The vignettes change, the problem remains*

Even if there are daily and quarterly stickers, the question is how both the outdated and newly built road infrastructure will be maintained.

Despite the resistance from the Ministry of Regional Development and Public Works (MRDPW), the introduction of daily and quarterly vignettes from January 1, 2017 was adopted at first reading in the relevant parliamentary committee. The proposal was made by a group of deputies from the Reformist Bloc and the Patriotic Front, supported by the Ombudsman. If the full package of measures passes the chamber, we will see one-day vignettes for passenger cars, we will use the so-called seasonal vignette, and the annual sticker will be valid not for the calendar year, but for 365 days from the date of purchase.

The inclusion of one-day and three-month vignette options is based on the sensible observation that a large proportion of those using the national road network with their cars do so during periods not covered by the current packages. Seasonal vignettes will be suitable for people who undertake significantly more trips during the summer season, while one-day vignettes open up opportunities to reduce the cost of weekend trips or shorter work trips.

As currently outlined, the options provided by the MRDPW – weekly, monthly and (calendar) annual vignette – leave the impression of a deliberate design to force motorists to overpay. If you want to travel only for a day – you can’t, pay for a whole week, if you want to go to the seaside for a week or two – you can’t, pay for a month, if you want to travel only in the summer or during the ski season – you can’t, pay for a year. This is no coincidence, the system is designed to mask the higher price of the actually useful period of use of the vignette with a longer nominal duration of the security. This pricing policy resembles the approach of some food manufacturers when their costs increase – they keep the price and packaging, but reduce the weight.

Vignettes do not pay for the roads

In fact, Lilyana Pavlova's department directly tells us that the funds generated from vignette fees are currently insufficient to maintain the road network within usage standards – the specific figure is a 600 million leva deficit. This should not surprise us, considering the active construction of roads in recent years, mainly through subsidies from the European Cohesion Funds. As with other projects financed with European funds, the real dimension of the costs of maintaining what has been built is already starting to weigh heavily and create problems in public budgets – just look at what is happening with the debts of municipalities, the Sofia ticket, etc. The job is not just to spend money on shiny infrastructure and cut the ribbon triumphantly, you also need a financially sound plan for the maintenance of each facility for years to come.

We are promised that in the next two years we will finally see a transition to a significantly better working toll system. At the same time, it is inexplicable why the MRDPW tells us that this will make the vignettes "electronic". It seems that someone needs to explain to the state transport specialists that the fundamental difference between a vignette and a toll system is that in the first one you pay for time, while in the second one - for the use of a specific road section. In other words, the planned change will be more in the system for monitoring the vignette stickers, and not a transition to tolls.

Either way, the problem already exists – we have infrastructure that cannot be sustained with the current model. The voted changes do not address it, but allow for a classic hidden subsidy to occur. If the MRDPW models prove correct and the deficit increases after the introduction of the new stickers, this larger hole will have its consequences. It will either be filled with revenue from other taxes, thus non-driving taxpayers will subsidize those who drive, or certain roads will be left in worse condition than others, and thus the subsidy will go to priority regions at the expense of non-priority ones. We are just changing who pays the bill.

Higher costs

According to the MRDPW, printing one-day vignettes (with all their attributes and security systems) may not be a particularly economically justified undertaking, because "the costs of production, distribution and sale will be higher than the revenues". Even more so, if we include in the picture the ubiquitous vignette fraud - peeling, sticking - as well as the extremely ineffective method of control - through physical inspection by traffic police. The picture looks even darker.

*You can see the original article in Trud newspaper from 27.05.2016 or at this link

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