The local election campaign saw very little mention of the state of the local roads. This may seem like a small issue however with the average price of petrol hitting an all time high of 96 pence per litre mainly due to government taxation I believe it is an important one. The state of the roads in the region, in my opinion, are poor topped off with the poor driving standards left to deteriorate with the lack of traffic police.

Being a regular reader of Auto Express, I have spotted some good news for Britain’s roads and road users:

  1. Car share lane on the M62 heading east towards Leeds
    A controversial idea but it should benefit the car sharers, the environment as well as commuters using the main carriageway
  2. Street lights which dim when not needed
    Ever thought what a waste of energy street lights can be when on at night with no road users? A new invention will see the end to this with lights dimming when not needed helping to reduce energy wastage and light pollution
  3. Brake lights which are brighter and pulse when braking harder
    Very useful enabling following motorists to be aware of hard braking and to react appropriately

Despite these advances, I think there’s still a lot to do in terms of taxation of motorists. While I appreciate the fact that cars are polluting, I think there are many ways in which the tax collected from motorists should be used to help motorists as well as providing alternatives. Cars will be around for a long time to come, I think that the government should accept this and work with motorists rather than against them. Work should then be done to provide alternatives to ween motorists from their cars by their own choice, not by trying to price them out of the market with perpetually increasing taxes.