In message , at 14:58:25 on Fri, 2 Nov
2018, John Williamson remarked:

Set the penalty at a bit more than it would cost to divert round the
restriction.
How do you measure such a cost? Just extra miles (and hence gallons)
of driving polluting people living further out, or does my time have
a value too?

Like all such things, the answer will be a fudge based on wage levels
and fuel costs.

Normally, the "value" of leisure time comes out at around minimum wage
(but try telling that to someone getting up at 6am on a Sunday instead
of 8am). Fuel cost avoiding Central London depends on whether one's
destination is Central London, or somewhere "across" London.

Maybe they should have built all those extra Ringways, after all.?

Call it twenty quid a trip as a starter, and if that doesn't put enough
off, then increase it. It's a penalty to discourage people, not a
carrot to entice people to update their transport.

I don't do any trips unless I *have* to. So that's a broken theory.

My time as a semi-retired person, is probably worth less than someone
with an urgent appointment in Central London.

If I had an urgent appointment in Central London, I'd either use public
transport or a pushbike, as they are the fastest ways to get round the
City.

I don't have a pushbike, and trains into Central London are often scare
at times like Sunday mornings, when I typically plan to travel into
London avoiding the traffic. You can't get a student's entire effects
onto a train, let alone a bike.

If I didn't need the carrying capacity of a car, I'd have been on a
train in the first place (or the person I was giving a lift to would
be).

Albeit a little way from London, my next non-trivial trip in a car will
be to pick someone up Saturday evening after a work shift, a couple of
hours after the last of the bus-every-3hrs has departed.
--
Roland Perry