Congestion charge in the Peak District

[Jen]

however this'll never happen due to the government making us to reliant on private cars for life

True - sad really. One of my colleagues spent 2 hours on public transport on Monday morning completing a journey that would normally take 20 minutes in the car.

Mind you, surely it's up to us to come up with ways to break the need for a car? Transport planning for car sharing, flexible working, showers at work for those that cycle - not that difficult really... B)

Like i said a differant view of the other side of the coin.

Ah, but I see both sides, don't forget I live the Borough I work in so get annoyed with my Local Council and the Central Govt! ... still not going to give up

Edited December 7, 2005 by Jen

[Iain]

going back to the first Issue: congestion charging and road tax.

Road tax pays for the upkeep of roads, and that kind of stuff - nothing to do with congestion.

every legally registered car in the UK has road tax - it's a fixed fee for the year - it can have no impact on congestion. - i.e. the number of vehicles choosing to use one bit of road at one time.

it has no affect on how often a person chooses to use their car, how many miles they do, and only a vague link to the amount of pollution they cause ( a 109 that does 2000 miles a year pays more than a new fiesta that does 20000 miles a year, because the 109 causes more pollution?)

tax on petrol should encourage people to use their cars less in general. but as petrol is still cheaper than public transport, and cars are very convenient, people would rather bltch about the cost, and still use cars for every journey.

depreciation and insurance are also fairly fixed - neither are double if you do twice the milage, or 1/2ed if you do half the milage, so again it's a cost of ownership that encourages people to make use of a car they have whenever possible.

The only "tax" to reduce congestion in one place at one time, is a specific charge applied every time a car drives on that bit of road.

Take the london thing - if you could get an annual pass ( can you? I don't know) , people would buy it, and from than on they've already paid - they have no reason to not use their car - worse still they'd feel they've paid to use their car, so they should drive in london as often as they can.

only by applying the cost each time, can you hope to discourage people from that bit of road at that time.

I'm all in favour of scrapping car tax fully. we'll still need to register the vehicle and display a disk, to show we're not uninsured MOT dodgers. it might even encourage the people who aren't insured or MOTd to give it a go.

Private transport in cities is still cheaper than public (even in a LR) on a trip by trip basis. I think a charge on congestion ( in cities or busy national roads), that directly subsidises public transport, cycling and pedestrians) would be a good thing.

wouldn't a lot more people use a good public transprt system if they could get a day ticket on the bus for mum,dad and 2.4 kiddies for less than the cost of driving into the city?

it would hopefully discourage the solo drivers too, except for the real fat-cats who are scared of sitting next to people they don't know anyway.

What irritates me most in cities is the terrible pedestrian facilities they have in many areas.

many years ago, i tried to walk from one part of liverpool to the other.

it was almost impossible. pavements were very dirty, covered in mud and debris. pavements next to some of the big roads just stopped sometimes, many large junctions had no crossing places. it took me 2 hours to walk 5 miles, I'd normally cover 8 or 9 in that time.

walking is the most basic level of human transportation - yet outside city centre's it's ignored by town planners and the ministry of transport, and most other levels of government. - Heck it's even hard to buy shoes that are suitable for walking around in these days - mine wear out in 4-6 months.

Even in cities, i find i'm sent 100 yards up side streets at main junctions to get to a crossing. The alternative is to climb the railings and dance with cars that are not expecting to see pedestrians on the road.

Every day for the last year my work collegues and I have to cross the end of a motorway, on my way to work from the local train station. it makes me a little bitter to see millions spent on roads, parking restrictions public transport etc, yet we can't even get a "pedestrians crossing" warning sign, let alone a proper pelican or foot bridge.

rant over, for now!

[Turbocharger]

I wholly agree with Iain, cars should be charged on a 'by journey' basis. Then I could have the expensive LR for offroading, an economical Smart or diesel supermini for commuting, and use the bus for town journeys. Instead I'm forced to pay ££ for tax, insurance etc which makes it cheaper to shovel fuel into the Ninety for a year.

You can't kick the government by overloading public transport though, the vast majority of bus and rail services are operated by private companies without public subsidy. It's deemed 'poor value for money' by the taxpayer and so falls down the priority list.

From January though, free bus travel for OAPs. Maybe that'll drag the Fiesta-grannies off the road?

[DaveSIIA]

cars should be charged on a 'by journey' basis

Given the way fuel is taxed, I thought we already were !!!

[dollythelw]

If I remember correctly only 5% of the tax disc value "vehicle excise duty" goes into maintainance. the rest goes on buying Jags and paying cherie blairs public appearance fees

[siggy]

the vast majority of bus and rail services are operated by private companies without public subsidy.

The privatized rail network is getting more public revenue than when it was a nationalized industry. This is to stop the TOC chucking it in because they can't adhere to the time table constraints and make profit

If a train fails they pay a massive amount in compensation due to all the other trains for example a train delayed for 15minutes can cost £millions in revenue

delay an intercity £200 per minute

delay an outer suburban £300 per minute

delay an inner suburban £500 per minute

this is due to how quickly they have to turn about for the next service (normally 10 minutes in my area) in affect a inner suburban can leave on time be delayed by 15minutes due to another broken train be 15minutes late at terminus has to be cleaned 10 minutes leaves now 25 minutes late however all the other trains going in the other direction are delayed leaving due to broke train so that when this train that was now 25 minutes late is now 40minutes late and so it goes on............accumulating

and the TOC's can't cancel trains because they have to pay for slots in the running diagrams if they cancel they still pay and then pay again for the cancelation and then technically they miss the target set by the regulaters so they have to pay again

hence heavy government subbing

hope's that clear!!

[dollythelw]

is this the integrated rail network that travels a lower average speeds than in the age of steam? or stops when theres "the wrong kind of sandwiches on the trolley"

the easy way of ensuring better statistics for "on-time" arrivals/departures is to increase the journey time (which is what they did), the figure I remember gave a station in cornwall to london and a speed lower than the average in 1930

bring back national service mutter mutter, fekless youths....... better in the days of the empire.. grumble...

[siggy]

is this the integrated fractured rail network that travels a lower average speeds than in the age of steam

the very same

the same privatisation that the Dutch copied then reversed because it can't /doesn't work. The very same that the government and Rail professionals that agreed the scheme admit doesn't work and if they had to do it again would do it completely differently....The very same network that I can foresee slowly being re-nationalized as the TOC's hand back contracts to NR..... as totally unworkable.....