New e-toll fees: nothing has changed

·19 Jun 2015

Opposition to Urban Tolling Alliance has slammed the gazetted e-toll tariff dispensation, saying that there have been no meaningful changes at all.

“Cutting through the amendments…one detects that no meaningful change has been made,” said Outa chairman, Wayne Duvenage.

“The scheme remains administratively cumbersome, and the alternative rate is still grossly punitive at 300% higher than the e-tag rate.”

Duvenage noted that non-registered users would have to pay within 7 days to get the 30c per km rate (which has not changed at all) – something which is “practically impossible”, due to the ineffective postal system.

“Sanral has simply painted a new coat over the same rusty broken vehicle and tried to sell it as a new car,” said Duvenage.

“The public are being taken for fools by this attempted morass of smoke and mirrors.”

Read: New e-toll fees are not what were promised: JPSA

Fuel levy still the way

Duvenage once again renewed Outa’s call for a national fuel levy to replace the “grossly inefficient” tolling system.

A fuel levy has 100% compliance, costs zero rands in administration costs, and has drawn over R30 billion since the Gauteng freeway project started – a third of which was paid by Gauteng road users, Duvenage argued.

“In effect, Gauteng freeway users have already paid for this freeway upgrade – a few times over – through the fuel levy increase applied over recent years.”

Outa said that it is waiting to see government’s next move to link e-tolling to licence disk renewals, after which it will assess its way forward.

“Hopefully, sanity will prevail before this matter becomes a bigger fiasco than it already has.”