The threshold for exemption from the London Congestion Charge is to be reduced from 100g/km to 75g/km.
From 1 July only cars and vans that emit less than 75g/km and are Euro V-compliant, or those that are pure electric vehicles, will be exempt from the charge. In a double blow to London’s motorists, the mayor of London, Boris Johnson, revealed a £10 increase in penalty charges - taking the fine up to £130 for late payment.
In a concession to motorists who have purchased a car on the basis of its charge exemption, however, Transport for London is to offer a ‘Sunset Period’ of three years. That means vehicles already registered for the Greener Vehicle Discount will have the waiver transferred to the new Ultra Low Emission Discount (ULED), guaranteeing their exemption until 24 June, 2016.
Currently no diesel-powered car or van is eligible for the ULED. TfL claims the move is to tackle the “increasing dieselisation” of vehicles operating in London. It says diesel car sales have grown from 10 per cent to 50 per cent in the last ten years, partly in reaction to low carbon incentives in the capital.
No vehicles that operate solely using a petrol engine will be eligible either. Only plug-in hybrids and range-extended electric vehicles, such as the Vauxhall Ampera and Chevrolet Volt will be exempt.
In a further announcement, it emerged motorists will no longer be able to pay the Congestion Charge in shops. The mayor’s office said that just six per cent of payments are made in such a way.
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One idea to cut congestion in London
One idea for cutting down on the amount of congestion in London is to actually try and keep it flowing at a steady rate. One very simple solution to this would be to cut down on the number of pedestrian crossings that keep springing up everywhere. If motorists have to keep stopping for these every 300 yards or so in some cases of course it's going to increase pollution as cars don't get a chance to get going and in most cases pedestrians don't even use them anyway!!!
about time councils and the government starting employing people who actually know something about traffic management which unquote clearly they are doing at present.
i agree that manufacturers should be looking at cutting pollution in vehicles but how about charging motorcyclists as well as they actually put out way more pollutants than cars and vans in some cases upto a 1000% more. I am not necessarily talking about the CO2 but all the other things. I was amazed by this too as people buy these believing them to be cleaner, but having seen a piece on Mythbusters a while ago on this very thing it showed cars as being far, far cleaner in this respect.
So what happens if....
OK so some of us bought low emissions vehicles to get the congestion charge discount... goalpost moving day was always going to happen - it's the government, they did it to motorcycles with free parking when they realised there were revenues to be had. Regardless of that, if you have a car which is currently registered for the discount, you will supposedly continue to benefit from the discount until 2016, so, will these 'registered' cars gain some temporary intrinsic value now, only for residuals to be crucified in 3yrs time? One interesting scenario will be what happens when a registered vehicle is written off - is an insurance Co. going to have to cough for the balance of any congestion charging discount factored into the 'value' ? Just curious as presumably, once it's gone, it's gone...
The Rest
When is Boris going to apply the same to his dirty, smelly and noisey buses. For that matter, the same applies to taxis!