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And their roads? What about their roads? Do their highways pay for themselves? Why is it that public transit must always be budget neutral or make a profit, but it's perfectly okay if, like in the US, the government pays $10 for every $1 a driver spends on driving?
Cars are heavily taxed in the Netherlands, afaik both when you buy them and then yearly.
I'd be very interested to see some numbers here. I share the sentiment of the OP: there's often talk about public transport being unprofitable but I haven't come across any conversation about how much it costs to maintain our road infrastructure and how much of it is covered by taxes.
Meanwhile, using a car to go between two cities in the Netherlands always works out cheaper than taking the train and the difference has gone up significantly in the last few years.
From my quick search, taxes come up to 4 billion.
Regular maintenance is 3 billion. Special projects for big repairs or new roads was 19 billion. But that also included some water infrastructure.
Don't really have the numbers, sorry, I just know that it's a lot of money, especially if you have a nicer car.
In the context of infrastructure, I don't think comparing direct costs/income makes sense to talk about. It's existence brings insane economical benefit, doesn't matter if it's roads or public transport.
So my point is, it doesn't make sense to try to hate on roads because of costs/income, same as it doesn't make sense to do the same with public transport, both have their place in a much bigger system than themselves.
It's no hate on roads, it's hate on injustice expectations. Why should trains make profit and cars/roads are accepted as public subsidized method of transportation?
Plus it's a misconception that roads bring us 'insane economical benefit'. They cost us so so much (consider freedom, equality, environment, health and actual money) and the average citizen is certainly not the one to profit from this system.
It's no hate on roadw
It might not be in this case, but it usually is, which is why I've included it
the average citizen is certainly not the one to profit from this system
Now there I wholeheartedly disagree. They absolutely do.
Freedom - I don't understand why you've included this one. Roads allow you to travel in the free-est way that exists, not considering <20km ranges, where that'd be walking/biking. You're just not dependent on a bus company deciding to cut a bus route, a train breaking down and blocking the rail, anything. It just doesn't make sense.
Equality - Yeah maybe, you could say that about almost anything though, same goes with housing, clothing, food, luxuries. I know it's worse in the US though, where it's a disaster not to drive, but I'm speaking from the European PoV, where cars extend what you can do, and the lack of them doesn't bar you from much.
Environment - Sure, though from what I've seen cars are not that bad, when you look at the whole picture. Can't disagree though.
Health - I don't really see a counterpoint, so agreed. Maybe ambulances?
Actual money - Worth it, very much worth it. I'm driving a car I bought for $1500 and put another $1000 in, and it's improved my life significantly, even though public transit is good and readily available (I'll take a 5m drive versus a 30m commute any day). My time is worth quite a lot to me.
The citizen might not profit directly, money-wise, but economically, it's invaluable. It's not easy to distribute goods around the country/the world, and it'd be impossible without the flexibility of roads.
How is it that every time I learn something about the Netherlands, it only ever sounds better?
Because you haven't tried moving and living there.
It's expensive, especially if you want to own a house, there's just no space.
Every three months for me. Around 100-150 eur.
That's not what I'd call heavily taxed but it's better than Germany where it's around 50-350 annually.
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Thanks, that checkbox was definitely not descriptive enough for me to notice.
It's astonishing the rail infrastructure is underfunded in the Netherlands. A flat country where you'd expect it to be fairly cheap to maintain rail networks
It might be "underfunded" but the quality is super high. Very regular trains, always on time or within a minute or two, and the trains are in good condition.
That's good news then, at least. And I've heard good things about the train stations as well.
Well it should be, but it isn't. We privatized our railroad and must suffer accordingly. The NS is almost the only true exploiter of our railway network (beside some local railroads, that have to be around to dodge Monopoly laws).
The NS got chopped up, leaving NS travelers (the public facing company) always in debt, whilst NS vastgoed (real estate) is taking in the money.
The brilliant thing? They don't even need to look after the railway, as a separate company, ProRail, gets to manage the infrastructure. That company is gouvernemental, so we get the bill for that.
So we have a railroad that's funded by the people, that hides it's huge profits away in a shell company, and bleeds out our tax money.
Liberal policy ftw
I appreciate the pun in the title.