SOME MORE DISCUSSION ON TOLL ROADS IN SYDNEY

2025 December 11 ABC Radio: Evenings with Renee Krosch. Interview with me about Sydney’s Toll System:

Cleaned transcript (lightly edited for clarity and flow)

Speaker H:
Now, I know this has been discussed a lot across 702 ABC Sydney today, but it is a big deal. Today, the Minns Government confirmed that, from late 2028, the Sydney Harbour Bridge and the Sydney Harbour Tunnel will be tolled in both directions.

Is this a broken election pledge? Didn’t Chris Minns say, when he came into office, that there would be no new tolls for old roads? But today it’s confirmed there will be tolls in both directions on the bridge and the tunnel.

Here is John Graham on 702 Breakfast with Chris Taylor this morning.

John Graham (excerpt):
It allows us to actually fund that $60 toll cap that’s been so important to motorists who just don’t have the option to jump on public transport and move around the city.

They do have to be in their car, it is expensive. That $60 toll cap is making a huge difference, but it is expensive to fund without some sort of reform.

But there is a second reason as well, and this is the reason why it was always the former Government’s plan to have two-way tolling on the harbour crossings. Once the new Western Harbour Tunnel, that third harbour crossing, opens, it is tolled in two directions.

To have two-way tolling on that Western Harbour Tunnel and one-way tolling on the Sydney harbour crossings would cause traffic chaos. That’s the advice from traffic experts as they look at the network.

If we didn’t do that, we’d simply have many, many drivers rerouting through the city. It would bring the traffic network to a halt. That’s why it was always the plan.

Renee Krosch:
“Hmmm, always the plan.” John Graham speaking on 702 Breakfast this morning. So, tolling in both directions, it’s happening at the end of 2028 when the new Western Harbour Tunnel opens.

What do you think? 1300 222 702. If you’ve got thoughts about this, the text line is 0467 922 2702.

Professor David Levinson is Professor of Transport at the University of Sydney. He comes on regularly here on evenings, and here he is again tonight. Hi David.

Professor David Levinson:
Hi.

Renee Krosch:
What do you think, David? Do you think it’s fair and reasonable to toll the Sydney Harbour Bridge and the tunnel in both directions?

Professor David Levinson:
I think it’s a bit inefficient. You could have one toll that was twice as much in one direction, and you wouldn’t have to pay tolls twice, and that’s what we used to do historically on lots of bridges. You would need half as many toll collectors. Now it’s automated, but you still have to build gantries and there’s still toll collection equipment.

The problem is that not all of the harbour crossings are tolled. If you’re willing to go farther west to the Iron Cove Bridge, Gladesville, or even farther west out to Rhodes, you’re not paying a toll when you’re crossing the river. So some people would cross in the non-tolled direction one way and avoid paying the tolls entirely.

So you have to decide whether you’re going to use the Parramatta River and the harbour as a toll cordon all the way through, with a toll northbound or southbound everywhere, or if you just want to do it in the more urban areas, in the city, where you have the tunnel, the new tunnel, and the bridge. Then you could put tolls on both directions.

But they made a choice to put tolls in both directions on the Western Harbour Tunnel, and now they’re using that as an excuse to put tolls in both directions on the other two facilities, which benefits people who collect tolls.

Renee Krosch:
It does benefit people who collect tolls. Am I right that the people who collect the tolls are getting two and a half billion dollars every year from Sydney motorists?

Professor David Levinson:
I don’t know the exact number, but they’re getting a lot of money from Sydney motorists who are paying tolls on various facilities. The current harbour crossings are not Transurban facilities, but the other toll roads are, and those tolls are collected at a pretty high rate from Sydney motorists.

Renee Krosch:
We’re the most tolled city in the world, we hear this a lot. We’ve got more kilometres of toll roads, and more toll points, than any other city.

Has the public private partnership model to build infrastructure in this city ultimately let down motorists?

Professor David Levinson:
I think it’s let down taxpayers in a lot of ways. We have all of these tolls, and then we put toll caps on. The toll caps are paid for by general revenue, everybody is paying into it, so that people who are driving on the toll roads don’t have to pay more than $60 a week.

You can say, that seems fair. We have a cap on transit fares, so if you ride Sydney trains, the light rail, and ferries, you’re not paying more than $50-something a week.

But we want people to use public transport and we want fewer people to drive. Instead, we’ve created an incentive to drive more kilometres. After $60, you’re not paying tolls anymore. We’re increasing people’s incentive to drive more. I think that’s distorted, and it’s not what we want as overall public policy.

Renee Krosch:
So the amount currently to cross the Harbour Bridge is about $4 or something, is that right?

Professor David Levinson:
I think $4.41 is what the newspaper article said in peak periods, and $3.20 in off-peak.

Renee Krosch:
So you double that to go to work and come home if you live in that part of the city. Let’s call that $8 a day, $40 a week. You’re not getting anything back on the toll relief.

I understand the extra money collected on the Harbour Bridge and the tunnel is going to help fund the toll relief policy, which is a good thing. The toll relief is a good thing.

Professor David Levinson:
Well, it might be a good thing. It’s a good thing if you’re getting the toll relief. It’s not a good thing for the people who aren’t getting the toll relief, who don’t drive that much.

It’s not a good thing for transit users. It’s not a good thing for people in eastern Sydney who aren’t driving enough to get the toll relief, and who are paying for other people’s toll relief.

It’s a transfer. We can decide we want to benefit one set of people over another, but that’s a policy choice. As you say, we’re doubling the tolls on one set of people so that another set of people don’t have to pay as much.

Renee Krosch:
I understand the equity issue, if you’re living in parts of Sydney, particularly western Sydney, there are no options for public transport and you do have to drive a long distance to get to the CBD.

However, I don’t know why and how we got to this point where this city is the most tolled city in the world.

Professor David Levinson:
There was a set of decisions that they didn’t want to pay for motorways out of current revenue. They wanted to pay for them out of future revenue.

So the question becomes, how do you do that? You need financing. How do you get financing? You ask somebody else to come up with a large sum of money so you can build the road, or you promise you can sell the thing you built, like WestConnex. We sold a large share of it to Transurban.

In exchange, future motorists have to pay for it.

The alternative, which a lot of places have used historically, is you could use fuel taxes to pay for all of the road construction, and we wouldn’t have tolls at all. That would likely lead to more congestion on motorways because people wouldn’t be discouraged from using them by high tolls. Again, that’s a policy choice.

It’s better from an economic point of view that everybody pays proportional to the amount that they use the facility, but we’ve created a system where some people have paid motorways and other people have free roads and aren’t paying tolls on those roads. In a sense, they’re getting an advantage.

Even with this rebate, you have to go online and apply. You have to fill out paperwork to get it, even though it could be done automatically. We do it automatically for public transport, but we don’t do it automatically for motorways.

One effect of not automating it is that people who don’t file the paperwork don’t get paid back. That saves money for the operator or the government, in this case, from having to provide the subsidy. You can say you’re providing a subsidy, and if you didn’t get it, it’s your fault for not filling out paperwork. But we didn’t have to make you fill out paperwork in the first place, that was a policy choice.

Renee Krosch:
Some people are saying, whatever happened to free travel after the bridge was paid for? That has been the promise, hasn’t it, from the Minns Government, at least. We wouldn’t put new tolls on old roads.

Someone else is saying, if you live on the North Shore, if you live in the East, you can afford it. I don’t know if that’s right, Rob, who’s just texted in. This assumption that because you live in a particular part of the city, you can, or can’t, afford to pay for things, particularly road tolls.

Professor David Levinson:
Some people can, and others can’t. Average income in the East is higher than average income in the West, but it doesn’t mean everybody in the East is wealthier than everyone in the West.

We want more people to be able to live in the East, to take the jobs that are in the East, so there isn’t as much west to east commuting in the morning.

Public policy is trying to increase housing around public transport stations, and apartment units. Those units are not only for the wealthiest people. They’re for people who can afford to live there.

Listener (unidentified):
We’re working class people, David, we are…

Renee Krosch:
We’re out of time. David, thank you so much for being here. Professor of Transport at the University of Sydney, David Levinson.

Well, it’s happening. Confirmed today by the Minns Government. Two-way tolling.