While global usage is divided it seems that within particular countries usage can be quite uniform, e.g. Indonesia uses toll=yes while the Philippines prefer fee=yes.
Which of the two tags do you generally find more fitting?
toll=* is documented as indicating “that a fee must be paid by general traffic to use a road, road bridge or road tunnel”. Focuses on roads, with no mention of ferries.
fee=* is documented as specifying “the nature of any fee for entry, access, service, use, or otherwise.” Interestingly, this documentation suggests toll for ferries:
I am not a native english speaker so this is more a guessing (and loking up in an older Oxford dictionary) than a knowing.
For british english toll seems to be the correct word (charge payable for permission to pass barrier or use bridge or road etc)
fee: sum payable to official or professional person etc. for services; charge esp. for instruction at school or entrance for examination etc; (and more meanings that have nothing to do with the question)
How is it in american english? Is there fee more common?
Anyway we should have one value and I voted for toll.
I think it probably depends on the type of ferry. For me, “toll” would apply to ferries that run at frequent intervals, often across relatively short spans of water, and where the payment amount is a relatively small sum. I’d consider these “commuter ferries”. An example is the Torpoint Ferry and they actually call their charge a toll: https://www.tamarcrossings.org.uk/prices/torpoint-ferry-tolls/
For larger, or less frequent ferry routes, where the fare is much more, e.g., the Isle of Man ferries, toll doesn’t seem right. You purchase a ticket, for the service of being transported (just as with a train or an aeroplane) rather than pay a toll.
My understanding of typical usage on roads in the US is as follows:
toll=yes is for roads that drivers must pay to use every time
fee=yes is for roads that drivers pay for a duration-based permit to use, with which they can freely leave and return to the fee area within that duration
In the majority of cases, this means toll=yes goes on high-capacity thoroughfares, and fee=yes goes on parkland access roads. If we extend this definition to ferries, pretty much every paid ferry here would be toll=yes. Most of them are pay-per-use—I’m not aware of a ferry that operates on a duration-based permit system.
I understand the term toll to mean simply turn up and pay. Ferry fares can be like aeroplanes, based on date/time/demand and require advance booking which is more of a fare
Full agreement from my side. For those “commuter ferries” moving back and forth between 2 locations a traveller would have to pay a toll like for a bridge or similar. You just drive up to such location, wait for the ferry to come, get on board and pay your toll.
For long distance ferries you must buy a ticket like for a trip by plane or train and in man cases you must book a reservation in advance. For this travel service I think fee is the correct term.
Edit: Sorry @trigpoint I overlooked your post, saw just now you wrote the same thing with less words …
