Transport | Tax increases aim at fighting soaring traffic

The Transport Advisory Committee’s first meeting of this year was held yesterday afternoon, during which members discussed possible measures to curb the city’s growing traffic. The Secretary for Transport and Public Works, Raimundo Rosário, announced that tax increases will likely be implemented in order to make car ownership more costly.
The secretary told journalists after the meeting that a majority of the committee members are in favor of introducing economic measures to slow the surging number of cars, which is increasing annually by 5 percent.
The measures discussed at the meeting included increasing parking fees and taxation in multiple areas, which have stayed unadjusted for a decade. However, the 59-year-old secretary conceded that, so far, discussion had not yielded conclusions on specific dates, target car reduction numbers to meet, or even how much the tax increment would be.
The Transport Bureau (DSAT) director, Wong Wan, argued that measures addressing private vehicles have to be implemented in tandem with those targeting public transportation. He highlighted to the media that several committee members had agreed to put the bus priority policy for the inner harbor district in place this August, which was considered the best time to implement the policy considering a reduced traffic volume. “We will work towards the goal [of enforcing the policy in August], but we have to continue collecting the public’s opinion in order to know to what extent the policy will be implemented to,” said Wong.
The secretary also added that the act of raising taxes was meant to achieve “a simultaneous and proportionate increase” in terms of the money needed for “purchasing cars, keeping cars and using cars.” The policy objective, as he said, was to make the tax adjustment fair to different sorts of car-owners.
The DSAT director revealed that “advance warnings” would be given to current car owners in case of tax increases, whereas there would not be any advance notification for tax increases for car imports in order to avoid the city’s sudden demand for vehicles.
According to figures provided by DSAT, the estimated cost of owning a private car (including taxes, parking fees, maintenance) in Hong Kong is 7.5 times more than in Macau. In Taiwan, it costs four times more to own a vehicle. Staff reporter