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Stop the free ride: all motorists should pay their way, whatever vehicle they drive
(theconversation.com)
This would incentivise cycling and public transport
this post was submitted on 17 Aug 2025
45 points (100.0% liked)
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Well, we'll just have to tax bicycles, buses and trains etc!
And anyone/anything who has legs. I'm awake to your 'walking' and 'riding a horse' schemes.
It would be logical to base road tax also on vehicle weight and the use of studded tires (in addition to CO2 like it is now). However, the weight classes should be devised so that the change only affects the needlessly massive cars. This would be a win-win.
The fuel excise obviously taxed larger vehicles more over the same distance. It totally makes sense to have weight classes.
Oh, and Australia needs a "kei" class, dammit. Nobody's second car has any business being bigger than that.
2x the weight causes 16x the damage (2⁴)
Yep. This is why I think my 900kg hatchback should cost less to register than a 2500kg roadblimp ute.
I don't think a quartic tax will scale too well because the impact of a vehicle isn't just its wear on the road.
However larger cars burn more fuel and release more particulates such as brake dust and microplastics from tyre wear. Backstreets that once could park on both sides without impeding flow are now reduced to a single lane. Turning lanes will now only hold 4 cars instead of 6, and less cars get through per green. They bring more kinetic energy into a collision, and are not as manouverable. They're less safe to have around by every measure.
If the TAC processed their road stats properly, they'd realise that a kei car won't kill anyone. People in kei cars will still get killed, but that's a misattributed stat that should go towards the vehicle that brought the most weight into the collision.
A fair tax would need to be based on size, weight and emissions. They all matter independently.
That make sense.
Also, an hybrid vehicle may pollute more if it's never recharged and only use gas. Or less if it's frequently recharged.
So an added benefit of that change would be to get rid of an automatic insentive for hybrid. Taxing gas and fossil fuel is a more direct and efficient insentive. If gas cost more, hybrid owners will recharge more often.
Fuel excise makes sense, the more fuel you use the more you've probably driven, the more damage you've contributed to the road. How to make it fair for EV users with out invading individual privacy is harder. Like what should a commuter pay compared to a courier who would do far more kms and relies on the road for the business?
It's going to be unpopular, but as a car lover, I'm happy to pay a carbon tax to keep driving gas guzzlers and have that reinvested into carbon neutrality, whether that's EV subsidies or something else work a better carbon return
If a commuter and or courrier drive the same distance on the same road with a similar car, they should contribute the same road toll for maintenance.
A courier should be able to deduct the toll from his income, counting it as a business expense. So it's a bit less of a burden for profesionnals who depend on their vehicle.
There already are mechanisms for this. No need to complicate further.
How do you calculate the road toll?
The article has some suggestions
The payment should be based on a combination of vehicle mass and distance travelled. That’s because damage to roads is overwhelmingly caused by heavy vehicles.
My biggest problem with that is the distance; either the licencing authority has access to our cars position or we self report it. Neither are great options in my opinion
Isn't the EV tax effectively just a fuel excise tax for cars that don't use fuel? I mean, regardless of what this article thinks the fuel excise is described as "a sales tax on fuel that is reinvested into roads".
That's what it is presented as. It functions as a disincentive against EVs
Though vehicles overall should be paying enough to pay for their infrastructure, I'd like that to be entirely borne by fossil fuel vehicles to move the balance of vehicles towards the quieter and less polluting
Don't discriminate against the poor.
The environment is better off with improved public transport rather than EV's anyhow.
Relevant to our recent exchange, @Zagorath, this helped clarify my thoughts on the topic.
Thanks for sharing!
I thought this line from the conclusion was particularly interesting:
Vehicle registration fees make only a modest contribution to road costs. That’s why all motorists should pay a road-user charge.
I'm torn. I do like the idea, in principle. Add a road-use charge to both EVs and ICE vehicles. That helps keep EVs at an economic leg-up over ICE, while also helping address the broader societal costs of cars.
The thing that makes me nervous is that even today, when there's no such thing as a road use charge and roads are paid for out of general revenue, we frequently see drivers say things like "I have a right to be on the road because I'm paying to use it, and you need to get out of my way" to cyclists. This is both factually and morally wrong, and my concern is that if the factual side of it were made correct, it might be a little harder to immediately shut them down for the bad morals. Not that I think some people arguing in bad faith should be a reason to avoid doing a good thing. It just needs to be accompanied by strong PR around the idea that it's to help offset the damage cars do to roads, and perhaps also the effects of pollution caused by tyres. And not merely framed purely as a toll for the right to use the roads.