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Comment by fredley | Hacker News Reader

Because this disproportionally affects people who have no other alternative. Rich city people can switch to electric cars without changing habits that much, there are charging points everywhere and they're building lots more all the time.

Go to Cornwall though and it's a very different picture. You need to get all these more remote regions as wired up as central London _before_ introducing any taxation, or make exceptions while you're building the infra.

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If we are aiming to increase air quality, then geographic taxes seem fine. And by that I mean hike London's congestion zone charge up x10 for all vehicles with emissions. And expand it back to cover a more sensible portion. And then have every city implement the same thing. And when the lobbying starts against it, how about someone holds their nerve for a change. Yes businesses need deliveries but they don't need to make them with polluting vehicles, that's a choice influenced by cost.

EDIT: BY incredible coincidence I just received an email from TfL on exactly this!

  ULEZ is coming to central London in the same area as the Congestion Charging zone from 8 April 2019. It will operate 24 hours a day, every day of the year.
  Vehicles will need to meet the new stricter emission standards, or you will need to pay the daily ULEZ charge. This is in addition to the weekday Congestion Charge. 
  
  £12.50 per day for cars, motorcycles and vans (under 3.5 tonnes)
  £100.00 per day for heavier vehicles, including lorries (over 3.5 tonnes) and buses/coaches (over 5 tonnes)
  
  From 25 October 2021, the ULEZ will be expanded to include the inner London area bounded by the North and South Circular roads.

Great news!

You could build up e.g. Cornwall (through subsidy) with the revenue from the tax.

You could, but people would be pissed about being taxed to pay for something they don't have yet (and hence have no way to avoid the tax). While it might be a sensible strategy for raising the money it would be political suicide.

let's flesh it out a bit then.

Op said "You can make a predictable scheme for the next 20 years (i.e. fuel will raise about 4% per year,...)"

So how about investing in Cornwall now, borrowing against the 20 year revenue stream from the tax.

So how are they better of by banning cars in 10 or 20 years?

Communities can also take loans to build out infrastructure now and pay with the transition tax levied a bit later.

As too political suicide, there are three types of voters:

a) those that believe petrol cars should be banned

b) those that do not want to give up their cars ever

c) those that think cars should be banned but not for them now.

Therefore:

a) should be happy with an immediate tax ladder as it creates incentive to move now

b) will never be happy.

c) if that is the majority of your voters it’s still better to have a a gradual change now then a sudden change in the future. They could just overturn your decision in the future just before the planned sudden change.

If MPs urge for a change that is more than one election away they are hypocrites and shouldn’t be MPs.

Obviously some changes take a long time to bear fruits, but the change has to be immediate and gradual.

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