Skip to main content

Switzerland to more than double road tax to tackle congestion

The cost of the Swiss road tax vignette will more than double to US$106.50 per year from just over $40 at present. With the extra money raised, the Swiss Federal Council wants to tackle congestion on the roads throughout the country and also extend the road network.
March 16, 2012 Read time: 1 min
The cost of the Swiss road tax vignette will more than double to US$106.50 per year from just over $40 at present. With the extra money raised, the 2972 Swiss Federal Council wants to tackle congestion on the roads throughout the country and also extend the road network. This will see nearly 400 kilometres of new road added to the network in 2014, exclusively focusing on existing cantonal road links.

Other ways in which congestion will be tackled is through the opening of hard shoulders and temporary reduction of motorway speeds from 120 km/h to 100 or 80 km/h at certain times. The 2970 Swiss Federal Department of the Environment, Transport, Energy and Communications (Uvek) says a section of motorway reaches its maximum capacity when vehicles travel at 85 km/h.

There were some 16,000 hours of traffic congestion on Swiss roads in 2010, which was a 30 per cent increase year-on-year. The Swiss Federal Council says the total investment in roads will cost some US$327 milion per year, nearly half of which will come from the federal government and the balance from cantons.

Related Content

  • $66 billion for Florida transport infrastructure
    March 11, 2025
    $66 billion will be spent on Florida’s transport infrastructure over the next five years.
  • A tricky road update is planned for an important rural road in Brazil
    September 27, 2013
    Brazilian consultant SOTEPA has been closely involved with infrastructure improvements in a series of projects in the southern state of Santa Catarina. One of the most important of these has been design work for the SC-477 state highway, which connects the east of the state to Brazil’s Littoral zone and the BR-101 federal highway. The SC-477 has had to be upgraded as part of it has been unsurfaced, without an asphalt surface between Itaiópolis and Doutor Pedrinho. The road provides an important link for the
  • New Zealand is bucking the trend in road safety with increasing crashes
    June 4, 2015
    New Zealand is bucking the trend worldwide on improving road safety with an increase in crashes on its roads. The country saw 5.7 road deaths/100,000 people in 2014 according to the International Road Traffic and Accident Database, an increase of 16.1% from the previous year. This is the largest increase in the 28 countries surveyed, and largely reverses a 17% reduction from the previous year. The death toll on New Zealand’s roads so far in 2015 is 134, compared to 123 and 100 in the comparable periods of 2
  • UK M6 motorway project complete
    December 20, 2024
    Work for the UK’s M6 motorway upgrade project is complete.