1 TAIEX, Ukraine Charging for road use Principles & practicalities UK experience and learning Ian Drummond Assistant Director, Transportation Leicestershire County Council 21 January 2011

2 Contents ›My involvement in UK Road Pricing ›Principles & practicalities ›UK experience and learning ›Some lessons from Australia ›Recommendations

3 My involvement in UK Road Pricing ›Former head of Road Pricing Framework in UK Department for Transport  Division set up to explore practical aspects of various forms of road pricing  Significant learning through research, liaison with UK and overseas companies and work on developing practical solutions  UK representative on EU groups dealing with interoperability, including EETS ›Now senior transport planner in UK local authority  Led road pricing study for East Midlands cities (Derby, Leicester, Nottingham and surrounding county areas)

4 Charging mechanisms - Principles & practicalities ›Who pays?  Where’s the money coming from to fund the construction and operation of the road?  Government borrowing (national or local)  Private sector sources  Who owns the road? Now? In future?  What’s it for?  Who pays for its use?  The State  Users  All classes or just trucks? ›In the end, the Ukraine economy will have to fund the scheme

5 Shadow tolls ›If the government is going to end up owning the road, shadow tolls may be the answer  No direct charge to user  Simple to manage  Finance sourced privately and repaid  Long-term borrowing  Not cheap  Pay on usage and availability  Length of franchise  Until paid off?  Fixed time?

6 User pays - Tolls ›Who sets the charge? Who to collect?  State  Private sector operator ›How to collect?  Toll booths  Free flow  ANPR  Tags ›What to collect?  Single charge (access fee)  Distance charge

7 Toll booths ›Benefits  Hard to avoid  Simple to understand ›Disadvantages  Land take  Cause congestion  Cash handling  Staffing  Inflexible – each new point needs new infrastructure ›Time consuming, inefficient and expensive to run  Not recommended

8 Free flow charging - ANPR ›Advantages  Low cost for user  Easy to set up technically ›Disadvantages  Dealing with accounts  Missed readings  Damaged plates, bad weather, foreign plates  Fraud  Stolen or faked plates  Depends on accuracy of vehicle registration data base ›Use as back-up

9 Free flow charging - Tags ›Advantages  Easy to read, more reliable  Accounts associated with specific equipment  Easier to deal with foreign users  Overcomes foreign plates/tracing of liability ›Disadvantages  Costly to set up – who pays?  Slow take-up of tags at first (inertia)  How to deal with those without a tag?  Incentivise take-up ›My preferred technique

10 Practical considerations ›Money-go-round  Collection mechanisms  Established? Bespoke?  Accounts. Pay-as-you-go  Every transaction has a cost ›Enforcement  Has to be credible and cost-effective  Understand potential ways to defraud system ›Charging by vehicle type  All traffic or trucks only? If trucks only, which class?

11 Practical considerations (2) ›Privacy  Can this be used to track people? ›Visitors and occasional users  Ukraine citizens  Foreign-registered vehicles ›The next scheme  Interoperability of equipment  Competition for next new road contract  Builder, operator

12 Setting the charge ›How long to pay for the infrastructure? ›Other costs  Road maintenance & operation  Enforcement  The charging scheme ›Is the charge reasonable to the user?  Traffic flow  Will people divert from the tolled road? ›Who sets the charge?  Is it easier to put 5c on a litre of fuel? ›Can the local economy afford to pay for it?

13 UK experience ›Very limited  Tolls (Dartford, Severn, M6Toll etc.)  Shadow tolls (M40, A1M, M25 etc.)  London (ANPR cameras)  First used for enforcement  From 2011 for payment on account

14 UK experience - river crossings ›Tolling established in history ›Used to fund river crossings  Forth (1964)  Severn (1966)  Humber (1981)  Tamar (1961)  Dartford (1963, 1980, 1991) ›Each has its own legislation

15 UK experience - Dartford ›Bridge required to increase capacity ›Act requires toll to cease when bridge paid for ›Tolls converted to “congestion charge” ›Charge now earmarked for further crossing – a toll again  Investigating alternatives to toll booths

16 UK experience – M6Toll ›Birmingham Northern Relief Road – long planned but no money  Relieve congested M6 ›Opened 2003 ›Franchised for until 2054 ›Uses toll booths and tags ›No control on tolls; not taking enough traffic, especially trucks ›Similar to Australian experience (described later)

17 UK experience DBFO ›DBFO  Design, Build, Finance & Operate ›Paid for through shadow tolls  Traffic flow and route availability ›Operator responsible for maintenance ›No impact on user ›Public has same rights of access as normal roads ›Roads revert to State at end of contract

18 UK experience DBFO ›Schemes using DBFO A1M Peterborough A1 Darrington to Dishforth A19 Dishforth to Tyne Tunnel A249 Stockbury (M2) to Sheerness DBFO Contract A30 Exeter to Bere Regis A419/A417 Swindon to Gloucester A50/A564 Stoke to Derby Link A69 Carlisle to Newcastle M1-A1 Link Road (Lofthouse to Bramham) M25 DBFO

19 UK experience - A1M ›21km dual 4-lanes ›£128 million (1996) ›Opened 1998 ›DBFO until 2026 ›Paid for by shadow tolls

20 UK experience – M25 DBFO ›102km widening works to 4-lanes ›Includes 400 km of operation and maintenance ›£6.2 billion (2009) ›Private sector consortium ›DBFO until 2039 ›Paid for by shadow tolls

21 Lessons from Australia Extensive use of tolling to pay for infrastructure  Expensive because of development density  Much use of tunnels, especially Sydney ›Private sector-run, except Queensland ›Several companies in competition  Free-flow tolling, interoperable  Companies migrate from builder-operators to operators alone, across franchises ›Australian company manages UK M6Toll

22 Melbourne ›City Link  22km motorway  2 long tunnels, 1 bridge  Tolls based on distance, up to $6  Opened in 2000  Concession until 2034

23 My recommendations ›Get the private sector to do it  Regulate the tolls  Decide if and when the State wants the road  Legislate to deal with style of operation, fraud  Make it interoperable and transferable  Don’t get tied to a sole supplier Useful information 

24 TAIEX, Ukraine Charging for road use Principles & practicalities UK experience and learning Ian Drummond Assistant Director, Transportation Leicestershire County Council 21 January 2011