An occasional update on items from Motordom – the world of auto dominance
______________________________
“MOTORISTS HAVE RUINED ENGLAND …”
Not a headline one expects in The Telegraph, a paper on the right-hand side of the ideological spectrum, especially when followed by “… and they need to pay the price.”
That’s Alex Proud’s conclusion:
In general, most of us are pretty happy with letting the markets allocate scarce (in the economic sense) goods by deciding the price for them. …
So what I want to know is this: why, the moment we get into our cars, do we all turn into screaming, pinko commies? Why do we reject the free market solutions that we embrace everywhere else. Why, rather than accept the idea that we should pay when we use a scarce resource (roads) do we ration them in the worst possible way. Why do we agree that, for a once-a-year fee, you can drive as much as you like, wherever you like and whenever you like? …
So what we need now is smarter congestion charging, nationwide. Congestion charging which is not a flat rate, but a rate that rises and falls until it reaches the right level to keep traffic moving. …
Come on, you’re Telegraph readers. This is capitalism at it’s best. It’s the market being used to solve real problems, where central price controls are leading to disaster. It’s a workable alternative to gridlock or paving over our countryside and probably it won’t even cost you any more.
______________________________
VEHCILE MILES TRAVELLED GOING UP IN U.S.?
“New estimates released today by the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) show that American driving between July 2013 and June 2014 is at levels not seen since 2008,” reports an FHWA press release. That news has prompted the FHWA to call for “greater investment in highways that must bear growing volumes of traffic.” …
The VMT numbers are not compared to population, so take them with that fairly large grain of salt, but the FHWA is certainly making the case that Americans are driving more, especially in recent months.
A hunch: Older people are driving more, younger people less. That would somewhat explain the conflicting reports we get on VMT rates.
______________________________
There are some critiques of the uptick in USA VMT – which, even with population growth, is still about a 100 billion miles below that 2008 peak. See http://usa.streetsblog.org/2014/09/02/behind-fhwas-dubious-vmt-announcement-and-call-for-highway-investment/ I like how the article points out the double standard: when VMT increases, FHWA calls for greater investment in highways. When VMT goes down, FHWA doesn’t make the case for less investment.
The country rebounds from the worst recession since the Great Depression, and there is surprise people are driving more?