ABSTRACT
In almost all developed economies, and increasingly in developing ones as well, transport has become a major problem for policy-makers, particularly in urban areas. The traditional response to increasing car use, that of road building, is now hard to justify economically, socially, and (above all) environmentally. Instead, the aim of most transport policy-makers is now the management of travel demand, a key element of which has been the development of an attractive public transport system as an alternative to car travel. But for this to work, major sustained investment is required. Such investment is diffi cult when public spending is already stretched to fund improvements to other parts of the public sector. Added to this, there are general economic and competitive pressures. In a deregulating and liberalized global economy, it is hard to sustain a high taxation regime.
