Matt B wrote:
> David Martin wrote:
[ ... ]
>> So you still haven't answered the question:
> I didn't know there was a question, but anyway...
>> Why should I (as a tax payer including the various duties on vehicle
>> use) pay for road surface to be maintained so you can store your
>> vehicle?
> Yes, that /is/ a good question - I wish I knew the answer.
There IS an answer.
> But, whilst
> we continue to suffer the, basically socialist, system that we do, it is
> for the same reason that you have to pay for the pavements so that I can
> stand about looking into shop windows from them, or for the bus shelters
> so that I can sit in them for an indeterminate length of time waiting
> for a bus, or for bike racks so that I can store my bicycle in them, or
> for the cycle lanes, and cycle paths, so that politicians can be smug
> about their complying with government targets.
Eh?
>> If we reduced highway width to what is needed for passing and
>> repassing, and required people to bear the cost of maintaining parking
>> spaces then I'm sure we would see a difference in attitude.
That would be OK as long as "passing and repassing" meant what it says
on the tin - with sufficient space (as a policy aim) for overtaking
(where the underlying width allows it).
> I'm sure there would, motorists would resent even more, the extortionate
> taxes that they are required to pay to use their vehicles - they may
> even mobilise (if they could be bothered) and force the government to
> "review the situation", as happened with the fuel duty escalator. 
I really don't see why. I have a garage and a driveway and we never
leave any of our cars on the highway near home (elsewhere is another
matter, of course). I do not feel "swizzed" by paying road tax (and it
IS road tax, despite what the enviro-loons prefer to think) and
parking on my own land. Rather, I take satisfaction from the increased
safety that vehicle and passengers enjoy by not having to mount and
dismount on the highway, to say nothing of the increased convenience
(try unloading ten bags of supermarket shopping from a space 50 yards
down the road) and increased privacy (no-one can see what I'm putting
into, or taking out of, the boot). I would not, given a choice, ever
buy a house that didn't have adequate garaging facilities.
On the contrary, rather than feeling robbed by a requirement that
vehicles must be garaged (ie, parked near home) off the highway (and
that a tax disc will not be issued unless there is evidence that such
space exists, is sufficient for the number of vehicles in use at that
address and that it is used), I would regard that as a liberating
factor. I think it's an idea whose time has come (or is coming).
It would not be popular with some of those whose home cannot
accommodate off-street parking, but of course, a market for suburban
off-street parking would be created*. And who knows? Perhaps some
car-less residents would be willing to rent out their garages and
driveways (I understand that the non-driving previous owner of my
house did exactly that, some thirty years ago).
[*I understand that Liverpool City Council actually has a proposal for
demolishing all the terraced houses on one side of a street a relative
lives in - so as to provide rear-of-property parking for the houses on
the adjacent main road - in an effort to redevelop and upgrade the
area. Of course, ATM that street is besieged by parking demand, not
only from its own residents but also from the residents of the
yellow-line-bound main road and visitors to a nearby hospital.]
> Just think though, the land thus saved in town centres, which would be
> quite substantial, especially if bus lanes were nullified, could be sold
> to the adjacent business owners, and they could choose whether to use it
> for bus lanes, cycle lanes, or to provide free customer parking. What
> do you think most of them would use it for, given the freedom of choice?
> For a clue, look at the out-of-town shopping facilities, and see how
> many of them have no free parking available.
Free parking and free garaging (see above for the distinction) are not
the same thing.
>> It would certainly make suburbia a more pleasant place.
> All those remaining front gardens would look lovely as oil-stained
> concrete forecourts, and the roller-coaster effect of all those new
> dropped-kerbs would add so much fun to pavement cycling. ;-)
If necessary, the planning system could be tweaked so as to prevent
undue or excessive concreting-over of small forecourts in terraced
housing (as distinct from driveways intended as such from the off).
Dropped kerbs are a concomitant feature of an inherently desirable
situation - off-street parking. We all have to live with them.
I know that there would be howls of indignation from terrace-dwellers
and flat-dwellers and their spokesmen (whether self-appointed or not),
but a good rule of thumb to remember would be that terraced housing is
mostly (I repeat: mostly) to be found in inner-city and inner-urban
areas which were meant to be serviced by a combination of walking,
cycling, deliveries and public transport. The inhabitants of terraced
housing outside such areas would not find alternatives as easy to come
by, but, OTOH, they ought, on average, to be able to more easily find
land near their home which they can rent for parking.
Of course, I would wish to see the same restrictions applied to
bicycles, motor-bikes, (especially) commercial vehicles, etc.
In common with the previous poster, I cannot see why anyone should be
able to pre-empt use of (a particular part of) the highway for 100
hours a week. Such a policy would also free up on-street parking (not
garaging) for legitimate purposes (working, shopping, visiting, etc).
