Tolls - are they really expensive?

[andyinluton]

M6 Toll half price if a member of the Caravan and Motorhome Club.

Its only half price if you are actually in a motor home or pulling a caravan, A cali is charged as class 4 by them which is double the price of a car, so the discount just brings it back to the normal car price.

 

[sapto]

I guess we are super lucky here down in Switzerland: CHF 40.- for one year. No extra fees for any tunnel. In Austria it‘s around €90.-/year (and extra for some tunnels fe Arlberg) and we just returned from Slovenia: €15.-/7 days.

 

[mccp]

Road work 50mps speed zones but nobody working/QUOTE]

If only. More often than not we have had to leave the motorway and follow a diversion as they seem to shut the road completely for roadworks after 9PM these days. Had this on the A30, M5 and A14 in the last 12 months.

 

[hirsty]

Amazing to me how varied the roads themselves, tolls, surface, roadworks etc etc vary so much from country to country.

We just did our annual blat to Italy & back on mostly toll roads. France & Switzerland were textbook with perfect surfaces & next to no traffic, whilst Italian autostrada very bad in places & all of Austria and seemingly half of Germany (whilst free) plagued by roadworks.

I'd really love to have the time to amble across Europe on local roads & take in more scenery / atmos, but I don't resent the French tolls or Swiss vignette considering what a pleasure they are to travel on.

 

[larrylamb]

Still too much for the length of the road...

Not for me, the hours/days I've wasted bumper to bumper trying to get through Birmingham. Love the toll road.

 

[Stoneybroke]

Not for me, the hours/days I've wasted bumper to bumper trying to get through Birmingham. Love the toll road.

I've done it in a car for that reason, but the height of the Cali makes it a silly price - OK if you can claim I suppose...
When it first opened we used it regularly to get to the in-laws, but it was only a couple of quid.

 

[larrylamb]

, but the height of the Cali makes it a silly price

Yes, we get the C&M club discount which helps.

 

[soulstyledevon]

If it meant our garbage roads could be like those in France, I’d pay double. Fact.

Do wish we scrapped car tax and paid a motorway toll system.
Might deter motorists off the motorway who don’t really need to use it.

Amazes me how quiet and well maintained those French roads are. Stress free driving.

 

[jts46]

I think we should pay to use motorways

 

[frenchie]

I think we should pay to use motorways ???????????? are you mad. drivers in the UK are taxed to the hilt as it is. what is needed in the UK is a cheaper train service, better bus service and so on. I am sure that most people don't willing set in miles of traffic each day for the fun of it. I sure as hell don,t. France can as stated keep their roads in better condition and free running and they don't pay road tax, in fact some of the cars driven don,t need insurance driving licence or mot,s ( so don't get in a rta with one). yet here in the UK we have rubbish roads, sky high parking, and road tax climbing ever higher. mad. F

 

[westfalia]

The M6 toll is a great road. It´s like a breath of fresh air (albeit near the black country) i´ve often
done 100mph + on there.
Sometimes been charged around a fiver and other times we´ve been charged around 11 quid.
(all daytime travel)
I like it because there seems to be no middle laners or drivers with a coffee or phone
in their hand.
People who simply want to get to where they´re going. Fast.

 

[Kmann]

Its quite interesting – a little amusing actually (maybe there are some Scottish genes around) – driving around in some really expensive cars that are not cheap on fuel either, bothering about whether the tolls are 12 or 18 € …

I really could not care. If I want to go from A to B I take the road that suits the purpose. Same so with Ferry, Tunnels, etc. I am on a holiday - not in a meeting with my Bank.

BTW: – Talking about tax. Please do not moan before you paid Denmark a Visit – we have taxes

(Please note: A little sarcasm might occur)

 

[CampervanTime]

I'd much prefer to pay motorway tolls and scrap road tax.

We are a household with 5 cars, all paying road tax and we can only drive 2 at once. Neither my wife or I use motorways on our commute and my daily driver is a BMW i3 Range Extender (10g co2) which has annual road tax of £450 because it cost more than £40k. Totally bonkers.

When we go to cornwall or further afield, I'd be more than happy to pay for the miles we do on the motorway, especially if it thinned the M5 out a bit so we could actually do the journey at a decent pace.

France is always a dream to get through into deeper europe, using the toll routes.

 

[Ocean Spirit]

Its quite interesting – a little amusing actually (maybe there are some Scottish genes around) – driving around in some really expensive cars that are not cheap on fuel either, bothering about whether the tolls are 12 or 18 € …

I get the light hearted element to your post Kmann. But not all members here have a source of income that is as disposable. Or at least that is the case for me. I have stretched as far as I dare buying a new Cali in the hope the money i spend on taking a break goes further and depreciation remains as good as it gets!! I'm not against tolls so long as they represent value.

 

[Romke]

The good thing about motorway tolls is that foreign users also contribute to the cost of maintenance.

 

[GrannyJen]

I would love to see tolls as long as there was a corresponding reduction in other motoring taxes. Tolls, as said above, would at least ensure that we had a contribution to our road maintenance from all the foreign drivers that use them.

 

[mccp]

Don't forget that tolls generally (always?) get paid to the company running the road/bridge/tunnel. There would be absolutely no chance that the government would give up any 'road' tax because of that.

It occurred to me this morning that on our several trips to the South we probably pay more to SANEF/Cofiroute/APRR in tolls every year than we pay to DVLA for our Discovery.

 

[Kmann]

I get the light hearted element to your post Kmann. But not all members here have a source of income that is as disposable. Or at least that is the case for me. I have stretched as far as I dare buying a new Cali in the hope the money i spend on taking a break goes further and depreciation remains as good as it gets!! I'm not against tolls so long as they represent value.

I still find it a bit amusing though. But I get your point, I am not unlimited to funds either, rather the opposite. And also very faliliar with taxes. Both income tax and tax on i.e. cars are very high in Denmark (I guess you all know that - Danes seems to whine over it all the time). But we do not have road tolls (only on one bridge) that on a second thought, made me understand that being a daily driver on toll roads, must be annoying and worth considering alternatives.

Happy Tolls ;-)

 

[frenchie]

I remember around two years back I was on the motorway just outside of Brussels. It was around 2am when I had to stop due to the road being blocked by trucks. I waited and waited, thinking that there must of been an RTA ahead. 4 hours pasted, then 6. Then there was a chap knocking on the car. He told me that the road was blocked in protest at a new toll for trucks. He then watched as I slowly inched to the hard shoulder as he talked to other drivers to let me pass. That added toll never happened, it would of killed off owner drivers.
Like the current road tax, toll money will never go on the roads. It will be wasted on paying for other countries police forces,or dancing girls,but not on the roads. F