How much would you pay to drive to work?

YOU'RE driving home from work, singing along to Dire Straits at the top of your voice, when your car butts in. How much, it asks, are you willing to pay to drive to work tomorrow? Would you like to register your bid?

But it's not the talking car that raises eyebrows. After all, we've all seen 1980s TV show Knight Rider. It's the idea of bidding to drive on the roads. But this could be the shape of things to come, according to a scientific think-tank.

Daily auctions of road space is one of the ideas contained in the Foresight report, the result of a year-long study by transport experts. But while it may sound far-fetched, the technology to make it happen is not that far away, according to the lead expert, Phil Blythe, professor of transport at Newcastle University.

"It sounds wacky but it is a way of showing how we can manage traffic demand through pricing," he says. "The idea is you put a limit on the number of people using the road, and people bid what they're willing to pay.

"The lowest bids are not allowed to use the road, and the others pay the minimum successful bid. In the future we may have to do that, and with new technology it will be possible."

The idea of road auctions is one of the proposals to try and ease congestion, already at near-intolerable levels on some roads and forecast to grow, and in the long-term could be a more realistic prospect than congestion charging.

Although the introduction of the charge has cut the amount of traffic in central London, Mayor Ken Livingstone was forced to raise it from £5 to £8 last year when the number of vehicles began to creep up again. Prior to the London charge, Durham became the first city in the country to introduce a congestion charge in 2002, with a £2 toll to use the Saddler Street route to the city's castle and cathedral. Since then, the Government has awarded £350,000 to investigate the possibility of further road pricing in Durham City. But while congestion charging is likely to become more widespread over the next few years, the disadvantage is that it cannot control how many cars use a particular road, and so is no guarantee against congestion.

As long as drivers are prepared to pay, they will continue to use their vehicles.

"We're getting to the point where there are too many cars on the road," says Prof Blythe. "That is creating extra pollution and is wasting time when you could be doing something else.

"Transport networks are becoming less efficient because of congestion, and we need to look at ways of addressing that."

Auctions too have their disadvantages, taking no account of need to travel, ability to pay or the alternatives available, but they are just one of the options.

The Foresight report is one of two produced for the Government every year, each looking at a different subject and covering the possible developments in science and technology over the next 50 years. The idea is to ensure action is taken now to invest in and harness the benefits of the technology.

The study also looked at the possibility of a self-driving car, where you get in, tell it your destination and sit back and enjoy the ride. It may sound a daunting prospect for more control-freak drivers, but we may come to accept it.

"We gradually accept new technology. ABS brakes take control of braking away from you and when they first came in there was an outcry, but now you wouldn't buy a car without it," says Prof Blythe. "About 40 per cent of a vehicle is now computer processing, and a lot of cars now have 50-60 processors."

Even if we still drive our cars, the technology is not too far away to warn us when we are getting too close to the cars in front, if we're drifting out of lane or if we're going to overtake and moving into the path of another car.

Prof Blythe says more work also needs to be done on alternative fuel sources, with even battery or hydrogen-powered cars relying on electricity which may itself not be clean, and on the manufacture of cars themselves, to consume fewer resources. But in the end these things may only happen if consumers become more aware of climate change and start demanding cleaner cars.

But it is the difficulties caused by too many cars on the road which presents the most pressing problems. As well as auctions for road space, we may have to buy our parking places in advance or hire a car by the day instead of owning one outright. Public transport may become more individual, with buses picking us up from outside our front doors and taking us direct to our destination.

"If we don't make some fundamental decisions soon about where we want to be in the future, we could have a pretty tough time," says Prof Blythe. "If we allow congestion to continue it could take four times as long to get to work. The challenge is getting investment into intelligent infrastructure so we can provide people with the information they need to travel, so they can see the alternatives and see the benefits.

"If the message gets across I think people are willing to change how to do things, and if they are given an easy way of doing them then maybe it could happen."