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this post was submitted on 08 Mar 2024
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No reason the tax had to scale exactly to match the damage though. At least make it painful enough so people consider whether a larger vehicle is worth it.
What I'm suggesting is to ramp up the tax on roads over several years in order to pay for the initial outlay on new train infrastructure. Then you don't need 90% of the trucking industry at all.
Which would be great for many other reasons.
Train infrastructure is being removed around the world - good luck convincing people to build more.
The fact is a train turns one trip into three trips - truck to the railway station, train to another station, truck to the final destination. That often adds days to what otherwise might be a 3 hour delivery - because trains are only cheap if you send about a hundred or so trucks full of cargo on a single trip.
Only really makes sense for really long trips but more and more of those are done by ship or airplane. Trucks aren't going anywhere.
What if it's not a larger vehicle, but transitioning from a petrol burning vehicle to an electric vehicle?
We don't want to give people reasons to hold on to old combustion vehicles any longer than they have to, but the roads of course need to be made safe for passengers and pedestrians and wildlife, I agree.
If they hold on to their existing vehicle than thats just another upside. If they buy a new gasoline car instead of an EV this is bad. But EVs dont have to be insanely heavy if we stop the whole cars getting bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger crap. They will still be heavier than their gasoline counterpart but one solution might be 2 tax brackets: One for gasoline cars and one for evs that has the same taxation levels but allows for, lets say, 500kg more weight in them