The Dutch have agreed in principle to implement a pay as you drive tax system for drivers...2012 is the intened start date with incremental priceing in the 1st 5 years....starting at around 0,03 euro cents a kilometer...working up to around 0,06 euro cents per km. This is going forward to the Dutch Parliment and it is rumoured that it'll will go through.
There serious about this and the Dutch are very good at electronics ...just look where the GATSO camera's came from...
Will be controlled by a satellite based system more than likely intergrated into a satnav system or such like (TOMTOM is Dutch also)...
http://www.expatica.com/nl/news/dutch-news/Pay_as_you_drive-system-divides-Dutch-cabinet_58080.htmlJust to give you an idea about taxes..I looked into buying a new Landrover 110 Defender double cab...the cost price is 21k ish Euro's and then ontop of that there is VAT at 19% and then 26,000 euro's in NEW CAR TAX...so given that they will over time scrap the VAT and new car tax..they will have to make this system work in order to continue drawing in the funds that were previously taken from ROAD TAX and new car tax.
Driving is expensive here...
Now add to the pay as you drive system...vech weight and it's enviromental rating and the cost per km will increase. Oh and if you drive in 'rush hour' that will be premium time too.
So my idea of a rebuild Landrover does not seem as sensible now....
Cheers
Dave.
ps. Just another thought....thinking about the satnav system...now if the system can calculate km's driven at what time of day then I am sure that it can calculate the time taken to drive between 2 points....installed speed computer...no need for speed camera's as all cars are being watched anyhow.
Think of the revenue that will be generated per day. And when it takes off....projected start is 2012 ...it will rake in loads of money and when other countries see this...guess what??? YOU'LL BE NEXT.