AA has suggested pay per mile after 3000 miles each year

[ivykaty44]

To reduce short trips by car

I think this would make people think about car usage & only use when needed, say school run & work. But then opt for shopping home delivery and other trips by bus, walking or bike

Countryside would get more mileage free

What do others think? Would it help reduce pollution and encourage parents not to pick up secondary children from school etc?

But if fuel is banned then how will the government get tax from a banned product?

@ivykaty44 they do - so they can either tax the new fuel method in some way or use something like this then. Until then drivers already pay more money if they drive more miles via fuel tax.

Anyone who does less than 3000 miles a year probably doesn't need a car!

Rurally woud get charged less? Perfect. That's another thing we have less of... less public transport, less jobs, less mileage charges. Great!

HaveYouSeenMyBones

So you’d have a raise in tax on electric? So households will pay more for heating and lighting ?
Or how will you tax solar energy?

If I was to get a bus to work (which won't happen because there's none that run until 8.30am...I start work at 7.30), it would be a 2/12 hour journey on 3 buses to travel the 10 miles from home to work. It would cost me approx £48 a day. Not much of an incentive to give up my car. Once again a policy devised with only those in towns and cities in mind and fuck the rural communities because we don't matter.

Anyone who does less than 3000 miles a year probably doesn't need a car!

I do less than 3000 a year, I still need a car!

Yes, great for city dwellers, but those of us who live rurally have little or no choice but to drive. It would have to vary according to where you live, and so, like most things, would be open to abuse and fraud.

This would only work in a country that properly resources public transport (not just in London) and had much better town planning practices rather than all these isolated new build bubbles on the outskirts of places with limited amenities.

I think it’s a good idea. Loads of people have just realised that they can work perfectly well from home, and anything that reduces short car journeys is a good thing. The road pricing money can be redirected into better public transport.

I had the misfortune of Working for the AA briefly. Jumping on this band wagon doesn't surprise me at all.
In reality, a survey conducted amongst AA members in the middle of a global pandemic should be the basis for fuck all.
No doubt people genuinely think they will walk/cycle more and will change their lives to work from home etc etc.
Let's see where we are this time next year.
I will drive ant distance I am asked to find work. Because that's the reality in a recession.

The way to reduce short trips is to make short trips easier on foot / by bike. Eg 20 mph speed limit on most roads in towns and cities, one way streets that are 2 way for cyclists, well lit, well maintained cycle routes.
Pavements and cycle routes gritted in winter as a priority. Secure cycle parking everywhere.

I.e. carrot not stick.

This is Tony Blair's road tax repackaged. That was thrown out when it became clear it wasn't going to be practically workable and that the general public were going to hate it and anyone who introduced it.

Self employed people are another group who would be screwed in being able to travel to work.

@ivykaty44

HaveYouSeenMyBones

So you’d have a raise in tax on electric? So households will pay more for heating and lighting ?
Or how will you tax solar energy?

It ain't my job to digure it out. I was sharing an opinion that I think adding extra charges per mile right now is just double counting because drivers alread pay per mile.

encourage parents not to pick up secondary children from school etc?

Not wanting to be goady but very very few people collect secondary children from clubs because it's fun and we need something to do - it's because often it would take them (and sometime us too) far longer to use public transport to say nothing of the cost. Mine are at school about 7 miles away - just under 20 mins on a good run. The nearest train station which only involves 1 change and not 2 is a 10 minute drive. If they finish at normal time, I often them to take the train home (not always due to different children in different places) but after about 4.30, the connections are far worse so it can easily take them 45 minutes and then me (plus them) a 10 minute journey - that's why I tend to pick them up.

@Taswama

The way to reduce short trips is to make short trips easier on foot / by bike. Eg 20 mph speed limit on most roads in towns and cities, one way streets that are 2 way for cyclists, well lit, well maintained cycle routes. Pavements and cycle routes gritted in winter as a priority. Secure cycle parking everywhere.

I.e. carrot not stick.

Absolutely agree with this

It would likely penalise the poorer people in society, as well as people who live in the country, many of whom are not at all rich. Much as normal then

^ This ^

And it would penalise the disabled, who often don't have access to public transport even where it exists - calling something "accessible" doesn't make it possible to walk!

I live in a rural area, and have to commute to work and to access many things. Even if they were to put in public transport (currently I'd need to drive to my nearest bus stop five miles away!), and make it run more often (there's a bus every hour), to somewhere that you actually want to go to (it runs between two small towns and goes nowhere else, so to get to many destinations you'd need to catch multiple buses), I can't walk 200 metres (which is why I have a car!).

3000 is fuck all. What a genuinely terrible idea. I live rurally and drive around 9000 purely to work a year! That’s before anything else at all like food shopping or even thinking about seeing friends or family.
I agree with a pp, I rather think incentives for those who are able to cycle or walk more would be a better way to go than further penalising drivers.

They would be better off improving rural transport links, which are pretty bad in most areas.

Ridiculous idea.
If they want to make people use cars less, they need to invest in alternatives.
Invest in street lighting so people feel safer walking in the dark
Invest in subsidised bus schemes, invest in cycle lanes, invest in improving bus routes and times. Even investing in benches so people walking around can stop and rest if they need to.

Such a ridiculous suggestion. 300 miles a year is fuck all. My DH does 12000 just on his commute, my commute is about 7500, plus I regularly have to use my car for work. We could get trains but it would take three times as long (and cost more) and we'd have to reduce our working hours to be able to drop off and pick up our kids at/from nursery. It's a 40 mile round trip to see my family and public transport is almost non-existent on a weekend because they're semi-rural. The in-laws are 200 miles away - should we just never go see them? Or perhaps save all our annual miles for visits to them?

Our situation is hardly unique.

If anything, people who do less mileage could probably reduce their car use more than those who do more because they're likely to be doing shorter, local trips - although I'm not suggesting any penalty is introduced for them either.

I do less than 3000 a year, I still need a car! I said probably not definitely!

I live rurally. We have no shops, no pub, nothing. I would starve without a car. Everything I do which isn't housework involves a car trip.
I used to live in a town, and dutifully rode my bike (even to do the food shopping) but was priced out.

Even school run is dependent on me driving because I refused to send my kids to our 'catchment' school which is a dire pit of bullying, so we aren't allowed to use the school bus.

Look at how councils have made town centers hard to access for normal people in cars. I now drive further to use a larger shopping complex because parking in local towns (5 miles away from me, no buses) has been made impossible, who can honestly look around a town inside one hour?

Who want to down a hot coffee because they are so scared of the militant traffic wardens!?

I'd be screwed, I live and work rurally and there are no buses to get me the 22 miles to work for 7.45. Mr Beacham (sp?) removed all the train lines.

@HaveYouSeenMyBones

Is that quite literally what petrol/diesel achieves? You pay per mile because the more miles you do, the more gas you need to buy, the more you pay.

The answer to everything seems to be to slap £ on it rather than look at better ways to achieve it.

You want people to travel less? Look at the journeys people make and ways to support them to not making those journeys. e.g. by making it a legal right to request work from home in all jobs where it is possible.

this,

I cant get public transport to where I work without multiple changes and going miles out of the way

I work about 16 miles from my house
To get the bus between 1hr 4min, up to silly numbers, and train would be over an hour and the 20 mins each side extra (both bus and train, maybe a little less walking on bus), so, 1hr 40 to get to work plus extortionate costs, and when they run

My car? 25 to 35 mins each way

I seem to recall when some countries introduced parking restrictions based on odd/even number plates, the wealthy just bought two cars (thus completely torpedoing the point of the law).

If this were to be introduced, you'd just get the wealthy buying a new car every 2,999 miles. Which is probably the real intent here