Road tolls “inevitable”
Road tolls across the length and breadth of Britain appear a foregone conclusion, according to a Government transport adviser.
Professor David Begg, chairs the Campaign for Integrated Transport, last night said Transport Secretary Alistair Darling has been converted to the idea of further road charging.
Prof Begg said: “It is now a matter of when, not if. Six months ago, it was on the shelf, but Mr Darling is now very serious about it.
“The Government has realised that there is only one way to reduce congestion and that does not mean trying to build a way out of it.”
Prof Begg has argued that the only way forward in the fight against road congestion is “charging the road user.”
On December 9th, Britain’s first pay-as-you-go motorway, the 27-mile M6 toll, situated north of Birmingham, opened for business.
Mr Darling said the road-pricing initiative may herald more road charging schemes in the future.
“You need to look at this in the wider context of the studies the Government is looking at as moving to a different way of charging motorists for travel.”
“There are no toll proposals in prospect at the moment, but I do think we need to look at alternatives.”
Mr Darling has also suggested the Government may assess “innovative methods” of road pricing such as GPS-mapped pay-as-you-drive schemes.
“We need to ask ourselves whether we shouldn’t look at the different ways of charging drivers perhaps on the basis of the distance they travel, or the time of day they travel so that they can make better choices.”
Prof Begg forecasted that toll schemes could reduce congestion by 30 per cent and pollution by 40 per cent nationwide.
Transport 2000 slammed the M6 toll Road as a ‘white elephant.”
