by Scott Wilson (Rational Transport) on Road Pricing
The blocking of further funding for this was proposed by Rep. Chip Cravaack (R-Minn.). He argued that it would “would hurt rural drivers, cost a lot to implement, since it would require devices in each car to track how many miles have been driven, and could impinge on privacy rights.”Now I’m not one to argue whether or not the Federal Government ought to be responsible for funding such studies, as it really depends on whether it wants to supplement or replace its own Federal gas tax. However, I can question the view of Rep. Cravaack, which contains a range of misconceptions.
I’ll go through them point by point:
“Hurts rural drivers”: This is a question of equity, and whilst the issue of equity raises claims of winners and losers, the only sure way to ensure equity is to charge according to a fair allocation of costs. Charging by distance on the face of it, means you use the road network more so you pay more. However, does that mean rural users are likely to be overcharged? There is a paucity of accessible research on the revenue generated by different roads by location. However, what I have seen over the years indicates that rural roads get heavily cross subsidised simply because the fixed costs of those roads can’t be recovered easily from the very low volumes of traffic on them. So the question comes as to who should subsidise them or if there is a better way to take this into account. One way is to ask whether the access value of a road to a property might better be recovered from charging the property itself as well as the motorist. That could mean not charging rural trips as much, because property owners value others being able to get to their properties. My counter-argument to this one, is that vehicles visiting rural areas should also pay. Besides, fuel taxes hurt people who can’t afford new fuel efficient vehicles. There is a concern that is worthy of debate, but rural roads will equally benefit if heavy trucks pay for the long mileage they undertake on them. My point is that what is charged (and how it is charged) should reflect cost.
For more good points continue reading here: https://roadpricing.blogspot.com/2012/06/us-house-of-representatives-rejects.html
B’ Spokes: Something I want to bring up as well as I have heard that rural drivers resent subsidizing mass transit since they don’t benefit from it. Well then why should city drivers subsidize rural roads?
rural roads get heavily cross subsidised simply because the fixed costs of those roads can’t be recovered easily from the very low volumes of traffic on them.
Anyway the current system isn’t working too well and it seems such a shame not to look at other ways to get the job done.