Moving away from the COE as vehicle population control

The Land Transport Authority (LTA) has just announced a new methodology to determine the number of certificates of ownership (COEs) that are balloted every 6 months:

Going forward, under the new methodology, LTA will recycle the COE quota from the actual vehicle de-registrations in the most recent 6-month period back into the system. This eliminates the need to make any corrections due to any under- or over-estimation. The result is a more responsive VQS that can adjust its supply more quickly to any change in vehicle de-registration patterns. This would also allow us to keep more closely to the allowable vehicle population growth rate on a year-on-year basis. The COE quota to be made available will also include quota for allowable growth in vehicle population, and slight adjustments from cancelled or expired COEs. LTA will effect the change from April 2010 onwards after the end of Quota Year 2009 (i.e. from April 2009 to March 2010).

The COE quota will be announced in January and July of each year, and will take into account the number of deregistered vehicles in the previous 6 months, instead of projected number of deregistered vehicles in the old model.

Quite clearly, LTA still views the COE as a viable method of vehicle population control. Chemical Generation analyses and proposes a move away from the COE.

Controlling the car population need not only be through the failing COE system. The direction to take is that it is not about regulating the car population per se, it is about controlling car congestion on the roads even without the COE. It is not about not making people own cars, but making driving so expensive that they would not want to use their car unnecessarily.

The Off Peak Car scheme, as an example, already offers potential if it can be revamped to a mainstream rather than minority car ownership scheme. Allow people to own cars, but driving it indiscriminately becomes a hole in the pocket, this thus potentially decelerating the car congestion problem on the road.

This is an interesting take on the issue. I am personally in favour of a bigger reliance on the public transport system, provided the infrastructure be expanded further and more environment-conscious, complemented by the Off-Peak Car scheme and a carbon tax for car owners rely heavily on their vehicles. As I am not a car owner (nor do I intend to be one), any comments or insights would be welcome.