Smeed Report - Legacy

Legacy

After Roth analysed its congestion problems for the World Bank Singapore has adopted many of the ideas originally identified in the Smeed Report, since introducing its first Restricted Zone in 1975. It uses a variable Electronic Road Pricing structure on expressways and through gateways into the central business district with pricing based on time and congestion levels. It aims to reduce congestion, encourage the use of public transport, car pooling, less congested alternative routes and different times of travel.

A cordon based charging scheme has also been running in the city centre of Oslo, Norway since 1990. However, this differs in some key respects from Smeed's scheme, as it relies on a system of 19 wireless AutoPASS-enabled entrypoints with toll booths, and it was not designed as a congestion charge. Instead it is a hypothecated tax or fund-raising mechanism to pay for new roads, in the first instance, and public transport more latterly.

It was not until 2002 that the principle was re-adopted in Britain, with legislation passed to allow the first schemes to be implemented in Durham and then London, with consideration given to a national road pricing system.

Research by the likes of Lewis and Mogridge were better able to formulate the observation that the more roads are built, the more traffic there is to fill these roads. Combined with the visible effects of growing levels of traffic, this developed the intellectual argument upon which to consider introducing new methods of charging.