UK roads privatisation

[kristopherb]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/pol...atised-roads-to-get-country-moving-again.html

The Prime Minister will warn that Britain’s road network is “falling behind” the rest of the world as he suggests that private companies should run motorways and A-roads.
Under the plans, the companies will receive a portion of the annual vehicle licence fee to maintain and upgrade the network. Firms would also be encouraged to build new motorways and roads that would be funded by tolls.
The Prime Minister will urge Britain to follow the example set by the Victorians by embarking on a new era of infrastructure building.
He will announce a new feasibility study to develop ways to bring private investment into Britain’s major roads, which independent experts calculate could be worth up to £100billion.

So yeah, driving becomes more expensive.

http://i.qkme.me/5w4i.jpg

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

Your Prime Minister should have a little look at the Dutch railways. After it was privatised it became more expensive and less reliable. It's almost as if private companies are trying to make a profit by cutting down on maintenance expenses and by increasing fares as high as they're allowed to. I predict the same fate for Britain's road network.

 

[Traitorfish]

Your Prime Minister should have a little look at the Dutch railways. After it was privatised it became more expensive and less reliable. It's almost as if private companies are trying to make a profit by cutting down on maintenance expenses and by increasing fares as high as they're allowed to. I predict the same fate for Britain's road network.

Unfortunately, his own party did the exact same thing to the British railways, so he's obliged to be completely blind to that sort of example. Nor at the Loyal Opposition likely to bring them up, either, giving that they've happily accepted grotesque profiterring and abuse of public monopolies is part and parcel of what you might call the "post-post-war consensus".

 

[Mise]

I'm okay with new roads being built, maintained, and tolled by private companies, but existing roads should remain public. Private companies should be allowed to add to the total number of roads a country has, but should not be allowed to cannibalise existing road capacity. They also should have to negotiate with landowners, councils, residents, and other interested parties themselves, instead of relying on the government's ability to seize land for the public good.


EDIT: I prefer the "post-post-war consensus consensus".

 

[Ayn Rand]

Your Prime Minister should have a little look at the Dutch railways. After it was privatised it became more expensive and less reliable.

No need, our own rail system suffered the same fate.

I'm all for privatisation but... but really? All the good things they could do to advance free enterprise and this dumbass scheme is the best they could come up with?

 

[Benefactor]

Will road tax go down then? No, probably not.

This is a terrible idea.

 

[luiz]

The only half-decent roads in Brazil are the privately-operated ones. The public roads are death traps where over 50,000 people die every year (actual number).

I don't see what's wrong with private roads, be them new roads or privatized public roads. The government can require a certain standard in maintenance and even establish a ceiling for the tolls (as long as everything is previously negotiated, of course). In fact, when the government sells an existing public road in Brazil those are the factors they take in account, when deciding who the buyer will be: the toll value, promised maintenance standards and timeline to duplicate the road (since virtually all public roads in Brazil are single lane, when they're privatized it's up to the buyer duplicate them). If the buyer fails to meet the contractual standards he is fined and, depending on the severity of the failure or re-incidence, it can lose the road.

 

[GoodSarmatian]

The only half-decent roads in Brazil are the privately-operated ones. The public roads are death traps where over 50,000 people die every year (actual number).

If that's the case it says more about the Brazilian government than about the general public vs private discourse.
Public roads in European countries usually aren't death traps, and when we privatise public services like basic infrastructure it usually leads to monopolies with alll the associated problems unless we regulate the hell out of it, but that's another political battle against newly created lobbies and it can be lost.
If Brazil fares better with private roads it means your government (and not government in general) is corrupt and inefficient and it's not something we should try to emulate in Europe.

 

[useless]

What a shock, it's almost as if they don't care about what the public thinks! (Aka NHS etc)

 

[bathsheba666]

Thatchers government specialised in handing state assets over to the private sector at way below cost.

The fun game then was spot which minister later pops up in a fat paying job in which newly privatised company.

 

[useless]

Or look at the ex-police officers/heads in the private security companies lobbying for a bigger slice of the action.

 

[amadeus]

This isn't privatization, it's the government subcontracting the work to private firms.

 

[Cutlass]

Privatization is not something one does if they want a situation to improve for the public. So either he's blind to reality or doing something he shouldn't.

 

[Leoreth]

Privatization isn't automatically bad. It's just that public roads are different from public shoe factories.

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

The issue here is it's rather difficult for a consumer to have a choice of roads to travel. I imagine there aren't two competing highways next to each other.

 

[Mise]

Yeah, well, that's why it should add to road capacity rather than canibalise existing capacity. If we assume that we currently have enough roads to get by, then anything on top of that is a bonus/luxury.

 

[downtown]

So what kinds of roads are going to be privatized? National highways? Major roads in specific cities? All the roads? Who is typically responsible for this sort of thing in the UK?

 

[luiz]

If that's the case it says more about the Brazilian government than about the general public vs private discourse.
Public roads in European countries usually aren't death traps, and when we privatise public services like basic infrastructure it usually leads to monopolies with alll the associated problems unless we regulate the hell out of it, but that's another political battle against newly created lobbies and it can be lost.
If Brazil fares better with private roads it means your government (and not government in general) is corrupt and inefficient and it's not something we should try to emulate in Europe.

Yes, the Brazilian government is certainly more corrupt and inefficient than European governments. But you are confusing the point I was trying to make. I was not saying that public roads are necessarily death traps everywhere, I was saying that they can be (that is, they're not inherently superior to private roads at all) and that private roads can be excellent, and in fact tend to be better.

It's a strong case for private roads that even in a country as corrupt and inefficient as Brazil, the private highways of São Paulo are on par with the very best roads in Europe, if not superior. They're certainly superior to the average European highway. Our public roads, by contrast, are total death traps, with holes the size of moon craters and deadly single lanes.

For illustration purposes, two of the main highways in São Paulo, both private:

Spoiler :

Rodovia dos Bandeirantes

Rodovia dos Imigrantes

And now, the glory of public, federal government roads. Note that those aren't local backwater roads, they are federal roads, BRs, the Brazilian equivalent of the American Highway system:

Spoiler :

 

[Silurian]

I'm okay with new roads being built, maintained, and tolled by private companies, but existing roads should remain public. Private companies should be allowed to add to the total number of roads a country has, but should not be allowed to cannibalise existing road capacity. They also should have to negotiate with landowners, councils, residents, and other interested parties themselves, instead of relying on the government's ability to seize land for the public good.


EDIT: I prefer the "post-post-war consensus consensus".

It is virtually impossible to build a new Motorway or all purpose roads - trunk road in the UK without compulsory purchase of some sections of the land. Some people just will not sell. Some will object to the road on principle. Some people will not sell their house because they were born in it. Other people will use it to make money with ransom strips etc.

So no compulsory purchase and there are not going to be any new roads.

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

Luiz, your two private examples look the same as our public highways (except for the mountainy bit).

I have to wonder what metric and/or research you have done to judge your private highways on par, if not superiour to the very best in Europe.