I quote this blog that appeared on Mr Brown.
After a particularly unpleasant commuting experience, I wrote to the Straits Times Forum about two idiots who violated bus lane hours and passed me way too closely. Surprise, surprise, one response was the ‘you don’t pay road tax so get off the road’ argument. I’ll accept the argument the day when you stop polluting the public air, raising the collective air temperatures of the island, increasing noise levels on the island, and killing people. None of the road taxes you pay goes towards removing your negative influences on our shared environment. It only goes towards building more roads and hence encouraging more pollution.
And another ‘if other people swerve to the right to avoid you they endanger other people and it’s your fault’ comment. Right. If it’s not safe for you to either pass me without swerving or swerve to the right, yet you choose to swerve to the right, it’s my fault?
It’s funny how people can think that they own the entire damn road just because they pay road tax. I guess it’s not an abstract idea that public road is a public good, regardless of having road tax or not. Tax is just a mechanism for the government to increase revenue and add on to the cost of owning motorized vehicle in this tiny sunny island. If i follow the flawed arguement of keeping off the road if you did not pay road tax, i guess there should not be any marked crossing on the road since you and i who cross the road may not have paid road tax. Or should i propose gantry at the crossing and some form of ID for road tax payer who are allowed to pass the gantry, while you and i who are not paying the tax should use other overpass or underpass.
While the public good cannot be excluded from anyone’s use, laws are in place to ensure proper use of the public facility for the greater good of the society. Since the law allows and requires bicycle of travel on the road, who are we to complain and harbour resentment towards cyclist?
Disclaimer: the author is an avid cyclist who wishes he has more opportunity to cycle to school without incuring more nagging from Mrs Chongky.
