User-pay road system suggested to ease congestion

USER-pays roads system must be considered if Melbourne is serious about easing congestion, according to infrastructure bosses and Australia’s largest toll-road operator.

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USER-pays roads system must be considered if Melbourne is serious about easing congestion.

That’s the verdict of infrastructure bosses and Australia’s largest toll-road operator who agree the current system burdens everyone no matter how often or far they drive.

Transurban, which manages CityLink, says the current funding model must change or Australia will run out of money to build new roads and keep existing ones in good condition.

With vehicles becoming more fuel efficient, electric vehicles on the rise, and more shared driving, government revenue from fuel excise, car registration and car purchases is declining.

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Transurban has undertaken a road-usage study of 1600 drivers in Melbourne.

Two models were tested in the study — usage-based (charge per kilometre, per trip or a flat rate) and congestion-based (area charges, time of day). At the beginning of the study, 85 per cent of participants said they were comfortable with the current road-funding system — at the end 60 per cent said they preferred a user-pays system.

Transurban chief executive officer Scott Charlton said the study showed that participants were open to trying a new, fairer and more transparent way of paying for road use.

“Our real-world trials have shown Melburnians are open to reforming the road-funding system and it is great that the federal government is undertaking its own study here, too,” Mr Charlton said.

RACV general manager public policy Brian Negus said Australia had an unfair and dysfunctional system of vehicle taxes that bore no relation to how, where and when we travelled.

Mr Negus said a more equitable and sustainable system of pricing road use was needed relating to vehicle weight and the location, time and distance travelled.

“This would mean as part of the change, people in outer and regional areas could pay less and people with more transport choices could consider cheaper alternatives,” Mr Negus said.

The federal government has said it would “investigate the benefits, costs and potential next steps of options to introduce cost-reflective road-pricing for all vehicles”.

Experts say Australia’s road-funding system is unsustainable. Picture: Nicole Garmston

In a speech to the Sydney Institute last year, federal Minister for Urban Infrastructure Paul Fletcher said Australia had a problem with its road-funding system.

“If fuel excise revenues decline as looks likely, it may become unsustainable; and we are not making maintenance and investment decisions which best respond to demand,” Mr Fletcher said.

“What we do not yet know is whether a cost-reflective road pricing system would do a better job.

“We would also need to make the case to the community — where, frankly, there is understandable scepticism.”

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@AndyJeffo