japan

The Japanese government's populist move last year to remove tolls on some of the country's toll expressways seems be moving in reverse. Since last summer the central government has been paying the toll corporations compensatory payments for removed tolls.

However recently its budgetary situation has worsened to the point it can't continue the compensatory payments, spokesmen say. In addition the toll removals worsened congestion by attracting extra traffic, and generated a political backlash.

TOLLROADSnews 2011-05-26

Here is a call for an Open Door for Japanese refugees from the earthquake/tsunami devastation.

One of the toll business' best friends in Japan is Kodo Ogata in Tokyo. So amid the news of the Friday's earthquake/tsunami drama we emailed him to see how he fared. He responded this morning with a personal greeting, then:

"The earthquake and tsunami caused the most severe damage we ever experienced.

"Blessedly my family and my house are all right.

"I went to play golf riding with a friend of mine crossing the Tokyo Bay Tunnel & Bridge (TBTB) on the day (of the earthquake).

Anti-toll Democrats in Japan who got into government August 2009 promising free roads are finding that detolling is difficult. Most of Japan's expressways were built as tollroads, initially government-owned, later privatized as regulated investor owned utilities. So to end tolls the government has to pay massive compensation to the toll companies.

Japan's Democratic Party government is in a heap of trouble over its election pledge a year ago to end tolls on the country's expressway network. Since coming to power in September last year the Democrats have managed to turn what started out as a successful political pandering into a worsening political disaster.

Mainichi reports a 49 year old motorist was detained by police near a tollgate on the Higashi-Meihan Expressway in the Nagoya area at the weekend.

They'd received a report that a man was scattering money on the expressway, throwing banknotes in the air, letting them blow all over. By evening police, motorists and tollroad staff had retrieved about Y2.8m of currency ($30,000) from the highway, some in high denomination bills.

Japan's Democratic Party government will confine any toll removals next financial year to  the sparsely settled northern island of Hokkaido, reducing the cost to a tiny fraction of the Y600b ($6.6b @ Y=1.1c) they previously said they would spend on detolling, Yomiuri Shimbun reports. The leading newspaper cited statements made by the party leader and prime minister Yukio Hatoyama in a closed meeting of lawmakers recently.

Japan's transport department estimates that ending tolls on Japan's expressways, as proposed by the the incoming Democrat Party of Yukio Hatoyama, will increase car use for trips of 200km (124 miles) or more by 58% and cause rail passenger travel in the country to decline 11% and air travel to drop by 4%.

Japan's Democrat Party, soon to become the government following a sweeping election victory, are rapidly retreating from their detolling campaign theme. A prominent member of the new governing party Mabuchi Sumio has said the plan for nation's expressways is to do traffic modeling of all segments.

The Democrats who just swept to power in Japan in a landslide national election have promised to nationalize toll companies and end tolls by 2012. Since 9,000km, 5600 miles of tollroad in Japan constitutes the great bulk of the country's expressway system this is a most radical proposal.