Samenvatting
In the author's view, the British Government lacks a clear strategy for road provision and pricing. In this paper, a public Road Authority is proposed. This organisation would own the highway infrastructure and hold the debt of 100 billion pounds, which would reduce the national debt by that amount. Charging cars 2.5p/km to cover interest and operating costs, with the balance of 1p/km as a pure tax, would finance additional motorways at 2-3.5p/veh.km, and facilitate proper road pricing, simplifying the price of rail and public transport. Present provisions for private roads lead to large distortions, and are unlikely to encourage private investment. (Author/publisher).