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Government urged to consider mobile phone approach to road charging
Date: 17 April 2007
The Government must have a complete rethink on road pricing or risk missing an opportunity to win over motorists, according to the RAC Foundation.
Foundation executive director Edmund King said the Government needs to start marketing road pricing as a solution to real problems, not just another revenue-raising device.
King suggests a package of solutions he calls "UK DriveTime", which would work in a similar way as a mobile phone package.
The RAC Foundation suggests the scheme could even be introduced on a voluntary level over a number of years, with subscribers benefiting from reduced fuel duty, cheaper insurance and up-to-date congestion and parking information, claiming the technology exists and is currently undergoing trials in America.
At present, motorists don't trust the Government to introduce and operate road pricing fairly, though RAC research showed a six-fold increase in support were the funds to be ringfenced and used only for transport.
"Turkeys don't vote for Christmas and motorists won't support road pricing unless they know that it will come as part of a congestion-busting package that will give the UK a first-class transport system, for business and personal use," said King. "A voluntary scheme, like UK DriveTime, introduced over several years, would iron out problems with technology and allow motorists to get used to a very different way of paying for motoring."
Meanwhile, a new report has branded progress on tackling school run traffic in London as "disappointingly slow". Only a third of primary schools have made plans to encourage pupils to travel to school without a car journey, compared with the target of 40%.
The report for the London Assembly's transport committee claims one in five cars on the road at 8.50am is on the school run.
