February 19, 2013

User fees and road costs

Last month, there was an interesting report from a US group called The Tax Foundation  on the fraction of US state and local road costs contributed by registration fees, tolls, petrol taxes, and other charges for road users.  It turned out to average about 1/3 — that’s just actual monetary costs, not the costs that drivers impose on others through congestion or carbon emissions.

In New Zealand, the fraction for local roads seems to be higher — if you look at the Funding Assistance Rates that say how much the NZ Transport Agency pays toward council road maintenance, operation, and renewal, it varies around roughly 50% (for Wellington, it happens to be 44%). According to NZTA, the rest of the money comes through mechanisms that don’t specifically target drivers, such as council rates.

So, why did I single out the 44% for Wellington? Well, that’s where anyone not at the wheel of a car is apparently a `guest’ on the roads. Or, with unsettling plausibility, `roadkill’.

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Thomas Lumley (@tslumley) is Professor of Biostatistics at the University of Auckland. His research interests include semiparametric models, survey sampling, statistical computing, foundations of statistics, and whatever methodological problems his medical collaborators come up with. He also blogs at Biased and Inefficient See all posts by Thomas Lumley »

Comments

  • avatar
    Steve Black

    There is lots of virtual ink being spilt at

    http://publicaddress.net/hardnews/when-common-sense-isnt/

    over the coroners comments about high vis gear being made mandatory for cyclists. In particular, it seems that the coroner made his remarks (1) without recourse to any evidence, and entirely based on an appeal to “common sense”, and (2) the guy who was clipped by the truck was wearing high vis gear so this incident can hardly be a sound basis for the coroners recommendation.

    It actually made me think that it is almost a “stat of the week” in extreme: a completely unfounded conclusion by the coroner based on…no statistics whatsoever.

    The Herald article you linked to illustrates quite nicely the point made by some commentators that the media has focused on the recommendation regarding compulsory high vis clothing thus taking the focus off cars as lethal weapons in the hands of an inattentive person. And the Herald nicely missed out that the person in question was wearing high vis gear.

    12 years ago

    • avatar
      Thomas Lumley

      Thanks. I’ve commented over there with a list of links. I’m surprised the Taupo Bicycle Study isn’t getting more coverage — it’s local, fairly recent, and estimates a substantial benefit.

      12 years ago

  • avatar
    Jason Felix

    Btw, the seemingly rabid post appears to have been intended as satire from an avid cyclist

    http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/news/8323890/Businessmans-anti-cyclist-article-ironic

    12 years ago

    • avatar
      Thomas Lumley

      Sigh.

      Isn’t that precisely the sort of thing we pay the mainstream media to be able to find out before they report?

      12 years ago