Interesting logic, only those that pay should be allowed to use the facility?
Would that refer to roads alone, or all publicly provided facilities?
Or would you prefer some kind of sliding scale depending on who paid the most?
Kind of a slippery slope (excuse the pun), do you think?
You've nearly got it, RH. I believe that cyclists should pay a contribution, yes, but that it should be proportionately lower than that paid by other road vehicles. Exactly how much I don't know.
But what other facilities are you thinking about? Health services and hand-outs? Yes, at the risk of straying off-topic, I think immigrants should have to pay towards the upkeep of the country before benefitting from certain, well, benefits - just like they do in other EU countries.
I wasn't thinking quite so narrowly as health and benefits.
Although health is certainly one area that paying into and enjoying the service has no connection. Nor should it. Health treatment, in an ideal world, is a humanitarian service and should not be denied.
I was also not thinking simply along the lines of indigenous and immigrant contributors/users. There are a multplicity of indigenous users (and immigrants) that make little or no payment towards the services that they enjoy. There are also a multiplicity of users (indigenous and immigrant) that do pay and make no use of the service.
But lets keep this relevant to the original discussion.
I was also thinking of education, social services, refuse, libraries, leisure, housing, police, fire, defence, coastguard, etc, etc.
There is no connection between paying into and enjoying benefits of practically all public services. So why draw the distinction for roads, some of which are the responsibility of national agencies, and others are the responsibility of local organisations. So, by your suggestion, those who "pay to use" would be paying to a national agency and to the myriad of local organisations.
An argument could be that payment is made to one central agency that distributes the income to the numerous local organisations. Well payment is made now to a central agency but it is not re-distributed.
Any local payment now is made direct to the local organisation. (parking fines, congestion charges)
So while your suggestion might appear to be reasonable, in practice it is, well, not practicable.
Where would it end, pedestrians paying to use the pavements? Pushchairs must pay slightly more?
Surely the status quo is sensible, no payment for cycles and there is encouragement to "get on your bike" with all the associated benefits.
After all, the majority of journeys on roads at any one time involve one or two people per car and sitting one behind the other would make a darned more sense in many ways.
