Whilst it's difficult to object to the LEZ in principle - after all, who would not want to see London's air become cleaner - the problem with the current scheme is that it will fail to achieve what it claims it will. If you really wanted to make a difference to air quality you'd charge cars as well as trucks, but because it's not politically expedient to do so (what with car drivers being voters) they are left out.
To add to that, no-one is tremendously sure of the cost of monitoring the scheme versus potential revenues and in the likely event there's shortfall it's going to be Londoners picking up the tab.
In the meantime the road haulage industry gets left to pick its way through the muddled thinking behind it. Yes, trucks should be as clean as possible, and, oh look, the vast majority are. OK so the LEZ may help clean up a small proportion of the remainder, but if they belong to a big fleet chances are they, and their pollution, will be shifted somewhere else. A nice gift from Ken to the good people of Birmingham for instance.
Will it shift freight to other modes? Unlikely. Given that the vast majority of big fleets (which move the vast majority of freight in the capital) will be LEZ compliant anyway there's no reason to shift goods to a barge or what have you.

Posted by: Dom | February 5, 2008 9:49 AM