Congestion charge. What did the Romans do?

Will Cambridge have its own traffic congestion charge? It looks likely. A bit different from the London version, it would charge you (£3-£5) for driving around between 7.30 and 9.30 am; after that it would be free. One notch up from the London scheme, there would be no concessions for residents within the zone – and in fact the plan is that you will get charged even for driving out.

I’m all for this in principle, but can’t for the life of me see why someone should get charged for driving from where I live OUT of the city, and so relieving congestion.

What’s puzzling is exactly who is backing this. All the leaflets from the three main parties that have dropped through the letterbox in advance of the City Council elections on May 1 have come out against. The Lib Dems say that it is being introduced by the Conservative County Council, and object (like me) to the driving out charge, and to the fact that the profits are to be spent on a road in Ely, rather than improving cycling facilities etc in Cambridge itself.

The Labour leaflet had the nerve to complain about the civil liberties implications of all the cameras required to operate the scheme. There may well be a point here, but when the Labour party has enthusiastically spread CCTV cameras across the nation to make us the most photographed part of the planet, what idiot (or dissident) in the local Labour party thought we wouldn’t notice the inconsistency?

The Tory, on the other hand, claims that it is all being driven by the Labour party. And with a charming classical reference reassures us that “like all cities since Rome in 70AD, Cambridge suffers from congestion. It is part of being a city.”

So what would the Romans have done?

That’s easy. And the answer is not, I think, Tory policy – even in the hands Roman-loving Boris. I’m not quite sure why the local party thinks that the year 70 AD was crucial (the beginning of the Flavian dynasty). But from the period of Julius Caesar, more than a hundred years earlier, laws banned wheeled transport from the city of Rome during daylight hours.

There were exceptions of course. It was OK “for anything to be brought or conveyed for the purpose of building sacred temples of the immortal gods” or for rubble to be taken out of the city when “a contract has been let for public demolition”. It was also allowed for Vestal Virgins and other priests to use carts when going about their religious business. It was OK for triumphal processions and the games too.

That apart, all traffic went by night.

Was it a good solution? Well, it must have made for a nicer city by day. But just think of the night. As the Roman satirist Juvenal complains, it was impossible to get to sleep.

Still, it might just be a model for Cambridge.

Comments

[dearieme]

Who will want to accept an appointment first thing in the morning at Addenbrooke's, if it's going to cost them £5 to drive there, on top of the £1.80 per hour to park?

[don]

As a Jew, I'm not that fond of 70 A.D. Maybe they think all that plunder depicted in the Arch Of Titus led to the beginning of traffic congestion. I would really like to know the significance, if any, of the chosen date for the beginning of urban traffic problems.

[Roy]

I suppose it is easier to set up a system charge anyone driving within the central zone than to differentiate between incoming and outgoing vehicles. And if everyone is charged, then you don't need so many bureaucrats to handle appeals from those who feel they were wrongly charged.

[Michael Bulley]

Seems unfair to charge people who live in the city centre. Let them drive in and out free. OK to charge everyone else for driving in and out of the city centre, even people who live in the outskirts of the city. The answer is Park 'n' Rides. After a while, given the choice between paying £5 to drive into the city centre and paying 20p to park outside it and getting a free bus in, people soon settle for the PnR.

[PL]

We have it in Stockholm too, and they also charge you for driving out of the city. I suppose the explanation is that when you've set up cameras at a spot pointing one way it's easy to set up ones pointing the other way too, and why not get the extra money?

[Jackie]

The point about the Roman method is that it did actually take traffic out of the city, at least during the day. What they didn't do was use it as an excuse for yet another stealth tax!

[Paul Potts]

What would the Romans have done? They'd have put hay on the roads and let only horses in. That reduces the noise, and I daresay the damage to the environment.

Paulo

[SW Foska]

Forget the Romans, you need to team up with the barbarians across Hadrian's Wall. In Edinburgh the congestion charge was rejected in 2005, and the attempt to charge for driving out of the zone was one of the main things that got the back up of the residents. Not being Romans, they decided the issue democratically, by referendum. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/4287145.stm