Transport pricing has been an actively debated topic in the European Union for a number of years. This debate has been stimulated both by the European Commission itself (notably through the publication of the Green Paper on "Fair and Efficient Pricing" and the White Paper on "Fair Charging for Infrastructure Use") and by a multitude of national policy initiatives such as distance-based charging schemes for heavy goods vehicles (e.g., in Switzerland and in Germany), urban and interurban road pricing (e.g., in the Netherlands and the UK) and ecological tax reforms (e.g. in Germany). This paper explicitly examines the acceptability of different transport pricing measures and the factors influencing acceptability. It summarises the results of empirical studies carried out in the PATS-project, a project funded by the European Commission under the 4th framework programme. This project dealt with user charging and taxation measures in the transport sector, covered all modes of transport. The research used both qualitative and quantitative survey techniques. The qualitative surveys took the form of (i) structured interviews with key transport operators and decision makers (key informants) in 9 European countries, (ii) focus groups with the general public, in 3 European countries and (iii) a Delphi survey with key informants, in 5 European countries. These qualitative methods were complemented by an extensive quantitative survey of public attitudes, undertaken in 6 European countries. The qualitative surveys considered both established pricing instruments such as fuel and vehicle taxation, parking charges, motorway tolling and urban road pricing and more novel instruments such as environmental charges, ecological tax reform and a more differentiated public transport pricing. The results from the initial set of quantitative surveys were used to inform the design of the subsequent public quantitative attitude surveys.
Abstract