Think Green Live Clean

Photo Credit: Ryan Cheng

Eco-conscious Holland is a country known for its cycling culture. However, as you move out of the Dutch cities you start to see less bikes and more cars. One of the major issues is transportation, since the country is so small and so densely populated traffic jams are frequent and carbon emissions are a main concern. In order to reward those people who have been cutting back on their driving, and to encourage those who are reluctant to change, the Dutch government has implemented a driving tax that looks promising.

In 2012, the government in Holland will require every driver to purchase a GPS that sends the amount of kilometers driven to a billing agency. The more a person drives, the more they are required to pay. Rates will also be higher for the people that drive gas guzzlers and for people that drive during rush hour.  This will hopefully encourage people to start car-pooling, work closer to home, and bike to wherever they need to go.

The Dutch people are very supportive of the new change, since they know something must be done to cut down the amount of traffic and cars on the road. The Dutch are especially concerned about the carbon emissions since most of their country lies below sea level, they realize they could soon be underwater if they don’t change.  If this works out the way the government hopes it will, we could be seeing this driving tax being implemented in countries all over Europe.

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