Area Licensing Scheme

The introduction of congestion pricing was one of a number of anti-congestion policies implemented in Singapore since the 1970s, in recognition of the country's land constraints, need of economic competitiveness, and to avoid the traffic gridlock that chokes many cities in the world.

These high initial buy-in charges are considered as the price motorists pay for the luxury of owning a car and to cover part of the fixed costs associated with scaling basic road infrastructure.

Then, use-related charges, such as fuel taxes (50% of final sale price), ALS or high parking rates are utilised by public authorities to further constraint travel.

In summary, Singapore's urban and transport strategy allowed the users to have pro-transit "carrots" matching auto-restraint "sticks",[3] and as a result, despite having one of the highest per capita incomes in Asia, 32% of Singaporean households owned cars in 2010.

[4] The ALS was first formulated and designed in 1973, under the leadership of a high level inter-ministerial committee, which recommended policies and measures to improve the urban transport situation back then.

In the first few years after the introduction of the ALS, passenger cars having four or more occupants, taxis, public buses and service vehicles were allowed into the zone without being charged.

For reason of traffic management, violating vehicles were not stopped at the gantries, but their number plates were taken down and their owner would receive an order to appear in court to pay the fine.

Prior to the end of the ALS and the beginning of Electronic Road Pricing (which rendered manual checks obsolete), 105 such officers were deployed.

[11] In 1995, congestion pricing was also implemented in urban segments of three major expressways, starting with the East Coast Parkway (ECP).

After about 10 years of planning and testing, in September 1998, the Area Licensing Scheme was terminated as Singapore upgraded to the current Electronic Road Pricing system, which is completely automatic and allows passing the control gantries at normal speeds.