Subsidizing road transport must end

If you want a market economy, then let it be a market economy. But a market economy is certainly not subsidizing car transportation with public money , as is the case today by tacit agreement of business circles.

The external costs of road transport in the European Union are estimated to be 700 billion euros per year . The external costs of transport include traffic accidents, air pollution, noise, loss of natural habitats and urban space; and carbon from global impacts, because climate-changing carbon emissions are growing fastest in the transport sector. Based on the polluter pays and user pays principle, car manufacturers, sellers and users should pay this money, but for some reason this cost is left to all members of society today. The price of fuel must begin to reflect all the damage that pollution causes to the living environment. If external costs were to be included in Estonia, for example through fuel excise duty, this would mean an excise rate more than three times higher than the current one.

In any case, it is certain that transport imposes many costs on society that are not covered by fuel excise, motor vehicle or road taxes. According to studies conducted in the UK and the US, the costs associated with road traffic in terms of air pollution, noise, congestion, road deterioration and traffic accidents are three times higher than the taxes paid by car users . Many researchers have concluded that these so-called external costs of transport account for 5% of GDP in industrialized countries and even more in some developing countries.

The right prices will lead to a change in consumer behavior, and they must. Then we will see which mode of transport is actually competitive and how Estonia's transport problem must be solved — through planning, internetization, developing a railway and light rail network connecting us to Europe, prioritizing maritime transport, promoting public transport, and only then building roads.

"An efficient transport system consists of several alternative modes of transport, suitable for different speeds, volumes, needs and purposes," argued Lewis Mumford 40 years ago. But even today, society develops more out of internal inertia than based on the needs of common sense, under the increasing pressure of GDP growth and consumerism.

A car-free city is 5 times cheaper for its residents to live in than a place with a transport scheme based on the use of a passenger car. It is clear that, for example, transporting 12 people in one minibus is much cheaper for both the individual and the state than building roads and parking lots for 12 passenger cars, stretching the city ever wider and increasing daily fuel consumption. Road construction is not the solution. We can build five-level intersections, but in traffic jams we still move at 5 km/h, even though we have a 300-horsepower car under our seats.