The London 'Toxicity Charge' / 'T-charge' / Ultra-Low Emission Zone (ULEZ)

pegging so much

kinky

A standard talking point on this is Big Petrol V8 Supercar/SUV is allowed, Small 2012 Diesel Hatchback isn't, therefore it's entirely arbitrary and nothing to do with pollution.

Are people really so unaware of how filthy diesel engines are, or is this just a pose?

IMO Teslas should also be charged same as a diesel. I think they made a mistake branding it on 'emissions' (Or musk bros did a good job on branding anti-emissions)

I’m sad about the ulez expansion as it means I’ve taken my lovely Citroen BX GTi 16v off the road- and as I only ever use it for leaving London rather than local trips, it seems a bit unfair as I’d be charged the same to drive to the m11 as I would be if I was chugging round inside the zone all day.
Plus running an older car rather than buying a new one is, I am guessing, a much lower carbon footprint overall.
But I guess on a societal level it’s worth it and I should stop being selfish!

The drivers of under-serviced diesel-engined vehicles never see the puff of black smoke PM10/PM2.5 their vehicles emit with every press of the accelerator.

There have been loads of articles about the ULEZ in the Standard. Here are some, including some of the Standard trying to do its best to find angles for negative write-ups:

https://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/stealth-tax-londoners-react-ulez-expansion-b962415.html
https://www.standard.co.uk/news/transport/ulez-expansion-majority-motorists-unaware-tfl-london-b961959.html
https://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/ulez-expansion-london-congestion-pollution-charge-boundary-map-b962319.html
https://www.standard.co.uk/news/transport/ulez-expansion-delay-sadiq-khan-tfl-london-b961918.html

Our experience mirrors yours, we only use our car to drive out of London up the M11 and back to see family, local journeys are done on foot, bike and tube. So to avoid the charge we had to replace a petrol Toyota with a good 15 years of life left in it with a Suzuki from which we’ll do well to get another 10 years from. I appreciate that the emissions from the Suzuki will be lower but I can’t help think that, overall, the carbon trade off is negative.

BTW, the programme about cobalt mining in DRP after C4 news this week was an eye opener.

completely agree on this hence the newer cars. should be taxed (more) and EVs even more as they require local authority to install chargers, calling it an 'emissions' charge is a mistake

and it should then be extended to M25

The whole legal basis for it is the toxic air quality in inner London though. a "cars Amey doesn't like" charge would be annihilated in court I'd reckon.

Which is why the car bros I mentioned upthread are confused. They live in constant fear that all the cars they like are going to be outlawed any second, and they're very confused the ULEZ charge is not that.

I'm not sure on what basis electric cars are exempt from the congestion charge though. It's not like they cause less congestion than other cars.

on the basis of lack of political will

On the basis it’s a good idea to replace ICE cars with EV, once this is done you start increasing the tax on EV?

It came in when EVs were rare and likely to be G-Wiz shaped and was a reasonable policy lever to pull to encourage those who do drive to get more sensible cars.

Now that EVs are mainstream and quite likely to be GBFO SUV shaped, it's extremely silly. It ends in 2025, which is far too late, but at least it's ending.

There are very few EVs that can take 5 large adults and a dog that haven’t gone for the SUV look

https://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/ulez-expansion-compliance-less-money-fines-tfl-b966901.html

£300m a year is 65,000 cars a day fewer than expected (or fewer people being fined). How many were they expecting???

The article misquotes the expectation as 130,000, which was the number of non-compliant vehicles in the zone shortly before it started.

It's about emissions and getting cleaner air though, not so much about CARbon (that's carbon bound up in car production and use). You could trade for a cleaner running used car rather than a new car and you're in the same boat (car), essentially, without needing to pay emissions charges to use it.

I had a quick look at rentals and if I rented a car for 5 weekends a year it would cost more than owning my car. At least owning my car, I can store stuff in it like my bike boxes, in off-street parking.

If it did fail ULEZ rules though I'd get rid of it (and maybe swap it for a van to store even more bike shit in haha).

May not be representative of what's happening across London but I've noticed when I cross into the ULEZ boundary at East sheen (crossing upper Richmond road and into the high street) the roads seem quite a bit quieter than they used to pre-ULEZ. It's probably a complex picture overall but is that what's happening elsewhere?

I'm on lower Richmond road. Absolutely no noticeable difference. It's bumper to bumper the full length of the road every morning and evening.

Disappointing to see ULEZ being cited as a reason for the Uxbridge bi election result. Kind of feel it represents why climate/ pollution based policies are not more radical generally - politicians fear electoral failure and are over cautious, meaning the difficult decisions are not made. We need better leadership, a more sophisticated, and well informed democratic process.

Ironic given ULEZ was originally introduced by BJ and Shapps made expanding ULEZ a condition of providing financial support to TFL during covid.

@andyp take note

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^ this is why I ride 29+ on NCN21

lol

What a twat.

I joined a Facebook anti-ULEZ group after seeing a bonkers screenshot and fuck me they’ve lost their minds! So many imaginary journeys with coming close to getting the point then veering wildly away.