Region-Wide Tolling

[cabotp]

They may have removed the tolls on the PMB and GEB. But I can pretty much bet my life that some how some way we will all be paying some kind of tax/fee to drive in the future.

I can't say what kind of system there will be. Since there are many different ways and ideas that exist in the world. We do know that there is a commission that is currently looking at the different systems and ideas and the pros and cons of all of them.

One thing to keep in mind the idea of the gas tax needs to go. Since there are more and more cars that are electric. Paying a gas tax makes no sense in the long run. So whatever system they come up with. The gas tax should be removed to somewhat compensate it.

[VancouverOfTheFuture]

maybe a vehicle levy? it was an NDP idea before, so why not bring that back?

[WarrenC12]

Originally Posted by VancouverOfTheFuture

maybe a vehicle levy? it was an NDP idea before, so why not bring that back?

That's the worst idea, like a flat tax no matter how much you drive. Makes no sense.

[SpongeG]

traffic on the #1 seemed a lot heavier today than it has been when the tolls were on. Will be interesting to see what the stats say.

[MIPS]

Originally Posted by WarrenC12

That's the worst idea, like a flat tax no matter how much you drive. Makes no sense.

If you can afford to live in the lower mainland, I sincerely doubt you would go hungry paying an extra $50 per year in taxes.
I'm not in region (and don't even own/rent because I can't even afford Kamloops) but I still stand by saying I'm okay not seeing an extra $50 in my annual returns if it means major projects see funding/maintenance/regular payments to the debt incurred by said transportation improvement projects.
For the average person that is the cost equivalent of one tank of gas.

[logicbomb]

Originally Posted by SpongeG

traffic on the #1 seemed a lot heavier today than it has been when the tolls were on. Will be interesting to see what the stats say.

Don't care what everyone here claims but there's a significantly higher number of motorists on the road this year compared to last year. Every damn corridor this AM rush was clogged including Hwy #1 which was stop-and-go from 156 ST to North Van. I would usually bypass the Burnaby Lake congestion by going on Winston to Lougheed, but no dice today as many motorist opted to do the same.

My commute is averaging 1hr nowadays vs the 20-30min in previous years. I bypassed Hwy #1 during the PM hours by going through Burnaby/New West and made it home sooner.

Vehicle stalls and accidents are increasing as a result and causing significant delays.

[SpongeG]

yes its nuts now. I moved away in 2012 and moved back last christmas, despite frequent visits here. The traffic is totally changed in that time. I really notice it in the last few times i have been home.

[cornholio]

Originally Posted by logicbomb

Don't care what everyone here claims but there's a significantly higher number of motorists on the road this year compared to last year. Every damn corridor this AM rush was clogged including Hwy #1 which was stop-and-go from 156 ST to North Van. I would usually bypass the Burnaby Lake congestion by going on Winston to Lougheed, but no dice today as many motorist opted to do the same.

My commute is averaging 1hr nowadays vs the 20-30min in previous years. I bypassed Hwy #1 during the PM hours by going through Burnaby/New West and made it home sooner.

Vehicle stalls and accidents are increasing as a result and causing significant delays.

Not to sound like a broken record player but it will get much much worse. Look at population growth (as a result of high immigration rate), current congestion, and planned infrastructure projects. I came to the realization after sitting down and analyzing everything that this region is about to face a complete transportation network failure and I have left the city/country. In today's world being able to get around easily is important. Take that away and you might as well live in Mumbai. And no, public transit wont be able to handle the loads and will be equally congested and overcrowded and slow. Any sort of catch up in infrastructure will take decades and require a complete reversal in policies today (not tomorrow) and require massive investments in roads/highways, public transit and ALL infrastructure that helps people get around by giving them options. With current immigration rates and population growth it would probably be logistically impossible to catch up anyways but people live here and someone has to try. This will be your entire life in Vancouver and it will get much worse.

[logicbomb]

Originally Posted by cornholio

Not to sound like a broken record player but it will get much much worse. Look at population growth (as a result of high immigration rate), current congestion, and planned infrastructure projects. I came to the realization after sitting down and analyzing everything that this region is about to face a complete transportation network failure and I have left the city/country. In today's world being able to get around easily is important. Take that away and you might as well live in Mumbai. And no, public transit wont be able to handle the loads and will be equally congested and overcrowded and slow. Any sort of catch up in infrastructure will take decades and require a complete reversal in policies today (not tomorrow) and require massive investments in roads/highways, public transit and ALL infrastructure that helps people get around by giving them options. With current immigration rates and population growth it would probably be logistically impossible to catch up anyways but people live here and someone has to try. This will be your entire life in Vancouver and it will get much worse.

That's why my advise to many is to seek employment near your place of residence or to move out. Commuting is getting exponentially worse within the confines of the town and city centers and there are no strategies in place to better this. Richmond, Surrey, and Burnaby are rapidly densifying without improving the transportation grid or ensuring there's adequate infrastructure to meet the demands of residents- furthermore, the thrust for investment (residents) have made commercial/industrial zoning an afterthought and more jobs are being pushed out to the fringes of Metro Vancouver.

To simply catch up to todays standards. This region needs several new E-W and N-S freeways with highly complex interchanges. Several new rail ROW's with high speed commuter rail and many new skytrain lines. It's not happening any time soon.

Mobility pricing needs to be implemented soon to claw-back on congestion. Think about it, people would limit their trips across the PMB or take an unnecessary detour to save a few bucks...can you imagine how many individuals would rethink their commuting habits knowing they would be priced by the KM? Probably limiting their unnecessary trips to the lake, carpooling, cutting down on multiple grocery trips.....

[aberdeen5698]

Originally Posted by logicbomb

Mobility pricing needs to be implemented soon to claw-back on congestion. Think about it, people would limit their trips across the PMB or take an unnecessary detour to save a few bucks...can you imagine how many individuals would rethink their commuting habits knowing they would be priced by the KM?

And the price doesn't have to be very high. As soon as you associate a cost - even a cheap cost - with every km driven people start to rethink their driving habits. It doesn't take all that many people to combine, shift or pool trips to make a big difference in the amount of congestion.

[CanSpice]

Originally Posted by logicbomb

That's why my advise to many is to seek employment near your place of residence or to move out.

That's a false dichotomy. There is another choice: transit, specifically SkyTrain. I live in New West and have the same commute going downtown that I did five years ago, and that commute will stay the same five years from now. I might have to wait for an extra train when commuting out of downtown, but that's a delay of a couple of minutes. And now that the Evergreen Extension is open my commute to near Coquitlam Centre is going to stay the same over the next five years too (before I had to take the bus, and that was affected by vehicle volume on Lougheed).

SkyTrain has opened up a number of city centers as possibilities for living and working, and ignoring that puts people at a disservice.

Edit: And this is why mobility pricing needs to be brought in in conjunction with a strong transit backbone (i.e. SkyTrain to Langley sooner rather than later).

[cleowin]

Originally Posted by CanSpice

That's a false dichotomy. There is another choice: transit, specifically SkyTrain. I live in New West and have the same commute going downtown that I did five years ago, and that commute will stay the same five years from now. I might have to wait for an extra train when commuting out of downtown, but that's a delay of a couple of minutes. And now that the Evergreen Extension is open my commute to near Coquitlam Centre is going to stay the same over the next five years too (before I had to take the bus, and that was affected by vehicle volume on Lougheed).

SkyTrain has opened up a number of city centers as possibilities for living and working, and ignoring that puts people at a disservice.

Edit: And this is why mobility pricing needs to be brought in in conjunction with a strong transit backbone (i.e. SkyTrain to Langley sooner rather than later).

Majority of people may disagree with me, but I was very bothered when they decided to remove the tolls, because I knew the massive increase in usage over the PMB would happen, causing delays on Hwy 1. It now takes me about an hour - hour and a half to drive to Vancouver from Fraser Heights. With the tolls, unless there was an accident, my travel time was always within 40-50 minutes.

Now i understand we need congestion pricing, but for those who never needed to take the PMB before, it sucks for all those commuters. And let's face it, this 'congestion pricing' is not fair to those who actually need their vehicles for work and have no alternative way of doing their job. Same with those who live on acreages away from any transit? Sure, they could drive to a Park & Ride, and pay for transit, but the increased cost is not fair for those users. Drivers have for years paid to drive. To say that drivers pay nothing is not fair. What about we tax those who walk, take a bike or transit? I think the cost of transit is far too low, and bike riders and pedestrians pay nothing to use the 'road network', the very thing they are asking those who drive to pay for. Let's also factor in that home owners who more often than not use cars pay extremely high for living costs. I think it's unfair to continue the burden on vehicle users.

Cost of Driving in BC:
Car Insurance: Ranges from $1600-3500 a year (2nd Highest in Canada)
Cost of a car: $200-800 monthly
Gasoline Costs: $200-400 monthly

That is $533/Month-$1492/Month.

Transit Costs:
$95 - $161/Month.

However, given all of these numbers, I do think there should be a reduction in the congestion cost if people are too get an electric vehicle or a hybrid vehicle, to encourage people to buy one of those types of vehicles.

Bike/Walk:
$0/Month.

[ssiguy]

Originally Posted by MIPS

If you can afford to live in the lower mainland, I sincerely doubt you would go hungry paying an extra $50 per year in taxes.
I'm not in region (and don't even own/rent because I can't even afford Kamloops) but I still stand by saying I'm okay not seeing an extra $50 in my annual returns if it means major projects see funding/maintenance/regular payments to the debt incurred by said transportation improvement projects.
For the average person that is the cost equivalent of one tank of gas.

$50 / month means a lot a city with the highest overall poverty and child poverty rate in the country. This is to say nothing of the highest gas prices and of course our real estate and rentals are also, by far, the highest in the country.

I don't think people mind special taxes for transportation improvements but the problem is that we already pay the highest transportation costs in the country but have pathetic infrastructure to show for it.

Another problem for region wide tolling is that it would make people N o F to put their money where their industrial sized mouths are and that's not going to happen. They seem to enjoy the benefits of HWY#1 improvements and SkyTrain and small wonder, people SoF are paying for it. This is why people SoF love { and people NoF hate } their new toll-free PM/GE bridges, it brings some equality to the system

[Pinion]

Yeah the cost of living in Vancouver means most people have less money, not more money, than other Canadians.

[CanSpice]

Originally Posted by cleowin

Majority of people may disagree with me, but I was very bothered when they decided to remove the tolls, because I knew the massive increase in usage over the PMB would happen, causing delays on Hwy 1. It now takes me about an hour - hour and a half to drive to Vancouver from Fraser Heights. With the tolls, unless there was an accident, my travel time was always within 40-50 minutes.

Now i understand we need congestion pricing, but for those who never needed to take the PMB before, it sucks for all those commuters. And let's face it, this 'congestion pricing' is not fair to those who actually need their vehicles for work and have no alternative way of doing their job. Same with those who live on acreages away from any transit? Sure, they could drive to a Park & Ride, and pay for transit, but the increased cost is not fair for those users. Drivers have for years paid to drive. To say that drivers pay nothing is not fair. What about we tax those who walk, take a bike or transit? I think the cost of transit is far too low, and bike riders and pedestrians pay nothing to use the 'road network', the very thing they are asking those who drive to pay for. Let's also factor in that home owners who more often than not use cars pay extremely high for living costs. I think it's unfair to continue the burden on vehicle users.

This came up frequently during the referendum, the idea that everybody should pay their fair share for whatever commute they're doing, and that it's unfair for someone driving to pay an extra 0.5% PST for transit users. Nobody's saying that drivers pay nothing -- they pay gas taxes in addition to all of the other taxes that go into highway improvements and maintenance. But the issue is is that highway improvements and maintenance are disproportionally expensive.

Society actually subsidizes drivers quite a lot, and if we were talking about a "truly fair" transportation model where everybody paid according to how much their given form of transportation cost, transit fares would go up about 125% (which is a lot) but drivers would have to pay about 9 times more what they currently pay [source].

Bike riders and pedestrians do pay for the road network through taxes. They also have a much much smaller impact on the conditions of the roads and sidewalks (compare how often a sidewalk needs to be replaced vs how often a road needs to be patched or repaved, and how much each project costs).

Vehicles cost society much more than transit does, and if you were really talking about fairness, vehicle drivers would pay user fees appropriate to those costs to society. They don't currently, and probably never will to the levels that transit users pay for transit's costs.

[ClaytonA]

Another point would be in the medium term that prices adjust. Markets work.
i.e. land costs on those acreages far from transit decrease in purchase price a little to compensate for the lack of accessibility.
i.e. wages or service charges for people who have to drive for work increase more than average to attract people to do the work.

As in another post, transportation is a system. As a motorist it benefits you when other chose walking, cycling, or transit. Municipal roads are paid for via municipal taxes like property tax.

For example: http://discoursemedia.org/urban-deve...l-cost-commute

[ssiguy]

Canspice is absolutely right, cars are heavily subsidized considering the amount of infrastructure they need.

He is also correct is that it is a issue of fairness which is why the PM & GE tolls were so dispised. If there was a fair system then people maynot have such an issue but they were grotesquly unfair with the tolls.

[SpongeG]

traffic has increased on the golden ears the most and then the port mann and decreased on the alex fraser and patullo with less traffic in new west as well.

I wonder where did people go to avoid the golden ears?

Ending tolls snarls traffic on Port Mann, Golden Ears bridges

'It now takes me approximately two and a half hours to get to work," says one regular commuter

By Tina Lovgreen, CBC News

It turns out, the experts were right.

More drivers are using the Port Mann bridge since tolls were eliminated on Sept 1 by the new NDP government and that's creating some new headaches for drivers.

In the week of Sept. 4 from Monday to Friday, nearly 150,000 more trips were taken on the Port Mann, compared to the same five-day period last year — an increase of 25.58 per cent.

The Golden Ears Bridge saw an even greater increase of 28.25 per cent.
The end of the tolls was initially welcomed by many drivers including Robert Thomasson who was looking forward to $1,500 in annual savings.

"We were kind of excited about the tolls being lifted," he said.

But since the tolls were axed his commute from Chilliwack to Burnaby has nearly doubled.

"Before it took me about an hour and 15 minutes. It now takes me approximately two and a half hours to get to work," he said.

As unpleasant as the 4:30 a.m. wake up calls are, Thomasson said his main struggle is dropping off his three children at school.

"We're having to drop our kids off at the school bus an hour before the school bus even arrives," he said.

"So they're standing outside waiting for an hour waiting for the school bus and we have to get to work and my wife is still getting late to work and she's actually getting in a lot of trouble for it," he said.

Thomasson said he's already had to negotiate a later start time

...

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/britis...ngry-1.4289533

[Pinion]

BREAKING: Man who moves to Chillwack confused by his long commute

...like... what did he expect? It's not like it was going to get better even if the tolls remained. And they weren't implemented that long ago.

[aberdeen5698]

Originally Posted by Pinion

BREAKING: Man who moves to Chillwack confused by his long commute

...like... what did he expect? It's not like it was going to get better even if the tolls remained. And they weren't implemented that long ago.

You're missing the point. We built a huge new 10-lane bridge to solve the congestion problem. It turns out that it wasn't the bridge that solved it, it was the tolls.

Of course it's unlikely that anyone will learn this lesson for the George Massey Tunnel...