National Press Waking Up to ULEZ Impact

Posted on December 10, 2018 by Freedom for Drivers Foundation

The Daily Mail ran a story on the 9^th December spelling out the enormous impact that the Ultra Low Emission Zone (ULEZ) will have on drivers in London. They suggest a million motorists will be paying £12.50 every day once the ULEZ zone is expanded to within the North/South Circular. This could generate as much as £700 million to £1.5 billion a year in revenues for Transport for London (TfL) they also suggested. See the Mail story here (it was also covered by the Sun and the Times newspapers): https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6476639/Londons-new-ultra-low-emission-zone-force-million-motorists-pay-12-50-day.html

But their figures probably do not take into the real impact because TfL have been misleading people about which vehicles will be exempt – see our previous blog article here on that: https://freedomfordrivers.blog/2018/12/07/press-release-uk-drivers-sleepwalking-into-macron-style-taxes-on-eco-hatchbacks/

Roger Lawson

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Crossrail – Late and Over Budget As Forecast

Posted on December 10, 2018 by Freedom for Drivers Foundation

Crossrail, that mega-project to link east and west London, is running late and needs more funding to cover the cost. It was supposed to open as the “Elizabeth Line” this week, but it was announced in October that it would be delayed until at least Autumn 2019 and according to a report in the Financial Times: “a number of people close to the project now believe it may not be ready until late 2020”.

After an extra £590m in July and a further £350m was granted to the project in October the cost of the scheme is now expected to be £15.8 billion. But it looks like even more money is probably going to be required.

It’s interesting to look back at what I wrote about this project in October 2004 – yes I have been writing on London transport issues for that long. This is some of what I published then when the forecast cost was only £10 billion, give or take a few billion: “The project review document [from the DfT] actually suggests the real “Net Present Value Cost” may be somewhat less at £8 billion after taking account of contributions from the business community of over £2 billion and other adjustments but that is still an enormous cost. In other words, instead of showing a positive return on the investment, it will show a gigantic loss. To give you some idea of the scale, assuming Londoners are primarily going to pay for it one way or another (through higher public transport fares, as is one suggestion, or through taxes), that means that it will cost London households as much as £3,000 each after taking into account the benefits they gain – so the real cash cost is even higher.

Of course it also ignores the risk that such large projects typically overrun on costs, and that fare revenue is often less than forecast, so the chance of the budget being adhered to is also fairly remote.

One reason why it loses money apparently is because only about a third of trips on the new line would represent new public transport trips – the rest are simply diversions from other rail or bus journeys so there is little financial advantage. But the costs above take into account the time saved by passengers on more convenient trips.

Only Ken Livingstone could have sold this financially disastrous project to the government. Anyone who is familiar with basic economics and capital project evaluation would immediately see that it is fundamentally financially unsound. Any project with a negative Net Present Value like this one would never even be looked at in a commercial environment. One can understand exactly why previous governments over the last 30 years have consistently shelved such a project).”

Well at least I forecast the likely failure to meet even the enormous budget then planned. But it just shows what typically happens with rail projects where construction is very expensive and complex when compared with building roads.

Note that Members of the London Assembly have accused Sadiq Khan of misleading them and the public over the delays to Crossrail and that the delays are due to his mismanagement. He only announced it at the end of August when it is alleged that he knew about it earlier. I wonder when a new opening date will be announced. He’s probably hoping it will before his re-election campaign commences in 2020.

Postscript: A KPMG report has suggested that as much as an extra £2 billion will be required to complete the project. When the Mayor was asked on television if he could give assurances as to when it would be complete and for how much, he said “no”.

Roger Lawson

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Drivers_London

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Press Release: UK Drivers Sleepwalking Into Macron Style Taxes On Eco Hatchbacks

Posted on December 7, 2018 by Freedom for Drivers Foundation

Modest three years old ‘eco branded’ family hatchbacks will soon be effectively banned from inside the London North and South Circular roads. That approach will likely be copied in cities and towns across the UK:

Owners of many just over three years old top selling diesel hatchbacks branded ‘eco’ or ‘blue’ will soon wake up to a shock as huge charges will effectively ban cars from towns and cities including some 2015 registered ‘Eco’ or ‘Blue’ branded Fiestas, Focus, Golfs, Corsas, Astras etc (see list below). When these charges are imposed owners will see their cars plummet in value.

Many people think that as they don’t drive in London, or that they drive newish ‘eco’ cars, this won’t affect them. They are wrong. The UK Government have given powers to local authorities to introduce emissions-based charges pretty much at their whim and with no justification.

Councils all over the UK are looking to copy Sadiq Khan’s lead, Manchester being well advanced in its plan. Values of the many affected cars, and even some that are not currently affected, will fall due to fear of future charges long before they even happen. If the government wish to avoid ‘Yellow Vest’ style protests they need to act now, remove such powers from local authorities and ban all such schemes.

Check your car here: https://tfl.gov.uk/modes/driving/ultra-low-emission-zone/vrm-checker-ulez

Here are just some of the cars falling foul of ULEZ charges:

2015 Citroen C3 Edition 1.6 Bluehdi 100 Edition 5dr 90bhp
2015 Citroen C4 1.6 e-HDi Airdream VTR+ Hatchback 5dr Diesel 115bhp
2015 Ford Fiesta 1.6 TDCi ECOnetic Style 5dr 94bhp
2015 Ford Focus 1.6 TDCi 115 Zetec 5dr 113bhp
2015 Fiat Panda 1.2 MULTIJET POP 5d 75 BHP
2015 Fiat 500 Lounge1.3 Multijet 3dr 95bhp
2015 Nissan Juke 1.5 ACENTA DCi 5 DOOR 110 BHP
2015 Renault Clio 1.5 dCi ECO Expression + 5dr 90bhp
2015 Toyota Auris 1.4 D-4D Excel (s/s) 5dr 90bhp
2015 Vauxhall Corsa 1.3CDTi Ecoflex Design 94BHP
2015 Vauxhall Astra 2.0 CDTi Ecoflex Elite 163 bhp
2015 Vauxhall Astra 1.6 CDTi 16V Ecoflex Design 5dr 108bhp
2014 VW Golf 1.6tdi estate 89 bhp and 108 bhp
2015 VW Golf hatch 1.6tdi Bluemotion tech S 104bhp
2015 VW Golf Bluemotion 1.6tdi estate 108bhp

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Fight Against Unfair Fines By Councils

Posted on November 2, 2018 by Freedom for Drivers Foundation

Have you ever received a PCN from a Local Council?

Did you believe the penalty was unfair? Did your appeal fail?

I am currently fighting Westminster Council against a PCN issued for Turning Left out of Denman Street into Shaftesbury Avenue, London. It transpires that in 2017 over 13,000 PCN’s were issued raising £700,000 despite the fact that it is illegal for councils to use such enforcement purely for fiscal reasons.

In my opinion this particular junction is badly signposted and is unfit for purpose for a number of reasons: –

There are only 4 signs indicating direction of travel, 2 of which are easily mistaken for “one way” signs the other 2 being a green arrow on traffic signals (see photos below). None of the signs are easily visible and green arrows not visible at all when lights on red. There are no advance warning signs, road markings or supplementary plates instructing ahead only.

Traffic is allowed to travel along Shaftesbury Ave in both directions, but not when exiting Denman St so there is no obvious reason for this restriction. On the nearby Gt. Russell St (a similar type of junction) where only 40 PCN’s were issued in 2017 there are signs clearly indicating no left or right turns so why not on Denman Street?

It is a fact that councils rely on motorists just to pay the fine, and apart from the appeals system there is no way of questioning whether a junction is correctly signposted. This is just one example of how councils make money by putting in artificial restrictions which are then badly signposted. Other examples in London that were reported on in August were the London Borough of Hackney where left turns off Mare Street in certain hours are banned, the closure of roads in Croydon around schools and in the City of London at Bank Junction, but there are no doubt lots of other examples around the country.

It’s time therefore for us motorists to get together and fight these unfair penalties, so if you have been fined at this junction or anywhere else where you feel there has been an injustice then please contact John Leak using this contact page (messages will be forwarded to me if you mention my name): https://www.freedomfordrivers.org/contact.htm

John Leak

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Denman Street Edited OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Shaun Bailey’s Policies on Transport

Posted on October 14, 2018 by Freedom for Drivers Foundation

The Conservative Party have selected Shaun Bailey as their candidate Mayor of London in 2020, when Sadiq Khan comes up for re-election. He has served on the London Assembly since May 2016, and previous to that was a youth worker and advisor to Prime Minister David Cameron. He gave a rousing speech at the recent Conservative Party conference.

But what are going to be his policies on transport? His campaign web site ( www.backbailey2020.com ) spells them out. We give a summary here. He intends to:

Invest in London’s transport to make sure there is more capacity and increased frequency of public transport to meet the needs of our growing city.
Put driverless trains on tracks – he will put driverless trains on tracks, so that hard working Londoners are no longer at the mercy of militant unions.
Protect the Freedom Pass – he will protect the Freedom Pass (no sensible politician would say otherwise surely).
He will get a grip on road maintenance, and will fight for more control over vehicle taxes to help fund the boroughs and get a grip on London’s potholes and road maintenance.
He will scrap the suburban driving tax, i.e. the costly expansion of the Ultra-Low Emission Zone, and use the money instead to fund a clean bus fleet, saving Londoners money and cleaning up the city’s air.

This looks a vote-winning agenda although I am not convinced that the Mayor should have control over vehicle taxes. This should be a national prerogative.

Roger Lawson

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Drivers_London

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ANPR Use in London – Big Brother in Operation

Posted on September 17, 2018 by Freedom for Drivers Foundation

A recent report on the Mayorwatch web site said that Transport for London (TfL) expects to take 21 million ANPR images each day to enforce the Congestion Charge and ULEZ zones. Expansion of the ULEZ to the North/South circular will require many more cameras not just on the border of the zone but within it to catch those who only drive within the ULEZ zone. TfL expects to catch as many as 138,000 cars/vans and lorries using automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) technology.

The police do have access to this system so you can see exactly how extensive the surveillance of the population of London will soon be. There will be an additional 2,172 cameras for the expanded ULEZ when London is already one of the most heavily populated areas in the world for surveillance cameras.

These extra ANPR images will cost a capital figure of £1.2 million to upgrade the server to connect to the National ANPR System and a further £555,000 per annum in support/maintenance costs to London’s Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime (MOPAC) – see https://www.london.gov.uk/what-we-do/mayors-office-policing-and-crime-mopac/governance-and-decision-making/mopac-decisions-0/anpr-nas-management-server

Comment: this is a typical result of the desire for road pricing and revenue raising – privacy just goes out the window.

Roger Lawson

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Joy Morrisey has the Right Ideas

Posted on September 9, 2018 by Freedom for Drivers Foundation

Joy Morrisey is on the Conservative short list to contest the next Mayoral election in London. She wrote an article for City AM last week (4/9/2018) that echoes much of what we have been saying about transport in London.

Firstly she attacked Sadiq Khan’s record on transport and the ballooning deficit in Transport for London (TfL). She suggests it is a priority to get operating costs under control and that a fresh approach is needed. Here’s an extract of what else she had to say:

“At present, it is not always clear what the current mayor’s plans are – “plans” would suggest that real thought had gone into the mistakes he keeps making and the promises he keeps breaking. But we can see the policies: Khan is trying to force motorists off the road, while squeezing as much money as possible out of those who need to drive.

The mayor’s intention to extend the Ultra-Low Emissions Zone (ULEZ) all the way out to the North and South Circulars in 2021 is a case in point.

Consider a family who live just outside the zone, who cannot afford to replace their old car, which they need to drive their kids to a school just inside the zone. They would pay £12.50 a day under Khan’s scheme. A pensioner who has to drive himself to, for example, Whipps Cross Hospital in Leytonstone would pay the same.

It gets worse. The cost of the infrastructure needed to cover this expanded area has been estimated at £780m.

That’s money that should be spent on genuinely improving London’s air quality. For example, £600m would pay for the replacement of 2,000 diesel buses with hybrid vehicles, which emit nearly 80 per cent less nitrogen dioxide.

We need to make it easier for Londoners to leave their car at home, but without punishing those who do drive for making an entirely rational and reasonable choice.

If I became mayor in 2020, I would scrap Khan’s unfair and ill-considered ULEZ expansion, and focus on more effective ways to improve both air quality and transport options in the capital, for all Londoners.

Londoners cannot afford another four years of a mayor guided by cheap headlines and misplaced ideology. Right now, we might be hopelessly lost on our journey towards better transport, but under a different mayor, London can find its direction again.”

All very sensible policies and surely a good basis for an election winning campaign. Let’s hope that she wins the nomination. The other candidates are Andrew Boff and Shaun Bailey

Let the best man/woman win. But more than one candidate suggests the Mayor needs more powers. Surely it’s more a case of Sadiq Khan not using the powers he already has effectively to improve the transport network, control crime, build more houses and improve the environment.

Roger Lawson

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Drivers_London

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Crossrail Delay and Sadiq Khan Balloon

Posted on September 2, 2018 by Freedom for Drivers Foundation

It has been announced that the opening of Crossrail is to be delayed until Autumn 2019. It was scheduled to open in December this year. This a major blow to transport plans for London as it was intended to provide a major improvement to public transport capacity across London, and provide correspondingly large revenue increases to Transport for London (TfL).

This could blow an even bigger hole in Mayor Sadiq Khan’s transport budget which was already heading for a deficit of £1 billion pounds in the current year. Crossrail was expected to contribute substantial revenue to TfL in the next financial year but that will now be much reduced. Falling passenger numbers, particularly on buses, and Khan’s inept promise to freeze London transport fares two years ago are the main causes of his budget problems. The promise on fares was a big factor in his election.

The Conservative party have suggested that there were no delays to the ten-year Crossrail project when they ran City Hall.

Mr Khan has also been under attack for his failure to tackle knife crime in London. The latest symptom of this was the launch of a balloon showing Khan in a bikini which emulated the one flown of Donald Trump in Parliament Square. Many people complained that Khan should not have given permission for that as there should have been respect for a foreign head of state and that dabbling in the affairs of other countries was not the role of the Mayor of London.

The latest balloon seems to also be a complaint about other aspects of Khan’s regime and his record on free speech. The organiser was Yanny Bruere who raised £60,000 in a crowdfunding campaign and apparently intends to continue to promote that Khan should be removed. See https://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/giant-sadiq-khan-baby-balloon-to-fly-over-london for more information or if you wish to comment.

Note that we have been very critical of Khan’s policies and in particular his “Mayor’s Transport Strategy” – see our campaign on that here: https://www.freedomfordrivers.org/against-mts.htm

It is undoubtedly the case that the Mayor’s Transport Strategy and his tax raising ULEZ proposals will not be changed unless he is removed from office by the electorate so supporting this initiative is surely worthwhile. Ridicule is a good a way as any of getting the message across that many people think Sadiq Kahn has demonstrated that he is the worst Mayor of London that we have yet had – and his predecessors were pretty poor. From car-hating Ken Livingstone to cycling fanatic Boris Johnson, none have shown much wisdom.

Directly elected Mayors in London have proved to be very dubious and the extent of their powers means that they have dictatorial control in effect. They are also impossible to remove. The current Mayor even wants to extend his powers over vehicle taxation, the surface rail network and in the planning area. Surely time to reconsider the governance structure in London and for the Government to take more direct control. Mrs Thatcher went so far as to abolish the previous left-wing dominated Greater London Council (GLC) in 1986. That got rid of Ken Livingstone but only temporarily. We now have another populist Mayor in Sadiq Khan who makes promises he cannot keep to win elections – just like Livingstone did. Perhaps you will recall the promise he made to solve traffic congestion with a “Congestion Charge” which naturally did not work. We get similar “gestures” from Sadiq Khan such as the ULEZ proposals which will not cure London’s air pollution problems but will impose very major costs on Londoners.

Time for central Government to intervene and ensure that whoever runs London is more representative of the overall electorate in the metropolis. No more dictators please. And time for Sadiq Khan to go!

Roger Lawson

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Drivers_London

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Projects With No Benefit – Rotherhithe Bridge and HS2

Posted on August 8, 2018 by Freedom for Drivers Foundation

When evaluating capital projects, it is wise to estimate the benefit/cost ratio (“BCR”), i.e. the likely value attached to the benefits divided by the overall costs. That is the best way to evaluate differing projects so one can pick the best ones. Those with a negative ratio are clearly not worth doing.

The DfT’s “Value for Money” guidance says a project will generally be regarded as “medium” value if the BCR is between 1.5 and 2; and “high” if it is above 2. The Eddington transport study of 2006 said the BCR for trunk roads was 4.66, local roads 4.23 and light rail schemes a measly 2.14. When there are so many possible projects that give high benefit/cost ratios, why bother with lesser ones? It’s just a misuse of public money to do so.

Transport for London (TfL) have published their response to the results of their public consultation on the proposed new Rotherhithe/Canary Wharf river crossing. This is a vanity project of the latest Mayor, rather like Boris’s “garden bridge” – it was covered in a previous blog post here: https://freedomfordrivers.blog/2017/11/11/new-thames-river-crossing-at-rotherhithe/

This bridge would only be useable by cyclists and pedestrians and the favourite plan now is for a bridge rather than a tunnel or a ferry. However the bridge would need to have a lifting section to allow for river traffic. How the bridge might be funded is still not clear (possible costs of well over £300 million for a “navigable” bridge was previously estimated including discounted running costs over the life of the bridge). The latest report simply says they are investigating a number of funding options.

More information on costs is given in this document: https://consultations.tfl.gov.uk/rivercrossings/rotherhithe-canarywharf/user_uploads/r2cw—background-to-consultation-report.pdf

When it comes to the benefit/cost ratio for the proposed bridge it is estimated to be between 0.7:1 to 1.97:1. In other words, it might actually be negative and will be unlikely to be a “high” return project. Even those figures assume very high usage of the bridge by cyclists and pedestrians but it is justified on the encouragement to cycling and walking that it would provide – and hence is consistent with the Mayor’s “healthy streets” policy.

In summary, this bridge is not justifiable in relation to other transport projects and knowing the Mayor’s budget problems it is simply unaffordable anyway. Time to kick it into the long grass surely before more money is wasted on it?

The latest report on this project from TfL is present here: https://consultations.tfl.gov.uk/rivercrossings/rotherhithe-canarywharf/

HS2

In comparison to the aforementioned bridge, the HS2 high-speed rail line is a mega-project of the first order. Likely cost is now more than £80 billion with major disruption in London and many other parts of the country. Local Transport Today (LTT) have published details of a leaked report by Paul Mansell, a Government-appointed advisor. It’s a very damning assessment of the value of the project. It seems his report was not shown to Government ministers before Parliament voted to proceed with the project.

Back in 2013, the benefit/cost ratio of HS2 was calculated by the Government to be 2.3. What it is now, after a major escalation in costs, is not at all clear. But it seems that the only justification for continuing with it is the possible boost to the economy that might be needed if a “hard” Brexit is the outcome.

Surely this is another project that should be canned sooner rather than later, simply because there are better things to spend the money on – and that includes not just railway lines.

It is of course fortunate that we have some benefit/cost information on the above two projects. TfL (and the Mayor of London) now often fail to provide such information. Figuring out whether the ULEZ scheme is worth doing for example is not easy. But in reality it’s wildly negative – see http://www.freedomfordrivers.org/Cost-of-the-ULEZ.pdf

It is unfortunately a symptom of the modern trend to make major public policy decisions on irrational grounds. They just need to sound appealing to a few segments of the population (preferably those who might vote for the politicians backing the proposals), when economics should be the key decision basis.

Roger Lawson

Twitter: https://twitter.com/Drivers_London

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Freedom for Drivers Foundation

Traffic and transport news

Category Archives: Financial and Taxes

National Press Waking Up to ULEZ Impact

Crossrail – Late and Over Budget As Forecast

Press Release: UK Drivers Sleepwalking Into Macron Style Taxes On Eco Hatchbacks

Fight Against Unfair Fines By Councils

Shaun Bailey’s Policies on Transport

ANPR Use in London – Big Brother in Operation

Joy Morrisey has the Right Ideas

Crossrail Delay and Sadiq Khan Balloon

Projects With No Benefit – Rotherhithe Bridge and HS2