Road toll plans for the West Midlands are set to be thrown out – and with them any chance of finding the £400 million needed to expand the Midland Metro tram system.
Council leaders of the region’s seven local authorities are expected to reject any form of congestion charging tomorrow.
The decision means that they are likely to lose out on huge funding from the Government’s Transport Innovation Fund, money that was reliant on the West Midlands agreeing to trial some form of road pricing.
The region is competing with Greater Manchester, which has already agreed to a road charging trial, for £2 billion from the fund.
It was suggested that motorists should be charged around £5 for travelling into city centres, using either roadside camera technology or spy-in-the-sky satellites.
But council leaders, who will meet tomorrow in Birmingham, have come to the conclusion that any scheme in the West Midlands would be too difficult to set up because of the sprawling nature of the region.
Wolverhampton City Council’s Roger Lawrence said: “We have always said there would be three pre-conditions to us agreeing to trial road pricing.
“The first is that public transport improvements should be in place before any scheme was initiated.
“The second is that it should be cutting edge technology and the third is that it should not involve the costs to run that the congestion charging scheme in London has incurred,” added Mr Lawrence.
The £388m scheme to expand the Metro would create 5,000 jobs but relies on the prospect of TIF cash and the setting up of a congestion charging trial – a pre-condition that has led council leaders to accuse the Government of blackmail.
14 Comments
Blackmail, nothing but blackmail. Unless the districts agree to an unpopular and totally unworkable congestion charging plan, the Government will not give us the funds we need to extend the Metro. Hobson’s choice, or what?
Excellent decision; keep cramming the cars in and we will all end up walking anyway. Trouble is there will be no unpolluted air to breath.
When the prime minister gives up his car for and goes to work on the bus or tram, I will think about doing the same myself, until then politicians have no right to try and bully us into using slow, inefficient and inconvenient public transport.
I believe the Midland Metro will do more harm than good, encouraging people to shop at Merry Hill rather than at traditional town centres. I certainly don’t see why I should pay a congestion charge to support something that onlya tiny minority would use.
And Dexey, trams cause pollution as well – they run on electricity which is generated in coal-burning power stations.
Perhaps now we can look at less grandiose transport schemes, particularly rail which is a genuine alternative to the car. Instead of spending hundreds of millions on hundreds of millions on Midland Metro, why not spend a few hundred thousand on a Parry People Mover link between Dudley Port and Dudley town centre? We could have a dozen small schemes like that for a fraction of the cost of the gimmicky Metro.
“And Dexey, trams cause pollution as well – they run on electricity which is generated in coal-burning power stations.”
Well, indeed, Boster but you don’t have to burn coal to make electricity.
Rail is an outmoded form of travel within urban areas. Regular, reasonable and attractive buses are what we need.
Don’t you worry though, you keep using your car and blaming the politicians for making you.
Boster’s right.
WEST MIDLANDS SEEK GOOD RICKSHAW AND TUK-TUK DRIVERS ? HILL-CLIMBING EXPERIENCE AN ADVANTAGE.
LONG TERM PROSPECTS. ALSO DONKEY AND CAMEL RAISERS FOR IMPORTANT FREIGHT MOVEMENTS?….
JOKE APART MOST OF THE TRAFFIC IS THROUGH-TRAFFIC.
WHY CAN’T WE IMPOSE SOMETHING LIKE THE LKW-MAUT IN GERMANY OR SWISS OR AUSTRIAN EQUIVALENTS OF TRAFFIC TAXES.THEY DO IT QUITE HAPPILY TO THE BRITS…
Good point Boster.
People need to realise that “public transport” is not a solution to everyone’s transport needs. More than likely, people go on about “make the buses better, then I’ll ditch the car” argument because they want OTHER people to ditch their cars first, which ain’t going to happen.
If everyone decided to leave their cars at home tomorrow and travel to work on all the buses, trains and trams in the country, there wouldn’t be enough room. Even if all the platforms were extended and bus lanes created on every main road, there still wouldn’t be enough room.
People need to live closer to where they work, or work closer to where they live. We’ve been pretending that it’s acceptable to work 20, 30, 50 miles away from where we live. People use any old excuse - “I’m a social worker so I can’t work near where I live” or “my partner walks to work - if I were to move, we’d both have to drive” but always seem to shirk the fact that the only answer is to stop travelling so much.
Leave it to market forces. As oil supplies dwindle, petrol will keep going up and up and eventually it will be cheaper to cut down driving and use our cars less. In the meantime, no Labour or Tory government will ever do anything to seriously challenge the status quo.
If people seriously want some action on the over dominance of the car in our lives - and the obesity, the road accidents, the anti-social behaviour and the air pollution they cause, then vote for the Green Party. That’s what I’m doing.
I think we should all travel on canal it would be nice to see the wonderful gardens at the back of peoples houses,a joyful ride especially if there are bars on the barges.
The council doing something right !!
Well a big pat on the back for you lot .
As for the tram I went on it when it first come out, and very good it was
I went into wolverhampton last week on the tram and I need some ANADIN EXTRA talk about loud, I will only ride on the tram if its a must unless the conductors are giving out ear plugs, I have heard of industrial deafness … But not tram deafness.
so if were not going to pay for the metro by road taxing what does our road tax pay for, now the price has shot up over the years and fuel prices too?
How come the Scots ar able to scrap toll roads and the Welsh are able to scrap parking fees at hospitals?
Am I missing something?
Bilstonian, you aren’t missing anything. The Welsh and the Scots can do these things because the English subsidise them. It was ever thus.
Yes we do subsidise the Scots and Welsh, but they can’t be blamed for everything. If our NHS didn’t waste so much money on smoking cessation officers, five-a-day co-ordinators and other stupid jobs, it would be able to provide free parking at our hospitals. You never know, there might even be some money left over to treat some patients.
My advice, if you are fit enough, is to park in the street outside the hospital (where legal, of course). If you won’t pay the parking charges, it takes away the incentive to install the machines.
if this comes to light for a congestion charge in Wolverhampton i hope that all our wages are going up and bus fairs going down I’m not paying 3.00 a day saver and get another 5.50 for a family so the misses goes and send the children to a nice nursery i dont think so i would rather move out of Wolverhampton than to take this BULL Horn. but i do feel sorry for the local trades it will kill off and any other company’s that gone away now making a come back they wont stay London is so big and vibrant that it can with stand anything but out side of London accept Manchester cant with stand this treatment we are the heart of the country and any one just passes though gets caught and the next other villages will be the next target for more traffic