Unsere Mobilitätspolitik braucht eine Dosis Realität

We are cycling more, but traffic jams are not getting any shorter and the budget deficit is getting deeper. The solutions are there for the taking, write Bruno De Borger and Stef Proost.

In Belgium, we are counting on large-scale investments and the modal shift to solve mobility problems. To this end, we are deploying massive subsidies. So far, this policy has mainly led to increased bicycle use, which is a good thing in itself due to the beneficial health effects. Train use during rush hour has also increased, but this is a very expensive form of transport.

The measures taken have removed some cars from the traffic jams, but their place is quickly taken by new rush hour users. Traffic jams are not only a waste of time for car and truck drivers, they also have an impact on the labor market. Employees are reluctant to use the ring roads around Brussels or Antwerp every day. The numerous road works will increase capacity in the long term, but they will not eliminate traffic jams.

Three problems in our mobility system need to be addressed urgently. Perhaps now is the right time to put them back on the table: they will not only improve mobility, but also help to get budgets in order.

The first problem is company cars. According to the Planning Bureau, these cost us at least €5 billion per year. Company cars were originally introduced to circumvent restrictions on wage increases. Now they are mainly used as a form of salary increase that allows employers to avoid taxes and social security contributions. What’s more, the beneficiaries buy more expensive cars and drive more kilometers than those who have to buy their own cars.

This is a tax anomaly that is on the radar of all external regulators (the EU, the OECD, the IMF). The system is an example of bad policy: it costs the government a lot of money, causes additional traffic congestion costs, and encourages people to live further away from work. Moreover, it is antisocial. It is not the people with the weakest shoulders who drive company cars, but they do pay for them.

Rush hour charge
The second problem is the massive focus on electric cars. Owners do not have to pay excise duties on these cars, which makes them much cheaper to use than gasoline and diesel cars. We are encouraged to buy a more expensive electric car, which is cheaper to drive. Electric cars cause no (or less) climate damage, but they do lead to higher external accident costs because they are heavier than fossil fuel cars.

The electrification of the vehicle fleet is causing excise duty revenues on gasoline and diesel to fall rapidly, which is weighing on the budget. Perhaps this is therefore the perfect time to switch to a new tax system for car use. This could take the form of kilometer charges, increased by a rush hour surcharge at times and places prone to traffic jams. Thanks to rush hour charges, access to road capacity in the busiest places during rush hour would be limited to what the infrastructure can handle. This would allow traffic to flow smoothly again, even when there are roadworks, because the charge would automatically increase temporarily.

The former Brussels government and previous Flemish governments have already studied rush hour charges in detail. The system proved to be perfectly feasible and would also yield positive results for Brussels and Flanders. However, the political courage was lacking each time. Yet it has been proven to work abroad. Traffic jams have decreased dramatically, and if the revenue is used to reduce labor taxes, employment will increase, the weakest shoulders will not pay more than before, and we will have a much more efficient labor market.

Transport companies will also be happy with rush hour charges in the long run. Their delivery vans and trucks will finally be able to reach their destinations during rush hour without losing too much time. The productivity gains here are there for the taking. A higher kilometer charge for trucks is primarily a tax measure: it will not eliminate traffic jams because it is not a rush hour charge and leaves cars, which account for the largest share of road traffic, unaffected.

Rush hour rates
The third problem is public transport fares. On average, we spend 1 percent more of our GDP on public transport subsidies than other European countries. What role does public transport have to play in the modal shift? The use of trains and buses has risen sharply over the past ten years, but these modes of transport have an even more acute rush hour problem than cars. A number of trains are used almost exclusively to travel to Brussels in the morning and back again in the evening. During off-peak hours, they are superfluous.

This makes these train journeys very expensive, even when the train is full. Capacity during rush hour is too low, and this will become even more acute if car use during rush hour is discouraged. The solution is higher train fares during rush hour and lower fares during off-peak hours. In order to make the best possible use of existing train capacity, even more differentiation is needed than just between rush hour and off-peak hours.

Rush hour fares should also vary according to location and direction: a train traveling from Ghent to Brussels during the morning rush hour should be more expensive than in the opposite direction. Social adjustments for the most vulnerable can be built into subscription prices, but these social adjustments can also incorporate a difference between rush hour and off-peak periods.

Public transport fares are largely determined by politics; neither politicians nor users have any idea of the real costs. On average, a bus ride on De Lijn costs five times more than what the transport company receives for it.

Our mobility policy needs a dash of realism. We subsidize company cars, the use of electric cars is not taxed, and our public transport is excessively subsidized. Reform is within reach: systematically reduce subsidies for company cars, only give public transport subsidies to those who really need them, and introduce mileage charges and rush-hour rates for road transport. This will benefit both our budget and our mobility.

Translated with DeepL.com (free version)

Its obvious its translated with AI. It basically repeats the company car problem twice.

Company cars is absolute disaster from budgetary and environment standpoint. Costing us billions, resulting in more traffic. Given our deep deficit, it should be scrapped to save those billions each year and reinvest in public transport.