[Note: In case, you haven't heard about Belgium introducing road tolls, this should be interesting for you. I intended to post it earlier, but I just forgot about it. I originally heard it on BVN last week, but since I haven't got a clue whether it was reported in the UK or anywhere else apart from the Benelux and the German-speaking countries as well.]
Brussels - Belgium moved closer Thursday to bringing in road tolls for all drivers, local and foreign, from 2013 as a key regional government voted its approval of a nationwide compromise.
Road users currently face no charge for using Belgium's motorway network, which is run by the national government, but which will put under the control of the nation's three regions - Brussels, Flanders and Wallonia - in 2013.
The regions have been negotiating for months on the introduction of nationwide tolls once they take over.
The Wallonia regional government approved a deal Thursday to introduce the nationwide toll system and share the proceeds between the three regions, government officials said. Brussels has already backed the deal, with Flanders due to vote on Friday.
Details of the system, including the likely fee, are still to be decided. But a spokesman for Wallonia's budget minister, Andre Antoine, said that the idea would be to have a 'free-flowing' system, 'so that drivers do not have to stop.'
The system would cover both local and foreign vehicles. Heavy goods vehicles would be tracked and charged per kilometre travelled, while light vehicles would pay a set fee for using the motorways and main roads.
'If we just introduced the toll on the motorways, there's the risk that we would push traffic off onto the main secondary roads,' the spokesman told the German Press Agency dpa.
One solution under discussion would be to introduce technology capable of reading drivers' licence plates, he said. That would allow the drivers of foreign cars to pre-register their licence number online or via text message before entering Belgium.
Belgium's road network is heavily used by drivers in transit between France, the Netherlands, Germany and Luxembourg.
[source: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/news ... -2013.html]
