Better Early Than Late

 Cancellation of Government’s debt-repaying road toll for secondary roads is applauded by the people and well appreciated by transportation enterprises; and the national treasury also assists in repaying 40% of the debt. But why are some local governments not having positive attitudes towards such a good event that is beneficial to everybody, and some of them even starting to play “face-change” game of promoting the secondary to the primary?

 It is self-evident that withdrawing toll stations is difficult and burden-laden. The secondary roads account for 60% of all our roads that are with tolls, and more than 80% of which were built with government loans. Such a large-scale withdrawal of the stations involves problems of redeploying millions of personnel, locking up hundreds of debt repayment, and new investment and financing system for road construction and sourcing of road maintenance funds in future…

 It is complicated and difficult to unravel, with nodi coming one after another and, the actual situation at each place is different. “To cut it even at one stroke” is really impossible. As such, the Government has decided on the principle of progressive and orderly implementation, with individual provinces organizing the task, either to completely cancel it once and for all, or cancel it in stages within the provinces.

 Nevertheless, cancelling in stages does not mean the stakeholders can “dawdle along", as every day counts. Local governments ought to get their calculations right.

 Actually, contrary to the hearsays, many secondary road tolls have not been "ATMs" for quite some time. In recent years, highway network construction has been progressing well, the original function of the secondary roads in support of the primary framework is diminishing, toll fees are dropping year by year, and the burden of debts is becoming heavier and heavier; many toll stations have long been caught in the nasty situation of "the more difficult to repay debts the longer will be the fees collecting period”.

On the other hand, these toll stations are mainly distributed over the districts where urban and rural residents frequently use, and it is becoming more and more prominent everyday that they contradict the development of local economy and the people's production activities. It is not uncommon to see the examples of too many toll stations affecting attraction of business investments. Wujiashan Toll Station at Dongxihu in Wuhan, Hubei has led to 500 local hardware and building materials suppliers in the town relocating away because of unbearable logistic cost, resulting in an annual revenue loss of 1.5 billion yuan to the government.

 Toll station withdrawal complies with the aspirations of the people, competes for business opportunities, and breaks the shackles of developments, thus creating a better investment and living environment, and has in fact earned a new “cornucopia”, gathering fortune, popularity and harmony. Such a good deed of “penny foolish, pound wise” would certainly be better early than late.