I've had a really good idea!

[HON2A]

Just had a puncture! So, fed up with the increasing number of nails and metal objects on the road, together with the immense cost of tyres, together with the high price of scrap metal...

I therefore propose a "tyre-tax" of 25p a tyre, funds going toward a fleet of vans with huge magnets on the back. At 40 million tyres sold a year, that's ten million pounds raised, plus the scrap metal costs raised, to sustain this fleet.

Results:
- Happier and wealthier drivers
- Increased productivity from not having to wait at tyre repair centres
- Less accidents from cars having punctures and/or being stranded on side of road/motorway
- Less rubber trees needing to be chopped down, so more oxygen (erm, not too sure about this last point)

[SteveDGY]

Excellent idea, but if you have the magnet on the back, the van will have already driven over the nail/sharp object, giving the van a puncture and making it useless?

[Robatr0n]

Or how about having the roads kept clean by the Council? We can pay them a tax to do it too! Let's call it Council Tax.

The state of the roads is nothing short of disgusting and we pay more than enough in taxes as it is without the introduction of more. The most irritating thing for me is seeing the old builder sweep all the nails and shrapnel from the back of their flatbed onto the road!

[deadtom]

also, if you stop people getting punctures, they wont have to replace tyres so often, so your 40 million tyres will will be.. less than 40 million

[Perd Hapley]

How about small electromagnets on the front bumper picking stuff up?

Or buy some of those wheel mounted snowplough things from last year and just let them scoop up the road debris.

[McSam]

Actually, I quite like the idea of using a very small tax to do something about all the crap lying around in the roads waiting to burst tyres, and very surprisingly your numbers stack up! But magnets aren't gonna do the job. For a start, there's more than enough non-magnetic debris around to blow out a tyre, and in any case you'd need a van as wide as the entire road, preferably both lanes, travelling pretty slowly if you wanted to pick stuff up with a magnet.

So really you need a dedicated team. Not sure how you could really do it for ten million quid, though maybe it could be put into making those street-sweeper things slightly less frigging useless?

[The Wookie]

I would chance that 10 million quid would not be enough to start a large scale governmental project of getting a management department out of bed in the morning, let alone buying/building trucks and arranging logistics for national movement.

ETA - There's also the factor of Turkey's voting for Christmas, I can't imagine tyre manufacturers will be too chuffed at a tax on their product that could directly reduce their sales

[SteveDGY]

Or a magnetic front and back bumper, although it could be a problem if two of the vans are following each other and one of them tailgates the other, leaving them stuck together

[Monty Python]

Surely by now you'd have thought someone would have been able to come up with a filler for a tyre that would make filling with air a thing of the past. if the wheel was split at the hub you'd just take the wheel apart when a new tyre was needed.


I mean, how hard can it be?

[sleep envy]

SteveDGY said:

Excellent idea, but if you have the magnet on the back, the van will have already driven over the nail/sharp object, giving the van a puncture and making it useless?

Easy, make it reverse everywhere.

NEXT!!

[Jayho]

Then the tens and thousands of tyre shops closing because there's not enough tyres sold to be sustaining? Which also makes tyre prices going up because the supply/demand has become affected, therefore the consumer loses out again

[J4CKO]

I think cyclists may object to this concept, the prospect of being hoovered up as metallic debris doesnt appeal.

[mickk]

J4CKO said:

I think cyclists may object to this concept, the prospect of being hoovered up as metallic debris doesnt appeal.

Can't see the problem with that.

[slipstream 1985]

its a possitive idea

[sleep envy]

J4CKO said:

I think cyclists may object to this concept, the prospect of being hoovered up as metallic debris doesnt appeal.

Hoover away, I doubt it'll be a problem on a carbon or ally bike

[Eighteeteewhy]

Monty Python said:

Surely by now you'd have thought someone would have been able to come up with a filler for a tyre that would make filling with air a thing of the past. if the wheel was split at the hub you'd just take the wheel apart when a new tyre was needed.


I mean, how hard can it be?

It's been done


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fqRJ9GfIJtI&fea...

[DanDC5]

Why not get all the thieving gobstes on 'community service' to clean it up?

[Steve_F]

Just get the big haulage companies to chuck them on the front of their truck and either pay them or give them tax breaks for every truck carrying a road clearing unit.

Sorted!

Guessing most of the debris that causes punctures is on side streets and back roads but at least main roads would be clear!

[Perd Hapley]

Monty Python said:

Surely by now you'd have thought someone would have been able to come up with a filler for a tyre that would make filling with air a thing of the past. if the wheel was split at the hub you'd just take the wheel apart when a new tyre was needed.


I mean, how hard can it be?

Hell, I remember Carol Vorderman riding a bike over a bed of nails on How2 to demonstrate a foam filled tyre and that must have been 15 years ago.

[HON2A]

Superb, I'll make an application to Dragon's Den then

http://www.bbc.co.uk/dragonsden/aps/apply.shtml