Keith Tanner said:Some European cities have added daily surchares to encourage people to use public tranport. IIRC they're highest for diesel vehicles and lowest/zero for electric due to the emissions involved. This will encourage - but not require - the use of electric vehicles, but it's also dependent on there being a realistic public transport system. That's a WHOLE other can of worms :)
Well, the most prominent city that does is the one that decided it doesn't want to part of Europe anymore - but in that case, it started out as an anti-congestion measure. They've added an emissions component to it a few years ago, though.
In Germany you have the "Umweltplakette", which depending on the colour, allows you to drive your car into certain cities (or not, if you have the wrong colour indicating higher pollution levels).
In both cases it tends to be an emissions control measure rather than a way to get additional funding. That said, European countries - at least the ones I'm familiar with - have long tried to steer people to certain propulsion mechanisms and away from others, usually by tweaking vehicle excise taxes and making them based on the likes of CO2 output.
