Despite the progress made so far, the need for further changes in road management and funding systems has been identified in the following series of documents published over the past five years:
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Transport Directions 1994 - 1999 (1994)
Land Transport Pricing Study: The Cost of Roading Infrastructure (1995)
Land Transport Pricing Study: Roading as an Economic Good (1995)
Land Transport Pricing Study: Environmental Externalities (1996)
Land Transport Pricing Study: Safety Externalities (1996)
Land Transport Pricing Study: National Traffic Database (1996)
Road Management: Options for Reform (1996)
Land Transport Pricing Study: Options for the Future (1997)
Vehicle Fleet Emissions Control Strategy: Stage One (1997)
The Way Forward: Roading Advisory Group Final Report (1997)
Inquiry into the Environmental Effects of Road Transport: Interim Report of the Transport and Environment Select Committee (1998)
Vehicle Fleet Emissions Control Strategy: Final Report (1998).
Interest groups and individuals have subjected these documents to widespread scrutiny and comment. Arising out of this process, the following problems with the current system have been identified:
There is no clear relationship between what road users pay to use a road and what it costs
to provide that road. We pay the same to use a highly congested road at peak time as we do
to use the same road when it has little traffic. We pay the same to use a very expensive
motorway as we do to use a low cost road. One result
is extreme congestion at some times, and much idle
road space at others. This is because users do not
have the incentive to make good decisions about
when to use a road and what road to use, and the
providers of roads do not get the information they
need to correctly decide where to build extra roads.
If we charged for toll calls the way we charge for roads, then calls would cost the same amount irrespective of the time of day, or day of the week, and irrespective of whether the call was by mobile phone or by land line. Few people would be surprised if as a result there was extreme congestion during peak calling hours on weekdays, lots of redundant capacity at other times and too little investment in the mobile phone system to cater for demand. Most people realise that a more flexible pricing arrangement with lower prices in the evening and at weekends, and higher prices for local mobile phone calls, has reduced the problems, and users have benefited in the process.
The situation is the same for roads. The congestion in the main centres at peak hours, and the difficulty experienced in providing roads to satisfy the demands from forestry, dairying and tourism are consequences of the inflexibility of prices under the current system. Prices are averaged across the road network, but costs differ significantly.
The maintenance of roads is decided mainly on technical grounds. There is no assurance that the levels of maintenance are the best economically. It may be, for example, that higher expenditure on the development of roads to reduce later maintenance costs could lower the overall cost of providing roads. The current funding structure does not facilitate trade-offs of this kind because maintenance money is allocated on a different basis from that used for new construction.
The current road management system does not incorporate proper incentives for
the operators of roads to take all reasonable cost-effective steps to avoid or mitigate
crashes. Of the three factors that largely account for road crashes - driver behaviour,
vehicle condition and road quality - the first two are subject to strict legislative
regimes.
While road quality is influenced by Transfund's policies when new projects are considered, at the day-to-day operational level, the safe provision of roads generally remains reliant on informal safety procedures, which vary across the country. In 1996, road factors were a contributing cause in 15.5 percent of fatal road crashes and 9.1 percent of injury-causing crashes. Significant road safety improvements could be achieved through greater attention to road quality.
The road transport system generates a number of harmful effects on the environment and communities. These include noise emission, greenhouse gas emissions, other air emissions, reduced water quality, landscape impacts, community severance, vibrations and visual intrusion.
The Transport and Environment Select Committee's 1998 Interim Report on the Environmental Effects of Road Transport points out that the current road funding system provides a poor framework for incorporating environmental costs into the costs faced by road users. If the threats to the environment caused by roads, and their use, are to be avoided or mitigated in a sensible manner, road management and funding decisions need to reflect such costs.
