A NSW Toll Review submission released today by urban policy think tank Committee for Sydney makes the case for a bold rethink of the way our roads work.

“The NSW Government has a rare opportunity to create a roads system that is fairer, in terms of time and money,” said Harri Bancroft, public policy advisor at the Committee for Sydney, and author of the submission.

“Everyone loves to hate tolls, but reducing tolls will simply shift the cost of driving from people’s pockets to people’s time.

“We need to be aware of the risk that if we make it cheaper for people to drive, more people will drive, resulting in more people being stuck in traffic longer.

“We should be moving to a more sophisticated program of road user pricing that can be used to influence how people choose to travel around the city.

“We can do this in an equitable and fair way, for example by tying per-kilometre rates to the level of public transport accessibility where people live, or how much they earn. Rates could also be waived or reduced for certain road users, such as carers, tradies, carshare and freight drivers.

“Even if we stick with the current tolling system, an option would be to convert the toll relief scheme into a transport voucher scheme to pay toll bills, top up Opal cards or pay a deposit on an e-bike.

“Traffic congestion is a huge drain on economic productivity, with a huge environmental cost, and for people stuck in traffic it means less time with family and friends.”

The paper puts forward six big ideas for the future of road pricing:

• Provide transport vouchers instead of ‘toll relief’
• Introduce a road user charge based on people’s access to public transport
• Introduce a road user charge based on people’s incomes
• Review the cost of all transport modes to encourage sustainable modes
• Consider alternatives to reduce traffic in CBDs and town centres
• Price parallel surface roads.

Read the full submission on the NSW Toll Review here: https://sydney.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/Committee-for-Sydney-Toll-review-submission-August-2023.pdf