Levy alone isn't enough

REARVIEW:The long-awaited introduction of the €200 parking levy has been greeted by the sight of many a rattle flying out of prams, not least among State employees, who are expected to make up the bulk of those people affected. Their sense of entitlement knows no bounds.

The levy is intended to discourage people from driving to work and to use public transport. There are two problems with this.

First, €200 a year is not enough of a disincentive to change peoples’ habits. Even taking into account weekends and holidays, it amounts to less than a euro per working day. Try finding parking anywhere in any of the major urban centres for that. Even with the levy, anyone lucky enough to have a free parking space in a city centre – be they public or private sector – is probably saving the guts of €5,000 a year over someone without one.

Unless the levy truly causes financial pain, it will merely serve as an annoyance rather than a deterrent. Secondly, the reason many workers drive is that they have no option. There will always be a significant number of motorists wedded to their cars, whose steering wheels will have to be wrested from their cold dead hands before they avail of public transport. but most right-thinking people would be more than happy to be free of the hassle and expense of driving if there was a reliable, comfortable and competitively-priced alternative.

The Government says there will be an exemption in certain areas poorly served by buses or trains. Fair enough.

But that doesn’t take into account the fact that many people begin their journeys in parts of the country with all the amenities of the Sahara.

So how does the Government propose to get people to switch to public transport that does not exist?