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19th February 2007, 09:29 PM
i have to say I dont subscribe to the notion that "Polluter pays' and thus that is why, amongst other things, developers pay for archaeological work. Why shouldn't that principle apply to the population at large.
Lets take this argument further and tax people on all the pollutants they produce. People coul be taxed on the amount of methane they produce and if they dont have enough trees in their garden the amount of carbon monoxide they emit. Ultimately we will have to have poo tax for people who donot use a biodisc.
Peter
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19th February 2007, 11:05 PM
Posted by Kevin Wooldridge: Quote:quote:Any chance BAJR might start a petition in favour of road pricing. I would be happy to sign.
There's plenty of pro-road pricing (and related topics) petitions already on the same website as the anti-road pricing one. Sign up there...
Posted by Invisible Man: Quote:quote:Nobody drives in rush hour traffic because they want to, it's because they need to
Not true - I have spoken to plenty of people in my office (in Leeds) who drive precisely because they want to, despite the fact that they could reach their destination faster by public transport.
On your other points - yes, any measures to penalise unnecessary driving should focus particularly on heavily congested areas. They should also pay particular attention to cars with larger engines, for which reason I also favour higher fuel taxes.
I'm not quite sure what you have against the 'bandwagon of climate change' - are you looking forward to sea levels rising, drowning East Anglia and London amongst other places?
Sticking on that theme, which is only one of several good reasons for cutting car use, we all know that traffic fumes are one of the largest (and fastest growing) sources of greenhouse gases. So, if there is no alternative (in your view) to continuing unrestricted use of cars, how would you go about cutting those emissions?
1man1desk
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20th February 2007, 09:48 AM
No bike trackways, no decent public transport network, extortionate rail fares etc. etc. etc.
Not exactly an attrative option to giving up four wheels. I drive a lot, also use a bike and walk (not at the same time!. The railway infrustructure can not cope with an increase in pasengers with out investment. I am aaware that sod-all money from road taxing has actually been allocated to improving public transport, if it is adopted. An allternative would be to raise vehicle and fuel tax-oops they already did and that really worked didn't it.
People need cars. You cannot remove a system and have nothing to replace it with. Perhaps politians would like to keep the low income peasents off the roads so they can get a clear run from Whitheall to Cornwall during peak our? Pase the bolli jeves and damn the speed camera (probably both claimable as travel expenses).
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20th February 2007, 11:00 AM
A slightly different slant for me....
The Montreal Protocol 1990s? resulted in a CFC market place. Countries were allocated upper emmission limits.This resulted in the international buying and selling of emmission allowances.The western worlds answer to emmissions seem to be either-turn the issue into an enterprise or, pass this "cost" to the consumer. In short-paying more to use current forms of transport (internal combustion) will do nothing to kerb emmissions.Car manufacturers continue to spew out machines that are contributing to the problem simply because it is big business.More and more sophisticated technologies are finding their way into homes and are designed so poorly, that everything needs a bloody battery charger. Even to clean ones teeth! No-one (in government or corporately) is seriously going to be willing to kerb our voracious energy requirements when it is simply big business. Road taxing is just another cynical way of making a business out of the destruction of our environment. :face-huh: not unlike ppg16.......
..knowledge without action is insanity and action without knowledge is vanity..(imam ghazali,ayyuhal-walad)
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20th February 2007, 11:11 AM
The problem seems to be it will be the poor and those who work in in low paying jobs and have to drive who will be hit the hardest. Does this ring any bells? Why should we put up with unfair taxation which disproportionately affects the least well off and those who work hard full time in low paying jobs?
Unless there is some provision for essential use, a lot more people won't be able to afford to be professional archaeologists.
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21st February 2007, 11:14 AM
1.7M people wow. But typing your name into an online petition is hardly proactive is it? Kind of sums up the whole issue for me. Protest for car driving couch potatoes? Also not clear what the petition is against - road charging, people tracking, or what? It strikes me that people view their 'freedom to drive' a bit like the american 'right to bear arms' or something? :face-huh:
Not really a 'pot person'.
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21st February 2007, 01:43 PM
Posted by Digger: Quote:quote:No bike trackways, no decent public transport network, extortionate rail fares etc. etc. etc.
Not exactly an attrative option to giving up four wheels. I drive a lot, also use a bike and walk (not at the same time!. The railway infrustructure can not cope with an increase in pasengers with out investment. I am aaware that sod-all money from road taxing has actually been allocated to improving public transport, if it is adopted. An allternative would be to raise vehicle and fuel tax-oops they already did and that really worked didn't it.
People need cars. You cannot remove a system and have nothing to replace it with. Perhaps politians would like to keep the low income peasents off the roads so they can get a clear run from Whitheall to Cornwall during peak our? Pase the bolli jeves and damn the speed camera (probably both claimable as travel expenses).
In Leeds, many of the commuter rail routes have had new rolling-stock with greater capacity in the last few years - although now at capacity again. There has also been quite a bit of work on providing more bus and cycle lanes (including on my cycling route). Still very far from perfect and I think a lot could be done, but it's not a case of no investment.
The biggest problem with the buses in Leeds is that they are constantly held up in gridlocked traffic - reduce the traffic or segregate the buses, and hey-presto, the buses will be more reliable and quicker.
It is certainly true that people need cars - I have not got rid of mine, but I do use it a lot less than I used to. The point is not to stop people who need to from using their cars, but to discourage the enormous amounts of un-necessary use, especially for daily commuting to workplaces that are accessible by public transport.
I think a lot of the concern about social exclusion is exaggerated and can be greatly reduced in working out the details. The roads most likely to be affected by pricing measures are either the busier motorways and trunk roads or urban commuting routes. If you are travelling in remote rural areas, you are unlikely to be using a priced road.
If your trip is essential for your work, your employer should reimburse you.
The tougher ones are commuting trips to workplaces in the urban fringe that are not easily accessible by public transport.
There is no reason why a road pricing scheme couldn't be phased in gradually, with improvements in public transport in advance of each new phase of road pricing.
1man1desk
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21st February 2007, 02:18 PM
But arent "better forms of public transport" still internal combustion engined concepts? Reducing volumes of personal transport to a roughly equivalent volume of public transport (in all its guises) simply increases the business opportunities for transport companies without addressing the obvious? Emmissions are emmissions-wether they come from private or corporate transport systems.I am yet to hear of "new" transport systems that will eradicate cfc and carbon emmissions. If "people need cars", then why are we not as an advanced industrial nation flooding the market with new, clean technologies? The governments approach to the environment is a simple and as yet, an unchallenged one; continue in the same vein but shift profit margins to localised transport corporations, lie about emmission levels, maintain the car industry moghuls and suck more money from the tax-payer in the process.
..knowledge without action is insanity and action without knowledge is vanity..(imam ghazali,ayyuhal-walad)
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21st February 2007, 02:40 PM
And some into Leeds haven't....I got on the other day and wouldn't have been surprised to see Thomas pulling it.
Bus lanes are a tricky thing, evidence for their effectiveness is mixed. What has been found is that in many cases (not all, before you pick on a example of the contrary) by reducing non-bus road capacity, traffic queues get far longer, and obstruct junctions, thus the buses can't get onto their lanes and you have a lose-lose situation. It is not a simple issue, there is no hey presto. Trams maybe?
Yes, I think the nub of it is the 'unnecessary journey' syndrome - but who decides? How about the school run - look at how dramatically the traffic flow improves during school holidays. Who decides how accessible by public transport a workplace is?
Society has chanmged enormously over the last 40 odd years. Infrastructure has become geared to the car - out of town shopping centres, peripheral supermarkets and the death of the high street. We used to have full time housewives with the time to go shopping every day or two. Now most people do a weekly shop, difficult to carry home from the peripheral supermarket.
Yes, exactly 1man, as I said before if government is serious about the issue they would put effective alternatives in place BEFORE introducing another tax, which doesn't just mean a couple of extra buses. Do you really believe that will happen? I'd like to think so, but....
We owe the dead nothing but the truth.
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21st February 2007, 02:54 PM
Well I signed the petition and I consider myself quite environmentally aware. I walk or take the bus when I can but getting to work is a different matter.
By Vulpes: âProtest for car driving couch potatoes?â
My current commute by car takes around 3 hours a day. The same by bus and train would be around 6-7 hours and thatâs if there were no delays. (And there are no busses early enough anyway!) The cost of the train journey is more than the cost of my petrol (thought that is a lot) so I choose to use my carâ¦understandably I think and I donât really see it as the lazy option, just the realistic one!
Also my job description says that I need my own car and so do many adverts on BAJR so how do all these people walking and biking to work get on when a last minute evaluation or watching brief comes up? Now I can manage a shovel, kit bag and cameras but I could not cope with a level on the back of a bike!!!!!
Basing half my commute on the £1.20 per mile for the busy motorway and 2p per mile for the quite country roads (though this is probably very conservative) that comes to about £65 a day.!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! That is my entire wage gone and I have not even counted in the petrol!
I am all for sorting out the problems on our roads (I am fed up with sitting in cues on the M5) but I really donât think that this is the way to go about it.
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