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Comment by Ekaros | Hacker News Reader

I think all road use should require some type of fee and maybe tracking. Why should people using cars be subsidising the pedestrians and bikers by huge amounts of money. They should pay for their own roads.

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Cars don't subsidize pedestrians or bikers, at all. The maintenance on roads from pedestrian traffic is essentially 0. bikes to almost no damage to roads compared to cars, much less tractor trailers. Doubles the weight of a vehicle increases maintenance costs by a factor of 4 per axle... bicycles and pedestrians are nothing. And without cars, we could go with much cheaper gravel, dirt, cobblestone, etc with no issues.

Actually surface roads in my state in the US mostly have another 4 ft of the outside lane (typically 12ft) for bikes. So 16ft frequently, with approx 25% of that for bikes. I have no problem with that. Just trying to be accurate.

The actual reason for that space is a shoulder for breakdowns. They paint a line on it and call it a bike lane for PR. A usable bike lane needs physical protection (and not be usable by cars at all).

I want to believe this is some kind of dry sarcasm but cars don't subsidize pedestrians. If anything, urban walkable, bikable neighborhoods subsidize cars and suburban areas.

The way it works in some places is that road tax is funded from taxes from general population plus road tax for cars, trucks and motorcycles plus, for highways, extra taxes for cars and trucks. The car use of pedestrians and bicycles has minimal to no impact on maintenance (I know sidewalks built more than 50 years ago that never needed any maintenance), while the part of the road where cars drive is impacted by the cars and a lot more by trucks, so the system above seems quite fair. Also highway taxes funded only by cars and trucks is very fair, pedestrians or cyclists are not allowed there.

Those must be in horrible condition. You are telling me that no one ever cleans sidewalks there? Or repair the broken parts?

What I am saying is that they are not broken. Pedestrians walking on asphalt sidewalks cannot break it. And no, in most cases rain is the only cleaning.

You want the government to track you everywhere you go? What could possibly go wrong with that?

Isn't that small price to pay for everyone paying their fair share and not free loading on others?

Frankly, no.

Well, it's a price. Definitely not a small one.

I'll pay more and subsidize freeloaders rather than increase government tabs on me.

If that’s the case, car users should be paying _more_.

Pedestrian and bike infrastructure is peanuts in comparison to the investment and ongoing maintenance costs that car infrastructure requires.

I genuinely can't tell if you're being serious or just taking the piss.

If you're taking the piss: lol, pretty funny.

If you're serious: lol, pretty funny.

Wear from bikes and pedestrians is too small to be worth metering. You'd spend more on tracking and enforcement than it costs.

It's true that automobile use-in-terms-of-road-wear taxes would look very different from what they are now. A compact ICE car's total tax burden would drop to almost nothing. Ditto motorcycles. Truck and large SUV taxes would increase significantly. 18-wheelers would see enormous tax increases (road shipping is effectively heavily subsidized, now).

No, no it is not. No thank you.

Roads are generally paid for from property taxes, which are paid by both pedestrians and drivers. The pedestrians are subsidizing the drivers.

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