Time for courage on road tolls, transport heads told

Traffic congestion in New Zealand will not be cut until cities here have leaders brave enough to bring in London-type toll charges, a British transport adviser says.

Professor David Begg, chairman of the Commission for Integrated Transport, said building more roads gave only temporary relief, and providing good public transport alone did not discourage people from using their cars.

"Politicians and transport planners alike ... will not find an infrastructure solution to congestion," he told a Sustainable Land Transport conference in Wellington.

Professor Begg said it had been estimated that an extra lane added to the M25 motorway orbiting London would be filled to capacity within a year, unless road tolls were introduced at the same time.

To reduce congestion and achieve a truly sustainable transport system, a combination of measures that offered both a carrot and a stick were needed - along with a leader brave enough to push through the unpopular policies, even in the face of hostility.

And that meant road tolls, he said.

London Mayor Ken Livingstone had five policy advisers who agreed on only one thing - that he should not bring in congestion charging.

Today, everyone accepted it had worked.

"Road pricing has come to be accepted as one of the most viable tools for achieving a sustainable transport system," Professor Begg said.

Since the £5 ($13) cordon toll was brought in, congestion in the central city had been cut by 30 per cent and 29,000 more people were using buses. "There was a dramatic improvement to the efficiency and quality of the bus services because there were fewer cars on the road."

For the future, satellite systems could be used to track vehicles and charge their owners according to the distance and time of day they travelled and the roads they used.

Though road pricing might be unpopular now, it would be accepted in time, Professor Begg said.

"We have been here before, with compulsory wearing of seatbelts and tough drink-driving laws.

"It was tough at the time but it is now accepted," he said. "There is nothing as painful as the birth of a new idea."

Countries could not escape the need to deal with traffic and the effects on the environment, and it required strong leadership.

The Commission for Integrated Transport is an independent group set up in 1988 to advise the British Government on transport policy.

- NZPA