Was it only three years ago that transportation minister Kevin Falcon all but ruled out new driver taxes, such as a vehicle levy?

How times change.

Back then, in late 2005, the minister was crushing tentative suggestions from some gutsy mayors that the idea deserved a fresh look.

The original $75-a-year vehicle levy still stands as TransLink's most hated move ever. Proposed in the late 1990s to finance the new authority, it was ultimately scuttled early in 2001 by the then-NDP government after a massive public outcry.

The minister's response to reviving it?

"I cannot think of any circumstances in which I'd entertain a vehicle levy," Falcon told me in 2005. "As long as I am the minister, I'm not imposing new taxes on the public."

He went on to say that if Lower Mainland residents were clamouring for such a levy he'd have to consider it. But he couldn't imagine that happening.

For a while, the anti-tax Kevinator stayed true to form. He nuked TransLink's replacement for the vehicle levy – the parking stall tax that outraged area businesses.

But the no-new-taxes mantra has been on mute ever since Premier Gordon Campbell pushed ahead with the carbon tax in 2008.

And Falcon himself, in remaking TransLink, provided the authority the power to raise fuel taxes in the region by another three cents a litre.

There's also every expectation that a vehicle levy and likely a clutch of other new fees and taxes will soon be pursued by TransLink.

It needs a minimum of $150 million more annually to maintain the system as it is now, and $300 to $500 million more to carry out the big, ambitious expansion the growing region sorely needs, particularly if the premier is serious about B.C.'s contribution to fighting climate change.

The first glimpse of the list of new revenue sources under consideration came a few weeks back.

It included hot-button ideas like a cellphone levy.

Other possibilities range from a new hotel room tax for TransLink, to extra charges to build new developments, or a cut of the property transfer tax collected by the province on most real estate transactions.

Also on the list are a variety of possible road tolls and – drumroll, please – a new vehicle levy.

The levy this time could be $100 per vehicle per year, internal TransLink documents suggest, generating about $140 million.

And even minister Falcon is laying the groundwork to give it his blessing.

Several weeks ago he said he might be able to support a car levy that acts as a "value proposition." In other words, everybody who owns a car would have to pay the annual fee, but they'd get something in return – most likely some sort of limited transit pass or credit toward use of the transit system.

That, he told me, would make it more than "just a cash grab."

A sweetener, in other words, to help the medicine go down.

So the stage is being set, albeit cautiously, for Victoria to agree to new taxes for TransLink.

But it will be a delicate dance between the province and area mayors, who will vote next summer to approve or reject what's proposed by TransLink's unelected board, after intense public consultation.

The mayors and their approval for any new taxes is the thin veil that shields Falcon's new TransLink from complaints of taxation without representation.

The devious construction also ensures Victoria can shovel blame at the mayors, regardless of whether they shoot down tax hikes and condemn the region to a perma-crippled transit system, or authorize an unprecedented new pillaging of local wallets.

A third scenario is that the mayors walk away and refuse to play the game. That could force minister Falcon, who rebuilt TransLink largely because he said the previous locally elected reps were dysfunctional, to take direct responsibility for taxation decisions and the results.

Either way, 2009 will be a turning point for the future of TransLink.