The Stockholm Congestion Charging Project and Vote

What is this?

The purpose of informal little collaborative project and supporting page is to have a good look at what might be called the "second half" of the challenge of the Stockholm Congestion Charging Project which has just got underway (the first half being its actual performance on the street) - bearing in mind that the New Mobility Agenda and its various antecedents have always been vigorous supporters of the principal of road pricing wisely applied.

Specifically, we want to collect views of our expert community on the chances of this important innovative project for political success -- that is popular acceptance -- of these new measures over the coming eight month trial period which has just been initiated. We do this by asking your views on four quick sets of questions organized as set out below:

But before you take pen in hand to mark your ballot, we would like to invite you in all modesty to check out first the latest news on this, which you can do by clicking right here. Likewise you might want to scan at least the top entries of the full Google coverage; you may find one or two things that you did not already know?

Once you replied to the poll, we would also like to invite your views and comments on the project as it proceeds over these next months. Stockholm has now taken the lead from London, Oslo and before that Singapore, and it is, as it should be, a far bigger, more ambitious and sophisticated project. Moreover, the project has been really very carefully planned by our Swedish friends, and they have been most thorough in reviewing past experiences, including the pluses, and the many minuses and various elephant traps, etc. So if it were to fail, it would still have to be counted the best prepared road pricing project in the history of man.

But now on to the poll (bearing in mind that as you learn more about the project you can at any time modify your vote, right up to the time of final closure of the poll, the day before the Referendum in Stockholm, the 16th of September):

Quick comments before you take pen in hand

In closing let us share with you a few quick thoughts as to why we think this is an important issue and a good opportunity for us as an independent expert community to speak out on it.

We know in advance that projects such as this will regularly get beat up by the media and the polls -- since most of us here are believers in the polluter-pays principle (by whatever name), then we should be ready to do our bit to support them in this.

I have already contacted people in Stockholm City Hall to inform them about what we are up to here, and that they may find it useful to follow both our informal poll results and the expert discussions -pro and con I would imagine -- that surely will appear here.

My hope too is that if we can get some media notice of our thinking and views on all this, that this too might work in the interest of the project.

I should say in closing here that I am a strong believer in what some call swarm intelligence and that the citizens of Stockholm will in the final analysis do the right thing-whatever that might be. But this is not to say that I think we should sit on our hands at a time when this good idea needs all the support it can get.

Poll Question

Question: Will the Stockholm Congestion Pricing succeed in getting majority public support at the time of the coming referendum?

Note: You are invited to cast your vote on all four basic questions as set out below (A. B. C. D. You'll see.)

Since the referendum is set for September 17th, we close the poll on the evening of the 16th. Vote early.

A. Will succeed to get majority backing
A. Will fail to get majority backing
B. Deserves to succeed
B. Deserves to fail
C. Succeed, but only by a very small margin
C. Succeed, and with 60% or more of votes
C. Succeed, and with 70% or more of votes
C. Fail - but by a very small margin
C. Fail, and with 60% or more of votes
C. Fail, and with 70% or more of votes
D. Project only concerns people of Stockholm
D. To the contrary, it concerns the world

(And remember, if you have second thoughts, if you happen to learn anything over these months, you can always come in and adjust up to the last minute).

Comments and thgouhts by those participating in poll

If you click here you will be taken to a compilation of the comments and points offered by those who participated in the poll and who kindly thought it might be useful if they share with us some of their thinking as to why they have done this as they have.

Go to voter commentary here

You will see considerable diversity of opinion among those of our colleagues who are checking in here. That indeed -- we call it creative dissonance -- is what this entire shared work and discussion space is all about. So you will see instances in which one person -- a true hard-working proponent of sustainable mobility and better cities -- will just turn their back on this whole economic approach to traffic reduction. Coming from her or him that is already interesting -- and all the more so once we have a chance to hear something about their reasoning in each case.

And if they make it?

Well if they do, I would like to think that our encouragement and support will have had at least some small part in making that happen. That after all is why we are here as a group.

Go Stockholm! Go complexity. Go international teamwork and Self-Organizing Collaborative Networks. Go democracy. Go sustainability and go social justice.

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