl-ups on a daily basis. I thought in a very simplistic way - if they work here then why do they continue to suffer such a horrendous journey when they could move to the town in which they work. I concede I was looking at it from my own viewpoint of someone who has worked at the same location for nigh on 30 years and is as secure as can be in this age. Thanks for pointing out that for the majority this is not the case. I stand corrected.
For the record, I did not vote for 'em and I'm with you Forth in view but we can't all just get peed off and threaten to go somewhere else. Lets stay and get our own county sorted. It's a great place really, it jsut has a few problems and a bit of radical, well discussed lateral and off-the-wall thought is needed to sort it. That's the springboard I offered here..
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Post by FrenchLeave »

I've been trying to get my head around the control system that is proposed for this idea. We are told that the new black boxes to be fitted to every vehicle will communicate with GPS satellites, allowing the government (or its agents) to download the information regarding who's been where and when.
But GPS satellites are not proactive devices; they simply sit in geostatic orbit, each one sending out a unique positional radio signal. In other words, our black boxes in our cars can tell where the satellites are and from that work out their own position. There is no way that the satellites can work out where the vehicles are.
It should also be remembered that the satellite system is owned by the American military. They spent an enormous amount of money putting the equipment in orbit for their own purposes - essentially navigation and weapon targetting. I doubt that they would allow an outside agency to alter their satellites, even if that were possible.
Or does the government propose to put its own satellites in orbit? One would think that the enormous amount of money required would be better spent on improving the existing transport system.
I will be happy to be shot down by those of you who know better, but it seems to me that this is a bit of political kite flying, programming us so that we will accept something less awful and think we are well off.
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