Ask not for whom the road tolls … it might be tolling for thee.
Annual polls often rate Vancouver, Toronto and Montreal as the worst congested cities in North America. It’s the usual combination of too many cars, overwhelmed or non-existent transit, and a failure at all levels of government to make hard political calls. You can get from here to there, but it’s gonna take you forever.
A Trent University professor started thumping a familiar drum recently, declaring it time for Ontario to jack gas taxes and start tolling some major highways. But is this the answer? Vancouver instituted tolls on its Port Mann and Golden Ears bridges to offset the cost of building them; instead, both bridges face annual losses totaling nearly $120 million. Vancouverites already face the most highly taxed gas in the country; not sure I blame them for crowding onto a “free” bridge to get to work. Or try to.
London, England instituted congestion tolls over a decade ago to much hue and cry, though ultimately, most consider it a success. Paris, France, facing horrendous air pollution levels from congestion, banned even numbered plates for a day. A single day. Officials yelled, “mission accomplished!” though it’s doubtful. For 10 years now, they’ve debated banning older vehicles and banning diesel vehicles, and while the city provided free transit on its experimental no-car day, it recognized the staggering costs of keeping that carrot in place.
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Mostly, Paris has a mayor who is embattled with various environmental ministers and nobody seems to be reading from the same play book. In fact, to even get that single day, the French President had to step in and rule against his former girlfriend — the environment minister. And to think all Toronto has to deal with is a former mayor who openly admits he misuses HOV lanes by keeping an eye out for the cops.
I live about 50 kilometres outside Toronto; I used to say a “half hour” drive, but that’s just crazy talk now. On the odd occasion I venture downtown, I need anywhere from one to two hours, factoring in rush hours that build and crunch for three hours and frequently merge in the middle. Are tolls going to add another layer of hurt?
The latest figures from Stats Canada (2011) reveal that 74 per cent of us drive a vehicle to work; 83 per cent of that number drive alone, and the remaining 17 percent carpool. In heavily built up urban centres, it’s the commuters who are creating all the traffic tangles and all that pollution. The desire (or necessity) to work in urban cores but not (or be unable to afford to) live in them means an endless daily trudge for millions of Canadians.
A Golden Gate Bridge toll-taker collects a toll from a customer in this file photo. Canadian jurisdictions are considering a wider application of toll roads.
Justin Sullivan, Getty Images
Governments are struggling with aging infrastructure that too often receives costly emergency repair instead of more affordable on-going maintenance. City coffers are struggling with a recession that looks like it’s moved into the guest room and has no intention of going anywhere. Governments spend a lot of money on city planners and staff who tell them what they don’t want to hear – that sewers will cave and roads will rot and more people will be using them – and politicians shelve the reports because they haven’t figured out how to deliver bad news and still keep their jobs. It’s cheaper to order another study and kick the can a little further down the road.
I’ve interviewed groups who make carpooling work, but it relies very much on people who live in close proximity to each other who also work in close proximity to each other who don’t mind being trapped in close proximity to each other for their daily drives. We treat our cars as an extension of our homes, and for many, that cocoon of silence or talk radio is sacred. For others, shift work or family concerns make it nearly impossible to factor yet another moving part into the equation.
Car manufacturers are tasked with making vehicles that get increasingly better fuel economy and do less damage to the environment. They’re holding up their end of the deal so well we’re buying more cars than ever; gas prices may rise, but ever optimistic, we grumble and absorb the bump in our budgets and carry on. It’s an argument that chases its own tail. If I were still driving the vehicle I was driving ten years ago, I’d be monitoring my fuel usage far more closely. Instead, my current ride gets about thirty per cent better fuel efficiency. It’s not that people don’t want to do the right thing, but we change when it becomes more painful not to change.
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Politicians and anyone who cares about the environment want drivers off the roads, but most of us are just trying to earn a living. Instituting gas taxes and tolls generates more money from an angry electorate, but predicting that income is tricky; if it works and people drive less, less money comes in. See: Vancouver bridges.
Tolling major routes pushes traffic onto secondary arteries. Never underestimate the ability of some portion of the driving public to see a toll booth as a challenge. With housing costs soaring in several of our major centres, we’re inevitably punishing those who have to commute, not only those who choose to.
When I travel through the U.S., I pay tolls all over the place. I also see a population that has factored those tolls into their daily drive as surely as you factor in your daily coffee or Sirius Radio. If you toll it, most of them will still come. We only change when the alternative is more painful.
