How much will toll roads cost Ukraine: the cost of the system reaches UAH 7 billion
1 January 13:17
The system for toll roads in Ukraine may cost UAH 7 billion. This was announced by Deputy Finance Minister Oleksandr Kava in an interview with Interfax-Ukraine, Komersant ukrainskyi reports.
The Deputy Minister of Finance noted that the topic of toll roads in Ukraine has been discussed for more than 20 years and each time causes a great public outcry.
According to him, toll roads can be different. There are concession roads that are built at the expense of the investor and he charges tolls for a certain period, and another option is tolling. This is a toll for freight transport on such roads, as it works in European countries.
To introduce toll roads in Ukraine, a special payment and control system needs to be created.
Kava noted that a system needs to be created that will track the movement of a car on the roads, determine how many kilometers it has traveled, and automatically issue an invoice for the use of infrastructure.
“This requires the development of a special payment and control system, which is not cheap. Even before the war, the cost of such a system for the main state roads was estimated at about UAH 7 billion,” he explained.
According to him, the payment depends on the distance the truck has traveled, which is the indicator the system should record.
There are models for implementing such systems around the world:
- Vignettes are special stickers or documents that confirm payment for road use. They are used in small countries, including the Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia, and Romania. However, this approach is not effective for Ukraine, as we have a much larger territory.
- GPS devices are devices that record the route of a car via satellites.
- Magnetic frames with RFID tags are special tags that are read at the entrances and exits of toll roads.
The easiest way to do this is to choose vignettes that confirm payment. Vignettes are used in the Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia, and Romania, among others. In Ukraine, given its large area, as in Poland, it makes no sense to introduce vignettes. Alternative payment methods include GPS and magnetic frames with RFID tags.
“But, frankly speaking, the state cannot afford to finance the development of such a system with a high level of security and cyber defense,” the Deputy Minister of Finance summarized.
It is worth noting that Ukrainians have been preparing for toll roads for years, since the late 90s, when the construction of the Krakovets-Lviv road was first discussed. Almost all European countries have toll roads.
For the user, the meaning of a toll per kilometer can be explained by several factors:
- the quality of the road surface is high;
- there are no traffic lights or left turns;
- there is a safety barrier in the middle.
As a result, you pay for the opportunity to get from point A to point B faster than by any other means. And the latter is also an integral part of the system – toll highways should have a free alternative.
Given that the first and so far the only potential concession toll highway, Krakovets-Lviv, has been in the works for more than 30 years, we should not expect new toll roads anytime soon.
