ULEZ Checker
Comments
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Lots of could mights and maybes about this. I have no doubt that road pricing will exist at some point in the future and tbh I don't have a problem with it. I have no doubt that it is being investigated as a possibility.
But it's a pretty big jump (and clearly political) to say that it will be put in place if Khan wins anther term. I think its still a long way off and to be done properly it will likely end up a national scheme (maybe with tiered pricing for different areas/roads) so I think it's likely its not going to be within Khan or any Mayor's control.6 -
So road pricing and the low emissions scheme are two different things for two different purposes probably using two different technologies.Fortune 82nd Minute said:
You won't be tracked purely by cameras for road pricing purposes. They are there, if you like, to enforce it.seth plum said:
From your answer you seem to be saying the ULEZ scheme and Road pricing are two different things.Fortune 82nd Minute said:
ULEZ was a trojan horse because you need a ring of cameras to introduce road pricing. TfL now have them.seth plum said:
You mention ULEZ being a Trojan Horse for road pricing.Fortune 82nd Minute said:Post on the other ULEZ thread posted across to this one, not least because I'm amazed at how few people realise that Khan and his officials are working on intoducing a pay per mile charging scheme in London.
Yes, that's my understanding.O-Randy-Hunt said:Does anyone know if the ulez cameras will be the same ones used for project detroit?
This isn't the last ULEZ thread we were commenting on but on that one, I told you that ULEZ was the trojan house that Khan was using to introduce road pricing in London. A few people needless to say LOL but I knew for a fact a huge amount of work was going on in TFL on road pricing and the ULEZ cameras were the first step in the process.
There was a big article in the Telegraph recently confirming this work. Its called project Detroit as you say above.
Road pricing is probably the way road taxation will go as the amount of Fuel Duty collected by the government falls off a cliff over coming years. But most experts in the field argue that road pricing charges should be instead of the existing taxes.
But Khan can only make this pricing additional to existing taxation as he doesn't control national taxation.
So it's simple. If Khan is reelected, you will pay for every mile you drive in London if he has his way. And this will be additional to the existing VED and Fuel Duty you are already paying.
You have been warned!
I asked on the other thread if when this road pricing malarkey comes in, will that mean polluting vehicles will be let back in as it were, treated like every other vehicle?
As regards your question, polluting vehicles will continue to be able to be used if, as now, the owners pay ULEZ charge as currently happens. (Although see below)
But in addition they will also have to pay a pay per mile charge.
The research that is going on could lead to a highly sophisticated charging system. So, for example, anyone driving a non-compliant ULEZ vehicle or a SUV could be charged more per mile than someone driving a small electric car.
As I say, I accept road pricing is probably the long term solution to government revenue declining as cleaner vehicles become the norm (although zero emission vehicles will start to pay VED in 2025). But imposing this charges on top of existing Fuel Duty and VED charges doesn't seem fair to me.
I take your point about the camera infrastructure possibly having dual purposes.
I thought however Road pricing will have to have more intensive coverage.
For example I live inside the South Circular. If I get into my Ford Fiesta and drive to the big shopping complex at Charlton, and then drive home, are you suggesting there will be enough cameras to track me? I know all the back doubles.
You will actually also need to have some sort of "tracker" installed in your car. I'll be honest and say I don't know for certain what technology is under consideration but I do know that TfL were looking at having an app that you would have to install on your smart phone and turn on when you start driving. Anyone who didn't would, I assume, be caught by the cameras.
The technology for all this sounds futuristic but it's not actually as road pricing schemes already exist throughout the world.
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I can't make it any clearer. You interpret what I've said however you like.seth plum said:
So road pricing and the low emissions scheme are two different things for two different purposes probably using two different technologies.Fortune 82nd Minute said:
You won't be tracked purely by cameras for road pricing purposes. They are there, if you like, to enforce it.seth plum said:
From your answer you seem to be saying the ULEZ scheme and Road pricing are two different things.Fortune 82nd Minute said:
ULEZ was a trojan horse because you need a ring of cameras to introduce road pricing. TfL now have them.seth plum said:
You mention ULEZ being a Trojan Horse for road pricing.Fortune 82nd Minute said:Post on the other ULEZ thread posted across to this one, not least because I'm amazed at how few people realise that Khan and his officials are working on intoducing a pay per mile charging scheme in London.
Yes, that's my understanding.O-Randy-Hunt said:Does anyone know if the ulez cameras will be the same ones used for project detroit?
This isn't the last ULEZ thread we were commenting on but on that one, I told you that ULEZ was the trojan house that Khan was using to introduce road pricing in London. A few people needless to say LOL but I knew for a fact a huge amount of work was going on in TFL on road pricing and the ULEZ cameras were the first step in the process.
There was a big article in the Telegraph recently confirming this work. Its called project Detroit as you say above.
Road pricing is probably the way road taxation will go as the amount of Fuel Duty collected by the government falls off a cliff over coming years. But most experts in the field argue that road pricing charges should be instead of the existing taxes.
But Khan can only make this pricing additional to existing taxation as he doesn't control national taxation.
So it's simple. If Khan is reelected, you will pay for every mile you drive in London if he has his way. And this will be additional to the existing VED and Fuel Duty you are already paying.
You have been warned!
I asked on the other thread if when this road pricing malarkey comes in, will that mean polluting vehicles will be let back in as it were, treated like every other vehicle?
As regards your question, polluting vehicles will continue to be able to be used if, as now, the owners pay ULEZ charge as currently happens. (Although see below)
But in addition they will also have to pay a pay per mile charge.
The research that is going on could lead to a highly sophisticated charging system. So, for example, anyone driving a non-compliant ULEZ vehicle or a SUV could be charged more per mile than someone driving a small electric car.
As I say, I accept road pricing is probably the long term solution to government revenue declining as cleaner vehicles become the norm (although zero emission vehicles will start to pay VED in 2025). But imposing this charges on top of existing Fuel Duty and VED charges doesn't seem fair to me.
I take your point about the camera infrastructure possibly having dual purposes.
I thought however Road pricing will have to have more intensive coverage.
For example I live inside the South Circular. If I get into my Ford Fiesta and drive to the big shopping complex at Charlton, and then drive home, are you suggesting there will be enough cameras to track me? I know all the back doubles.
You will actually also need to have some sort of "tracker" installed in your car. I'll be honest and say I don't know for certain what technology is under consideration but I do know that TfL were looking at having an app that you would have to install on your smart phone and turn on when you start driving. Anyone who didn't would, I assume, be caught by the cameras.
The technology for all this sounds futuristic but it's not actually as road pricing schemes already exist throughout the world.
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I know bringing politics into things is frowned upon now but this is inextricably linked to politics. What we appear to have here is the Tory press saying that a Tory politician (Peter Fortune) is telling the truth (despite it being pure speculation) and that a Labour politician (Khan) is lying (despite explicit statements from Khan to the contrary and FOI requests providing no evidence of Fortune's claims). And this must be set in the context of the Uxbridge by-election where the Tories suddenly realised that the whole ULEZ/road charging topic is a potential vote winner for them.Fortune 82nd Minute said:And here's the Telegraph article.Sadiq Khan investing £150m in ‘secret’ technology that could deliver pay-per-mile road charging
London Mayor employing 157 staff on TfL scheme amid claims he is stepping up war on motorists
Sadiq Khan is investing £150 million on a “secret” technology project capable of charging motorists a pay-per-mile road tax, The Telegraph can reveal.
The scheme, called Project Detroit, was set up by Transport for London (TfL) to create a “more sophisticated… new core technology platform for road-user charging”.
A series of Freedom of Information (FoI) requests show 157 staff are now working solely on the scheme, with some engineers being paid more than £100,000 a year.
In total £21 million has already been spent on the project, which started in 2021, but the “platform has an estimated final cost of between £130 million to £150 million”.
But Conservatives at City Hall claim Project Detroit, which is creating a single “road user charging” platform for the congestion charge, Ultra Low Emission zone (Ulez) and Low Emission Zone, could be used to introduce a charge based on the distance driven in cars within London.
One FoI response from TFL says: “The Detroit platform has the capability to be extended and we will be looking to build the system flexibly so that other forms of charging based on distance, vehicle type, etc could be catered for if a decision was made in future to do so.”
In 2018, the mayor’s Transport Strategy said an “integrated pay-per-mile charge could replace pre-existing schemes”, such as the congestion charge.
However, the furore over the expansion of Ulez and claims Labour is waging a “war on motorists” saw the mayor recently insist he would not introduce a pay-per-mile tax on cars in the capital.
Third term
Peter Fortune, the Conservative London Assembly Member for Bexley and Bromley, insisted that Project Detroit paves the way for pay-per-mile charging.
“Sadiq Khan can deny it all he wants but it’s pretty clear he plans to introduce pay-per-mile road-user charges for every motorist if he wins a third term,” he said.
“He has a history of saying one thing and doing the opposite. Remember he told us he wouldn’t expand Ulez, then did precisely that.
“Sadiq Khan relies on road-user charges to plug the black hole in TfL finances.Motorists will pay TfL one billion in ULEZ and other road user charges this year
“As the number of non-Ulez compliant vehicles inevitably falls, he’ll need to find new sources of revenue. He recently confirmed plans to charge motorists at least £123 million annually from 2025 for using the Blackwall and Silvertown tunnels.
TfL income
“Pay-per-mile is next in providing a steady source of income for TfL.
“He has confirmed TfL is developing new technology to integrate Ulez, congestion and other charges into a single payment. Charging motorists for each mile they drive won’t be difficult once this technology is in place.”
The latest FoI responses from TfL show how 41 of the 157 staff dedicated to the scheme are permanent. Of those, three are Band 4 employees earning between £76,000 and £111,800, a further 33 are in Band 3 paid between £58,300 and £85,8000, while five are on Band 2 wages, earning between £51,000 and £75,700. Meanwhile, 89 are “third-party consultants”.
The number of staff working on the scheme, begun in 2021, has increased from 97 in December 2022 to its current 157.
Ruled out
Mr Fortune added: “I know the team includes experts working on a pay-per-mile road-user charging scheme. It’s a very secretive project. I asked to visit the project team last year. I’m still waiting for an invite. ”
Asked to release “any correspondence sent to the mayor” regarding Project Detroit, TfL’s FoI team replied: “We do not hold any correspondence sent to the mayor during the requested period in which Project Detroit is referred to.”
A TfL spokesperson said: “Any work carried out or staff hired as part of Project Detroit has been in relation to TfL’s existing road-user charging schemes.
“This was part of TfL’s wider work to bring in-house the currently outsourced system for which the contract expires in 2026.
“Pay-per-mile charging has been ruled out by the mayor and no such scheme is on the table or being developed.”
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By the way, ignore the bit about scheme having been ruled out. I spent a lifetime as a civil servant seeing such things (indeed sometimes writing them!) only for 6 months later seeing that conditions had now changed and although there were no plans at the time we said it, there are now because of those changed conditions!12 -
Spot on. The old anti-Khan lobby is having a field day with this, with no proof at all that Khan is somehow poised to extort millions out of unsuspecting motorists. It's utter nonsense.cantersaddick said:Lots of could mights and maybes about this. I have no doubt that road pricing will exist at some point in the future and tbh I don't have a problem with it. I have no doubt that it is being investigated as a possibility.
But it's a pretty big jump (and clearly political) to say that it will be put in place if Khan wins anther term. I think its still a long way off and to be done properly it will likely end up a national scheme (maybe with tiered pricing for different areas/roads) so I think it's likely its not going to be within Khan or any Mayor's control.
Having said that, road pricing may well come in eventually, and I certainly wouldn't be against it. The current system involves people who use the car once a month being charged the same as someone using the car every day, which is utterly crazy and unsustainable.
Enough of the anti-Khan propaganda/hysteria already!
'And this must be set in the context of the Uxbridge by-election where the Tories suddenly realised that the whole ULEZ/road charging topic is a potential vote winner for them.' - Well that turned out to be a damp squib!7 -
So my quick takeaway from this is that a few days ago you were heavily involved in a thread bemoaning any political content on the main forum, and indeed keen to see the HoC remain closed.Fortune 82nd Minute said:And here's the Telegraph article.Sadiq Khan investing £150m in ‘secret’ technology that could deliver pay-per-mile road charging
London Mayor employing 157 staff on TfL scheme amid claims he is stepping up war on motorists
Sadiq Khan is investing £150 million on a “secret” technology project capable of charging motorists a pay-per-mile road tax, The Telegraph can reveal.
The scheme, called Project Detroit, was set up by Transport for London (TfL) to create a “more sophisticated… new core technology platform for road-user charging”.
A series of Freedom of Information (FoI) requests show 157 staff are now working solely on the scheme, with some engineers being paid more than £100,000 a year.
In total £21 million has already been spent on the project, which started in 2021, but the “platform has an estimated final cost of between £130 million to £150 million”.
But Conservatives at City Hall claim Project Detroit, which is creating a single “road user charging” platform for the congestion charge, Ultra Low Emission zone (Ulez) and Low Emission Zone, could be used to introduce a charge based on the distance driven in cars within London.
One FoI response from TFL says: “The Detroit platform has the capability to be extended and we will be looking to build the system flexibly so that other forms of charging based on distance, vehicle type, etc could be catered for if a decision was made in future to do so.”
In 2018, the mayor’s Transport Strategy said an “integrated pay-per-mile charge could replace pre-existing schemes”, such as the congestion charge.
However, the furore over the expansion of Ulez and claims Labour is waging a “war on motorists” saw the mayor recently insist he would not introduce a pay-per-mile tax on cars in the capital.
Third term
Peter Fortune, the Conservative London Assembly Member for Bexley and Bromley, insisted that Project Detroit paves the way for pay-per-mile charging.
“Sadiq Khan can deny it all he wants but it’s pretty clear he plans to introduce pay-per-mile road-user charges for every motorist if he wins a third term,” he said.
“He has a history of saying one thing and doing the opposite. Remember he told us he wouldn’t expand Ulez, then did precisely that.
“Sadiq Khan relies on road-user charges to plug the black hole in TfL finances.Motorists will pay TfL one billion in ULEZ and other road user charges this year
“As the number of non-Ulez compliant vehicles inevitably falls, he’ll need to find new sources of revenue. He recently confirmed plans to charge motorists at least £123 million annually from 2025 for using the Blackwall and Silvertown tunnels.
TfL income
“Pay-per-mile is next in providing a steady source of income for TfL.
“He has confirmed TfL is developing new technology to integrate Ulez, congestion and other charges into a single payment. Charging motorists for each mile they drive won’t be difficult once this technology is in place.”
The latest FoI responses from TfL show how 41 of the 157 staff dedicated to the scheme are permanent. Of those, three are Band 4 employees earning between £76,000 and £111,800, a further 33 are in Band 3 paid between £58,300 and £85,8000, while five are on Band 2 wages, earning between £51,000 and £75,700. Meanwhile, 89 are “third-party consultants”.
The number of staff working on the scheme, begun in 2021, has increased from 97 in December 2022 to its current 157.
Ruled out
Mr Fortune added: “I know the team includes experts working on a pay-per-mile road-user charging scheme. It’s a very secretive project. I asked to visit the project team last year. I’m still waiting for an invite. ”
Asked to release “any correspondence sent to the mayor” regarding Project Detroit, TfL’s FoI team replied: “We do not hold any correspondence sent to the mayor during the requested period in which Project Detroit is referred to.”
A TfL spokesperson said: “Any work carried out or staff hired as part of Project Detroit has been in relation to TfL’s existing road-user charging schemes.
“This was part of TfL’s wider work to bring in-house the currently outsourced system for which the contract expires in 2026.
“Pay-per-mile charging has been ruled out by the mayor and no such scheme is on the table or being developed.”
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By the way, ignore the bit about scheme having been ruled out. I spent a lifetime as a civil servant seeing such things (indeed sometimes writing them!) only for 6 months later seeing that conditions had now changed and although there were no plans at the time we said it, there are now because of those changed conditions!
Yet here we are discussing the upcoming mayoral elections, speculating about the motives of the incumbent and posting links to media which is overtly biased against both the mayor himself and this particular policy.
Hmm...
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This is a very real possibilty across the developed world. Europe has an extensive system already in place and think inevitably we'll see more of it here in time. So, given that, it makes sense to install a system now that could at a later date be adapted to facilitate future need.JamesSeed said:
Spot on. The old anti-Khan lobby is having a field day with this, with no proof at all that Khan is somehow poised to extort millions out of unsuspecting motorists. It's utter nonsense.cantersaddick said:Lots of could mights and maybes about this. I have no doubt that road pricing will exist at some point in the future and tbh I don't have a problem with it. I have no doubt that it is being investigated as a possibility.
But it's a pretty big jump (and clearly political) to say that it will be put in place if Khan wins anther term. I think its still a long way off and to be done properly it will likely end up a national scheme (maybe with tiered pricing for different areas/roads) so I think it's likely its not going to be within Khan or any Mayor's control.
Having said that, road pricing may well come in eventually, and I certainly wouldn't be against it. The current system involves people who use the car once a month being charged the same as someone using the car every day, which is utterly crazy and unsustainable.
Enough of the anti-Khan propaganda/hysteria already!
'And this must be set in the context of the Uxbridge by-election where the Tories suddenly realised that the whole ULEZ/road charging topic is a potential vote winner for them.' - Well that turned out to be a damp squib!
The alternative is to rip it all out in 5, 10, 15 years time and start from scratch I suppose but I'd rather not have my taxes spent on essentially the same thing twice if avoidable.2 -
It does come across as propaganda as 90% (I think 95% now) of cars are ULEZ except and people aren't as concerned about it. Phrases like secret trojan horses are going to get people's attention.3
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Well then he and Labour just need to deny it with very clear and unambiguous language from now until the elections to ensure his only motivation of clean air and is understood.JamesSeed said:
Spot on. The old anti-Khan lobby is having a field day with this, with no proof at all that Khan is somehow poised to extort millions out of unsuspecting motorists. It's utter nonsense.cantersaddick said:Lots of could mights and maybes about this. I have no doubt that road pricing will exist at some point in the future and tbh I don't have a problem with it. I have no doubt that it is being investigated as a possibility.
But it's a pretty big jump (and clearly political) to say that it will be put in place if Khan wins anther term. I think its still a long way off and to be done properly it will likely end up a national scheme (maybe with tiered pricing for different areas/roads) so I think it's likely its not going to be within Khan or any Mayor's control.
Having said that, road pricing may well come in eventually, and I certainly wouldn't be against it. The current system involves people who use the car once a month being charged the same as someone using the car every day, which is utterly crazy and unsustainable.
Enough of the anti-Khan propaganda/hysteria already!
'And this must be set in the context of the Uxbridge by-election where the Tories suddenly realised that the whole ULEZ/road charging topic is a potential vote winner for them.' - Well that turned out to be a damp squib!Say something often enough and eventually people will believe it.The problem is both sides will use imprecise language to give themselves wriggle room.Just (both sides) be clear and up front.2 -
What, likevalleynick66 said:
Well then he and Labour just need to deny it with very clear and unambiguous language from now until the elections to ensure his only motivation of clean air and is understood.JamesSeed said:
Spot on. The old anti-Khan lobby is having a field day with this, with no proof at all that Khan is somehow poised to extort millions out of unsuspecting motorists. It's utter nonsense.cantersaddick said:Lots of could mights and maybes about this. I have no doubt that road pricing will exist at some point in the future and tbh I don't have a problem with it. I have no doubt that it is being investigated as a possibility.
But it's a pretty big jump (and clearly political) to say that it will be put in place if Khan wins anther term. I think its still a long way off and to be done properly it will likely end up a national scheme (maybe with tiered pricing for different areas/roads) so I think it's likely its not going to be within Khan or any Mayor's control.
Having said that, road pricing may well come in eventually, and I certainly wouldn't be against it. The current system involves people who use the car once a month being charged the same as someone using the car every day, which is utterly crazy and unsustainable.
Enough of the anti-Khan propaganda/hysteria already!
'And this must be set in the context of the Uxbridge by-election where the Tories suddenly realised that the whole ULEZ/road charging topic is a potential vote winner for them.' - Well that turned out to be a damp squib!Say something often enough and eventually people will believe it.The problem is both sides will use imprecise language to give themselves wriggle room.Just (both sides) be clear and up front.
"A TfL spokesperson said: “Any work carried out or staff hired as part of Project Detroit has been in relation to TfL’s existing road-user charging schemes.“This was part of TfL’s wider work to bring in-house the currently outsourced system for which the contract expires in 2026.
“Pay-per-mile charging has been ruled out by the mayor and no such scheme is on the table or being developed.”
9 - Sponsored links:
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I can categorically call bullshit on that. I personally (and professionally) know a few of the Band 3, 4 & NPL staff involved in the project. Road pricing (specifically 'distance charging'....which is a get out for the term 'pay-per-mile') is very much part of the long term plan and is being built-in/future proofed to the 'in-house' system.Rizzo said:
What, likevalleynick66 said:
Well then he and Labour just need to deny it with very clear and unambiguous language from now until the elections to ensure his only motivation of clean air and is understood.JamesSeed said:
Spot on. The old anti-Khan lobby is having a field day with this, with no proof at all that Khan is somehow poised to extort millions out of unsuspecting motorists. It's utter nonsense.cantersaddick said:Lots of could mights and maybes about this. I have no doubt that road pricing will exist at some point in the future and tbh I don't have a problem with it. I have no doubt that it is being investigated as a possibility.
But it's a pretty big jump (and clearly political) to say that it will be put in place if Khan wins anther term. I think its still a long way off and to be done properly it will likely end up a national scheme (maybe with tiered pricing for different areas/roads) so I think it's likely its not going to be within Khan or any Mayor's control.
Having said that, road pricing may well come in eventually, and I certainly wouldn't be against it. The current system involves people who use the car once a month being charged the same as someone using the car every day, which is utterly crazy and unsustainable.
Enough of the anti-Khan propaganda/hysteria already!
'And this must be set in the context of the Uxbridge by-election where the Tories suddenly realised that the whole ULEZ/road charging topic is a potential vote winner for them.' - Well that turned out to be a damp squib!Say something often enough and eventually people will believe it.The problem is both sides will use imprecise language to give themselves wriggle room.Just (both sides) be clear and up front.
"A TfL spokesperson said: “Any work carried out or staff hired as part of Project Detroit has been in relation to TfL’s existing road-user charging schemes.“This was part of TfL’s wider work to bring in-house the currently outsourced system for which the contract expires in 2026.
“Pay-per-mile charging has been ruled out by the mayor and no such scheme is on the table or being developed.”
6 -
There's none so blind as those who cannot see.JamesSeed said:
Spot on. The old anti-Khan lobby is having a field day with this, with no proof at all that Khan is somehow poised to extort millions out of unsuspecting motorists. It's utter nonsense.cantersaddick said:Lots of could mights and maybes about this. I have no doubt that road pricing will exist at some point in the future and tbh I don't have a problem with it. I have no doubt that it is being investigated as a possibility.
But it's a pretty big jump (and clearly political) to say that it will be put in place if Khan wins anther term. I think its still a long way off and to be done properly it will likely end up a national scheme (maybe with tiered pricing for different areas/roads) so I think it's likely its not going to be within Khan or any Mayor's control.
Having said that, road pricing may well come in eventually, and I certainly wouldn't be against it. The current system involves people who use the car once a month being charged the same as someone using the car every day, which is utterly crazy and unsustainable.
Enough of the anti-Khan propaganda/hysteria already!
'And this must be set in the context of the Uxbridge by-election where the Tories suddenly realised that the whole ULEZ/road charging topic is a potential vote winner for them.' - Well that turned out to be a damp squib!5 -
No. As in deny / account for the evidence / comments to the contrary.Rizzo said:
What, likevalleynick66 said:
Well then he and Labour just need to deny it with very clear and unambiguous language from now until the elections to ensure his only motivation of clean air and is understood.JamesSeed said:
Spot on. The old anti-Khan lobby is having a field day with this, with no proof at all that Khan is somehow poised to extort millions out of unsuspecting motorists. It's utter nonsense.cantersaddick said:Lots of could mights and maybes about this. I have no doubt that road pricing will exist at some point in the future and tbh I don't have a problem with it. I have no doubt that it is being investigated as a possibility.
But it's a pretty big jump (and clearly political) to say that it will be put in place if Khan wins anther term. I think its still a long way off and to be done properly it will likely end up a national scheme (maybe with tiered pricing for different areas/roads) so I think it's likely its not going to be within Khan or any Mayor's control.
Having said that, road pricing may well come in eventually, and I certainly wouldn't be against it. The current system involves people who use the car once a month being charged the same as someone using the car every day, which is utterly crazy and unsustainable.
Enough of the anti-Khan propaganda/hysteria already!
'And this must be set in the context of the Uxbridge by-election where the Tories suddenly realised that the whole ULEZ/road charging topic is a potential vote winner for them.' - Well that turned out to be a damp squib!Say something often enough and eventually people will believe it.The problem is both sides will use imprecise language to give themselves wriggle room.Just (both sides) be clear and up front.
"A TfL spokesperson said: “Any work carried out or staff hired as part of Project Detroit has been in relation to TfL’s existing road-user charging schemes.“This was part of TfL’s wider work to bring in-house the currently outsourced system for which the contract expires in 2026.
“Pay-per-mile charging has been ruled out by the mayor and no such scheme is on the table or being developed.”
Deny or account for those.Likewise the other side need to say what they will do and how they will manage the financial impact.Let Londoners know the whole truth. Then we can vote with greater confidence.0 -
Not at all. I have consistently pointed out that UlLEZ is intrinsically linked with future plans for road pricing in London and it does no harm to publicise this fact.Bournemouth Addick said:
So my quick takeaway from this is that a few days ago you were heavily involved in a thread bemoaning any political content on the main forum, and indeed keen to see the HoC remain closed.Fortune 82nd Minute said:And here's the Telegraph article.Sadiq Khan investing £150m in ‘secret’ technology that could deliver pay-per-mile road charging
London Mayor employing 157 staff on TfL scheme amid claims he is stepping up war on motorists
Sadiq Khan is investing £150 million on a “secret” technology project capable of charging motorists a pay-per-mile road tax, The Telegraph can reveal.
The scheme, called Project Detroit, was set up by Transport for London (TfL) to create a “more sophisticated… new core technology platform for road-user charging”.
A series of Freedom of Information (FoI) requests show 157 staff are now working solely on the scheme, with some engineers being paid more than £100,000 a year.
In total £21 million has already been spent on the project, which started in 2021, but the “platform has an estimated final cost of between £130 million to £150 million”.
But Conservatives at City Hall claim Project Detroit, which is creating a single “road user charging” platform for the congestion charge, Ultra Low Emission zone (Ulez) and Low Emission Zone, could be used to introduce a charge based on the distance driven in cars within London.
One FoI response from TFL says: “The Detroit platform has the capability to be extended and we will be looking to build the system flexibly so that other forms of charging based on distance, vehicle type, etc could be catered for if a decision was made in future to do so.”
In 2018, the mayor’s Transport Strategy said an “integrated pay-per-mile charge could replace pre-existing schemes”, such as the congestion charge.
However, the furore over the expansion of Ulez and claims Labour is waging a “war on motorists” saw the mayor recently insist he would not introduce a pay-per-mile tax on cars in the capital.
Third term
Peter Fortune, the Conservative London Assembly Member for Bexley and Bromley, insisted that Project Detroit paves the way for pay-per-mile charging.
“Sadiq Khan can deny it all he wants but it’s pretty clear he plans to introduce pay-per-mile road-user charges for every motorist if he wins a third term,” he said.
“He has a history of saying one thing and doing the opposite. Remember he told us he wouldn’t expand Ulez, then did precisely that.
“Sadiq Khan relies on road-user charges to plug the black hole in TfL finances.Motorists will pay TfL one billion in ULEZ and other road user charges this year
“As the number of non-Ulez compliant vehicles inevitably falls, he’ll need to find new sources of revenue. He recently confirmed plans to charge motorists at least £123 million annually from 2025 for using the Blackwall and Silvertown tunnels.
TfL income
“Pay-per-mile is next in providing a steady source of income for TfL.
“He has confirmed TfL is developing new technology to integrate Ulez, congestion and other charges into a single payment. Charging motorists for each mile they drive won’t be difficult once this technology is in place.”
The latest FoI responses from TfL show how 41 of the 157 staff dedicated to the scheme are permanent. Of those, three are Band 4 employees earning between £76,000 and £111,800, a further 33 are in Band 3 paid between £58,300 and £85,8000, while five are on Band 2 wages, earning between £51,000 and £75,700. Meanwhile, 89 are “third-party consultants”.
The number of staff working on the scheme, begun in 2021, has increased from 97 in December 2022 to its current 157.
Ruled out
Mr Fortune added: “I know the team includes experts working on a pay-per-mile road-user charging scheme. It’s a very secretive project. I asked to visit the project team last year. I’m still waiting for an invite. ”
Asked to release “any correspondence sent to the mayor” regarding Project Detroit, TfL’s FoI team replied: “We do not hold any correspondence sent to the mayor during the requested period in which Project Detroit is referred to.”
A TfL spokesperson said: “Any work carried out or staff hired as part of Project Detroit has been in relation to TfL’s existing road-user charging schemes.
“This was part of TfL’s wider work to bring in-house the currently outsourced system for which the contract expires in 2026.
“Pay-per-mile charging has been ruled out by the mayor and no such scheme is on the table or being developed.”
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
By the way, ignore the bit about scheme having been ruled out. I spent a lifetime as a civil servant seeing such things (indeed sometimes writing them!) only for 6 months later seeing that conditions had now changed and although there were no plans at the time we said it, there are now because of those changed conditions!
Yet here we are discussing the upcoming mayoral elections, speculating about the motives of the incumbent and posting links to media which is overtly biased against both the mayor himself and this particular policy.
Hmm...
0 -
I thought the ULEZ and road pricing were not linked because you said there would need to be phone or car technology for road pricing to work. The ULEZ cameras are about the air pollution and no good for road pricing. I gave the example of me driving my Fiesta from Lee to Charlton.Fortune 82nd Minute said:
Not at all. I have consistently pointed out that UlLEZ is intrinsically linked with future plans for road pricing in London and it does no harm to publicise this fact.Bournemouth Addick said:
So my quick takeaway from this is that a few days ago you were heavily involved in a thread bemoaning any political content on the main forum, and indeed keen to see the HoC remain closed.Fortune 82nd Minute said:And here's the Telegraph article.Sadiq Khan investing £150m in ‘secret’ technology that could deliver pay-per-mile road charging
London Mayor employing 157 staff on TfL scheme amid claims he is stepping up war on motorists
Sadiq Khan is investing £150 million on a “secret” technology project capable of charging motorists a pay-per-mile road tax, The Telegraph can reveal.
The scheme, called Project Detroit, was set up by Transport for London (TfL) to create a “more sophisticated… new core technology platform for road-user charging”.
A series of Freedom of Information (FoI) requests show 157 staff are now working solely on the scheme, with some engineers being paid more than £100,000 a year.
In total £21 million has already been spent on the project, which started in 2021, but the “platform has an estimated final cost of between £130 million to £150 million”.
But Conservatives at City Hall claim Project Detroit, which is creating a single “road user charging” platform for the congestion charge, Ultra Low Emission zone (Ulez) and Low Emission Zone, could be used to introduce a charge based on the distance driven in cars within London.
One FoI response from TFL says: “The Detroit platform has the capability to be extended and we will be looking to build the system flexibly so that other forms of charging based on distance, vehicle type, etc could be catered for if a decision was made in future to do so.”
In 2018, the mayor’s Transport Strategy said an “integrated pay-per-mile charge could replace pre-existing schemes”, such as the congestion charge.
However, the furore over the expansion of Ulez and claims Labour is waging a “war on motorists” saw the mayor recently insist he would not introduce a pay-per-mile tax on cars in the capital.
Third term
Peter Fortune, the Conservative London Assembly Member for Bexley and Bromley, insisted that Project Detroit paves the way for pay-per-mile charging.
“Sadiq Khan can deny it all he wants but it’s pretty clear he plans to introduce pay-per-mile road-user charges for every motorist if he wins a third term,” he said.
“He has a history of saying one thing and doing the opposite. Remember he told us he wouldn’t expand Ulez, then did precisely that.
“Sadiq Khan relies on road-user charges to plug the black hole in TfL finances.Motorists will pay TfL one billion in ULEZ and other road user charges this year
“As the number of non-Ulez compliant vehicles inevitably falls, he’ll need to find new sources of revenue. He recently confirmed plans to charge motorists at least £123 million annually from 2025 for using the Blackwall and Silvertown tunnels.
TfL income
“Pay-per-mile is next in providing a steady source of income for TfL.
“He has confirmed TfL is developing new technology to integrate Ulez, congestion and other charges into a single payment. Charging motorists for each mile they drive won’t be difficult once this technology is in place.”
The latest FoI responses from TfL show how 41 of the 157 staff dedicated to the scheme are permanent. Of those, three are Band 4 employees earning between £76,000 and £111,800, a further 33 are in Band 3 paid between £58,300 and £85,8000, while five are on Band 2 wages, earning between £51,000 and £75,700. Meanwhile, 89 are “third-party consultants”.
The number of staff working on the scheme, begun in 2021, has increased from 97 in December 2022 to its current 157.
Ruled out
Mr Fortune added: “I know the team includes experts working on a pay-per-mile road-user charging scheme. It’s a very secretive project. I asked to visit the project team last year. I’m still waiting for an invite. ”
Asked to release “any correspondence sent to the mayor” regarding Project Detroit, TfL’s FoI team replied: “We do not hold any correspondence sent to the mayor during the requested period in which Project Detroit is referred to.”
A TfL spokesperson said: “Any work carried out or staff hired as part of Project Detroit has been in relation to TfL’s existing road-user charging schemes.
“This was part of TfL’s wider work to bring in-house the currently outsourced system for which the contract expires in 2026.
“Pay-per-mile charging has been ruled out by the mayor and no such scheme is on the table or being developed.”
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
By the way, ignore the bit about scheme having been ruled out. I spent a lifetime as a civil servant seeing such things (indeed sometimes writing them!) only for 6 months later seeing that conditions had now changed and although there were no plans at the time we said it, there are now because of those changed conditions!
Yet here we are discussing the upcoming mayoral elections, speculating about the motives of the incumbent and posting links to media which is overtly biased against both the mayor himself and this particular policy.
Hmm...0 -
Sadly those not wanting any political discussion got their way.Bournemouth Addick said:
So my quick takeaway from this is that a few days ago you were heavily involved in a thread bemoaning any political content on the main forum, and indeed keen to see the HoC remain closed.Fortune 82nd Minute said:And here's the Telegraph article.Sadiq Khan investing £150m in ‘secret’ technology that could deliver pay-per-mile road charging
London Mayor employing 157 staff on TfL scheme amid claims he is stepping up war on motorists
Sadiq Khan is investing £150 million on a “secret” technology project capable of charging motorists a pay-per-mile road tax, The Telegraph can reveal.
The scheme, called Project Detroit, was set up by Transport for London (TfL) to create a “more sophisticated… new core technology platform for road-user charging”.
A series of Freedom of Information (FoI) requests show 157 staff are now working solely on the scheme, with some engineers being paid more than £100,000 a year.
In total £21 million has already been spent on the project, which started in 2021, but the “platform has an estimated final cost of between £130 million to £150 million”.
But Conservatives at City Hall claim Project Detroit, which is creating a single “road user charging” platform for the congestion charge, Ultra Low Emission zone (Ulez) and Low Emission Zone, could be used to introduce a charge based on the distance driven in cars within London.
One FoI response from TFL says: “The Detroit platform has the capability to be extended and we will be looking to build the system flexibly so that other forms of charging based on distance, vehicle type, etc could be catered for if a decision was made in future to do so.”
In 2018, the mayor’s Transport Strategy said an “integrated pay-per-mile charge could replace pre-existing schemes”, such as the congestion charge.
However, the furore over the expansion of Ulez and claims Labour is waging a “war on motorists” saw the mayor recently insist he would not introduce a pay-per-mile tax on cars in the capital.
Third term
Peter Fortune, the Conservative London Assembly Member for Bexley and Bromley, insisted that Project Detroit paves the way for pay-per-mile charging.
“Sadiq Khan can deny it all he wants but it’s pretty clear he plans to introduce pay-per-mile road-user charges for every motorist if he wins a third term,” he said.
“He has a history of saying one thing and doing the opposite. Remember he told us he wouldn’t expand Ulez, then did precisely that.
“Sadiq Khan relies on road-user charges to plug the black hole in TfL finances.Motorists will pay TfL one billion in ULEZ and other road user charges this year
“As the number of non-Ulez compliant vehicles inevitably falls, he’ll need to find new sources of revenue. He recently confirmed plans to charge motorists at least £123 million annually from 2025 for using the Blackwall and Silvertown tunnels.
TfL income
“Pay-per-mile is next in providing a steady source of income for TfL.
“He has confirmed TfL is developing new technology to integrate Ulez, congestion and other charges into a single payment. Charging motorists for each mile they drive won’t be difficult once this technology is in place.”
The latest FoI responses from TfL show how 41 of the 157 staff dedicated to the scheme are permanent. Of those, three are Band 4 employees earning between £76,000 and £111,800, a further 33 are in Band 3 paid between £58,300 and £85,8000, while five are on Band 2 wages, earning between £51,000 and £75,700. Meanwhile, 89 are “third-party consultants”.
The number of staff working on the scheme, begun in 2021, has increased from 97 in December 2022 to its current 157.
Ruled out
Mr Fortune added: “I know the team includes experts working on a pay-per-mile road-user charging scheme. It’s a very secretive project. I asked to visit the project team last year. I’m still waiting for an invite. ”
Asked to release “any correspondence sent to the mayor” regarding Project Detroit, TfL’s FoI team replied: “We do not hold any correspondence sent to the mayor during the requested period in which Project Detroit is referred to.”
A TfL spokesperson said: “Any work carried out or staff hired as part of Project Detroit has been in relation to TfL’s existing road-user charging schemes.
“This was part of TfL’s wider work to bring in-house the currently outsourced system for which the contract expires in 2026.
“Pay-per-mile charging has been ruled out by the mayor and no such scheme is on the table or being developed.”
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
By the way, ignore the bit about scheme having been ruled out. I spent a lifetime as a civil servant seeing such things (indeed sometimes writing them!) only for 6 months later seeing that conditions had now changed and although there were no plans at the time we said it, there are now because of those changed conditions!
Yet here we are discussing the upcoming mayoral elections, speculating about the motives of the incumbent and posting links to media which is overtly biased against both the mayor himself and this particular policy.
Hmm...
1 -
For the Mayor?Big_Bad_World said:
I can categorically call bullshit on that. I personally (and professionally) know a few of the Band 3, 4 & NPL staff involved in the project. Road pricing (specifically 'distance charging'....which is a get out for the term 'pay-per-mile') is very much part of the long term plan and is being built-in/future proofed to the 'in-house' system.Rizzo said:
What, likevalleynick66 said:
Well then he and Labour just need to deny it with very clear and unambiguous language from now until the elections to ensure his only motivation of clean air and is understood.JamesSeed said:
Spot on. The old anti-Khan lobby is having a field day with this, with no proof at all that Khan is somehow poised to extort millions out of unsuspecting motorists. It's utter nonsense.cantersaddick said:Lots of could mights and maybes about this. I have no doubt that road pricing will exist at some point in the future and tbh I don't have a problem with it. I have no doubt that it is being investigated as a possibility.
But it's a pretty big jump (and clearly political) to say that it will be put in place if Khan wins anther term. I think its still a long way off and to be done properly it will likely end up a national scheme (maybe with tiered pricing for different areas/roads) so I think it's likely its not going to be within Khan or any Mayor's control.
Having said that, road pricing may well come in eventually, and I certainly wouldn't be against it. The current system involves people who use the car once a month being charged the same as someone using the car every day, which is utterly crazy and unsustainable.
Enough of the anti-Khan propaganda/hysteria already!
'And this must be set in the context of the Uxbridge by-election where the Tories suddenly realised that the whole ULEZ/road charging topic is a potential vote winner for them.' - Well that turned out to be a damp squib!Say something often enough and eventually people will believe it.The problem is both sides will use imprecise language to give themselves wriggle room.Just (both sides) be clear and up front.
"A TfL spokesperson said: “Any work carried out or staff hired as part of Project Detroit has been in relation to TfL’s existing road-user charging schemes.“This was part of TfL’s wider work to bring in-house the currently outsourced system for which the contract expires in 2026.
“Pay-per-mile charging has been ruled out by the mayor and no such scheme is on the table or being developed.”
0 -
Have Peter Fortune London assembly member for Bexley and Bromley and @Fortune 82nd Minute been seen in the same room?
3 -
Do you not know the back story to Fortune 82nd Minute?ME14addick said:Have Peter Fortune London assembly member for Bexley and Bromley and @Fortune 82nd Minute been seen in the same room?
1 -
Jonathan Fortune?JohnnyH2 said:
Do you not know the back story to Fortune 82nd Minute?ME14addick said:Have Peter Fortune London assembly member for Bexley and Bromley and @Fortune 82nd Minute been seen in the same room?0 - Sponsored links:
-
For the Chair of TfL, yes. At his request.Friend Or Defoe said:
For the Mayor?Big_Bad_World said:
I can categorically call bullshit on that. I personally (and professionally) know a few of the Band 3, 4 & NPL staff involved in the project. Road pricing (specifically 'distance charging'....which is a get out for the term 'pay-per-mile') is very much part of the long term plan and is being built-in/future proofed to the 'in-house' system.Rizzo said:
What, likevalleynick66 said:
Well then he and Labour just need to deny it with very clear and unambiguous language from now until the elections to ensure his only motivation of clean air and is understood.JamesSeed said:
Spot on. The old anti-Khan lobby is having a field day with this, with no proof at all that Khan is somehow poised to extort millions out of unsuspecting motorists. It's utter nonsense.cantersaddick said:Lots of could mights and maybes about this. I have no doubt that road pricing will exist at some point in the future and tbh I don't have a problem with it. I have no doubt that it is being investigated as a possibility.
But it's a pretty big jump (and clearly political) to say that it will be put in place if Khan wins anther term. I think its still a long way off and to be done properly it will likely end up a national scheme (maybe with tiered pricing for different areas/roads) so I think it's likely its not going to be within Khan or any Mayor's control.
Having said that, road pricing may well come in eventually, and I certainly wouldn't be against it. The current system involves people who use the car once a month being charged the same as someone using the car every day, which is utterly crazy and unsustainable.
Enough of the anti-Khan propaganda/hysteria already!
'And this must be set in the context of the Uxbridge by-election where the Tories suddenly realised that the whole ULEZ/road charging topic is a potential vote winner for them.' - Well that turned out to be a damp squib!Say something often enough and eventually people will believe it.The problem is both sides will use imprecise language to give themselves wriggle room.Just (both sides) be clear and up front.
"A TfL spokesperson said: “Any work carried out or staff hired as part of Project Detroit has been in relation to TfL’s existing road-user charging schemes.“This was part of TfL’s wider work to bring in-house the currently outsourced system for which the contract expires in 2026.
“Pay-per-mile charging has been ruled out by the mayor and no such scheme is on the table or being developed.”
“The Mayor has asked TfL to develop proposals for consolidating existing road user charging schemes into one simple and fair pay-per-mile scheme for introduction by the end of the decade.”
The pay-per-mile cat was then well and truly out of the bag so the terminology has since changed. It will be 'distance charging' which now means the Mayor can, until he's blue in the face, deny that there'll be a 'pay-per-mile' scheme introduced.
It's all smoke and mirrors.3 -
That,s not a sarcy LOL from me, it actually made me laugh!ME14addick said:Have Peter Fortune London assembly member for Bexley and Bromley and @Fortune 82nd Minute been seen in the same room?0 -
I was looking at Peter Fortune's X feed and he talks about Ulez a great deal.Fortune 82nd Minute said:
That,s not a sarcy LOL from me, it actually made me laugh!ME14addick said:Have Peter Fortune London assembly member for Bexley and Bromley and @Fortune 82nd Minute been seen in the same room?0 -
From TfL:Big_Bad_World said:
For the Chair of TfL, yes. At his request.Friend Or Defoe said:
For the Mayor?Big_Bad_World said:
I can categorically call bullshit on that. I personally (and professionally) know a few of the Band 3, 4 & NPL staff involved in the project. Road pricing (specifically 'distance charging'....which is a get out for the term 'pay-per-mile') is very much part of the long term plan and is being built-in/future proofed to the 'in-house' system.Rizzo said:
What, likevalleynick66 said:
Well then he and Labour just need to deny it with very clear and unambiguous language from now until the elections to ensure his only motivation of clean air and is understood.JamesSeed said:
Spot on. The old anti-Khan lobby is having a field day with this, with no proof at all that Khan is somehow poised to extort millions out of unsuspecting motorists. It's utter nonsense.cantersaddick said:Lots of could mights and maybes about this. I have no doubt that road pricing will exist at some point in the future and tbh I don't have a problem with it. I have no doubt that it is being investigated as a possibility.
But it's a pretty big jump (and clearly political) to say that it will be put in place if Khan wins anther term. I think its still a long way off and to be done properly it will likely end up a national scheme (maybe with tiered pricing for different areas/roads) so I think it's likely its not going to be within Khan or any Mayor's control.
Having said that, road pricing may well come in eventually, and I certainly wouldn't be against it. The current system involves people who use the car once a month being charged the same as someone using the car every day, which is utterly crazy and unsustainable.
Enough of the anti-Khan propaganda/hysteria already!
'And this must be set in the context of the Uxbridge by-election where the Tories suddenly realised that the whole ULEZ/road charging topic is a potential vote winner for them.' - Well that turned out to be a damp squib!Say something often enough and eventually people will believe it.The problem is both sides will use imprecise language to give themselves wriggle room.Just (both sides) be clear and up front.
"A TfL spokesperson said: “Any work carried out or staff hired as part of Project Detroit has been in relation to TfL’s existing road-user charging schemes.“This was part of TfL’s wider work to bring in-house the currently outsourced system for which the contract expires in 2026.
“Pay-per-mile charging has been ruled out by the mayor and no such scheme is on the table or being developed.”
“The Mayor has asked TfL to develop proposals for consolidating existing road user charging schemes into one simple and fair pay-per-mile scheme for introduction by the end of the decade.”
The pay-per-mile cat was then well and truly out of the bag so the terminology has since changed. It will be 'distance charging' which now means the Mayor can, until he's blue in the face, deny that there'll be a 'pay-per-mile' scheme introduced.
It's all smoke and mirrors.
"The Detroit platform has the capability to be extended and we will be looking to build the system flexibly so that other forms of charging based on distance, vehicle type, etc., could be catered for if a decision was made in future to do so. TfL will own the IPR for the platform going forward."
could = will
if a = when the
was = is
I've worked for this mob long enough to know when my eyes can't see anything but wool.2 -
Yes for an area with particularly bad air quality due to its Topography the Bexley Councillors were surprisingly anti ULEZ!ME14addick said:
I was looking at Peter Fortune's X feed and he talks about Ulez a great deal.Fortune 82nd Minute said:
That,s not a sarcy LOL from me, it actually made me laugh!ME14addick said:Have Peter Fortune London assembly member for Bexley and Bromley and @Fortune 82nd Minute been seen in the same room?3 -
Found the only person who calls it XME14addick said:
I was looking at Peter Fortune's X feed and he talks about Ulez a great deal.Fortune 82nd Minute said:
That,s not a sarcy LOL from me, it actually made me laugh!ME14addick said:Have Peter Fortune London assembly member for Bexley and Bromley and @Fortune 82nd Minute been seen in the same room?3 -
What, like, the people who run the forum?ME14addick said:
Sadly those not wanting any political discussion got their way.Bournemouth Addick said:
So my quick takeaway from this is that a few days ago you were heavily involved in a thread bemoaning any political content on the main forum, and indeed keen to see the HoC remain closed.Fortune 82nd Minute said:And here's the Telegraph article.Sadiq Khan investing £150m in ‘secret’ technology that could deliver pay-per-mile road charging
London Mayor employing 157 staff on TfL scheme amid claims he is stepping up war on motorists
Sadiq Khan is investing £150 million on a “secret” technology project capable of charging motorists a pay-per-mile road tax, The Telegraph can reveal.
The scheme, called Project Detroit, was set up by Transport for London (TfL) to create a “more sophisticated… new core technology platform for road-user charging”.
A series of Freedom of Information (FoI) requests show 157 staff are now working solely on the scheme, with some engineers being paid more than £100,000 a year.
In total £21 million has already been spent on the project, which started in 2021, but the “platform has an estimated final cost of between £130 million to £150 million”.
But Conservatives at City Hall claim Project Detroit, which is creating a single “road user charging” platform for the congestion charge, Ultra Low Emission zone (Ulez) and Low Emission Zone, could be used to introduce a charge based on the distance driven in cars within London.
One FoI response from TFL says: “The Detroit platform has the capability to be extended and we will be looking to build the system flexibly so that other forms of charging based on distance, vehicle type, etc could be catered for if a decision was made in future to do so.”
In 2018, the mayor’s Transport Strategy said an “integrated pay-per-mile charge could replace pre-existing schemes”, such as the congestion charge.
However, the furore over the expansion of Ulez and claims Labour is waging a “war on motorists” saw the mayor recently insist he would not introduce a pay-per-mile tax on cars in the capital.
Third term
Peter Fortune, the Conservative London Assembly Member for Bexley and Bromley, insisted that Project Detroit paves the way for pay-per-mile charging.
“Sadiq Khan can deny it all he wants but it’s pretty clear he plans to introduce pay-per-mile road-user charges for every motorist if he wins a third term,” he said.
“He has a history of saying one thing and doing the opposite. Remember he told us he wouldn’t expand Ulez, then did precisely that.
“Sadiq Khan relies on road-user charges to plug the black hole in TfL finances.Motorists will pay TfL one billion in ULEZ and other road user charges this year
“As the number of non-Ulez compliant vehicles inevitably falls, he’ll need to find new sources of revenue. He recently confirmed plans to charge motorists at least £123 million annually from 2025 for using the Blackwall and Silvertown tunnels.
TfL income
“Pay-per-mile is next in providing a steady source of income for TfL.
“He has confirmed TfL is developing new technology to integrate Ulez, congestion and other charges into a single payment. Charging motorists for each mile they drive won’t be difficult once this technology is in place.”
The latest FoI responses from TfL show how 41 of the 157 staff dedicated to the scheme are permanent. Of those, three are Band 4 employees earning between £76,000 and £111,800, a further 33 are in Band 3 paid between £58,300 and £85,8000, while five are on Band 2 wages, earning between £51,000 and £75,700. Meanwhile, 89 are “third-party consultants”.
The number of staff working on the scheme, begun in 2021, has increased from 97 in December 2022 to its current 157.
Ruled out
Mr Fortune added: “I know the team includes experts working on a pay-per-mile road-user charging scheme. It’s a very secretive project. I asked to visit the project team last year. I’m still waiting for an invite. ”
Asked to release “any correspondence sent to the mayor” regarding Project Detroit, TfL’s FoI team replied: “We do not hold any correspondence sent to the mayor during the requested period in which Project Detroit is referred to.”
A TfL spokesperson said: “Any work carried out or staff hired as part of Project Detroit has been in relation to TfL’s existing road-user charging schemes.
“This was part of TfL’s wider work to bring in-house the currently outsourced system for which the contract expires in 2026.
“Pay-per-mile charging has been ruled out by the mayor and no such scheme is on the table or being developed.”
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
By the way, ignore the bit about scheme having been ruled out. I spent a lifetime as a civil servant seeing such things (indeed sometimes writing them!) only for 6 months later seeing that conditions had now changed and although there were no plans at the time we said it, there are now because of those changed conditions!
Yet here we are discussing the upcoming mayoral elections, speculating about the motives of the incumbent and posting links to media which is overtly biased against both the mayor himself and this particular policy.
Hmm...
5 -
I thinked you’ve missed the point, nobody is accusing you of being inconsistent on this thread, it’s just a bit hypocritical to ask why people would want to discuss politics on a football forum, and then spend your time doing exactly that.Fortune 82nd Minute said:
Not at all. I have consistently pointed out that UlLEZ is intrinsically linked with future plans for road pricing in London and it does no harm to publicise this fact.Bournemouth Addick said:
So my quick takeaway from this is that a few days ago you were heavily involved in a thread bemoaning any political content on the main forum, and indeed keen to see the HoC remain closed.Fortune 82nd Minute said:And here's the Telegraph article.Sadiq Khan investing £150m in ‘secret’ technology that could deliver pay-per-mile road charging
London Mayor employing 157 staff on TfL scheme amid claims he is stepping up war on motorists
Sadiq Khan is investing £150 million on a “secret” technology project capable of charging motorists a pay-per-mile road tax, The Telegraph can reveal.
The scheme, called Project Detroit, was set up by Transport for London (TfL) to create a “more sophisticated… new core technology platform for road-user charging”.
A series of Freedom of Information (FoI) requests show 157 staff are now working solely on the scheme, with some engineers being paid more than £100,000 a year.
In total £21 million has already been spent on the project, which started in 2021, but the “platform has an estimated final cost of between £130 million to £150 million”.
But Conservatives at City Hall claim Project Detroit, which is creating a single “road user charging” platform for the congestion charge, Ultra Low Emission zone (Ulez) and Low Emission Zone, could be used to introduce a charge based on the distance driven in cars within London.
One FoI response from TFL says: “The Detroit platform has the capability to be extended and we will be looking to build the system flexibly so that other forms of charging based on distance, vehicle type, etc could be catered for if a decision was made in future to do so.”
In 2018, the mayor’s Transport Strategy said an “integrated pay-per-mile charge could replace pre-existing schemes”, such as the congestion charge.
However, the furore over the expansion of Ulez and claims Labour is waging a “war on motorists” saw the mayor recently insist he would not introduce a pay-per-mile tax on cars in the capital.
Third term
Peter Fortune, the Conservative London Assembly Member for Bexley and Bromley, insisted that Project Detroit paves the way for pay-per-mile charging.
“Sadiq Khan can deny it all he wants but it’s pretty clear he plans to introduce pay-per-mile road-user charges for every motorist if he wins a third term,” he said.
“He has a history of saying one thing and doing the opposite. Remember he told us he wouldn’t expand Ulez, then did precisely that.
“Sadiq Khan relies on road-user charges to plug the black hole in TfL finances.Motorists will pay TfL one billion in ULEZ and other road user charges this year
“As the number of non-Ulez compliant vehicles inevitably falls, he’ll need to find new sources of revenue. He recently confirmed plans to charge motorists at least £123 million annually from 2025 for using the Blackwall and Silvertown tunnels.
TfL income
“Pay-per-mile is next in providing a steady source of income for TfL.
“He has confirmed TfL is developing new technology to integrate Ulez, congestion and other charges into a single payment. Charging motorists for each mile they drive won’t be difficult once this technology is in place.”
The latest FoI responses from TfL show how 41 of the 157 staff dedicated to the scheme are permanent. Of those, three are Band 4 employees earning between £76,000 and £111,800, a further 33 are in Band 3 paid between £58,300 and £85,8000, while five are on Band 2 wages, earning between £51,000 and £75,700. Meanwhile, 89 are “third-party consultants”.
The number of staff working on the scheme, begun in 2021, has increased from 97 in December 2022 to its current 157.
Ruled out
Mr Fortune added: “I know the team includes experts working on a pay-per-mile road-user charging scheme. It’s a very secretive project. I asked to visit the project team last year. I’m still waiting for an invite. ”
Asked to release “any correspondence sent to the mayor” regarding Project Detroit, TfL’s FoI team replied: “We do not hold any correspondence sent to the mayor during the requested period in which Project Detroit is referred to.”
A TfL spokesperson said: “Any work carried out or staff hired as part of Project Detroit has been in relation to TfL’s existing road-user charging schemes.
“This was part of TfL’s wider work to bring in-house the currently outsourced system for which the contract expires in 2026.
“Pay-per-mile charging has been ruled out by the mayor and no such scheme is on the table or being developed.”
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By the way, ignore the bit about scheme having been ruled out. I spent a lifetime as a civil servant seeing such things (indeed sometimes writing them!) only for 6 months later seeing that conditions had now changed and although there were no plans at the time we said it, there are now because of those changed conditions!
Yet here we are discussing the upcoming mayoral elections, speculating about the motives of the incumbent and posting links to media which is overtly biased against both the mayor himself and this particular policy.
Hmm...7 -
Fair enough - take your point. I will steer well clear of this thread (and similar ones) from now on.SomervilleAddick said:
I thinked you’ve missed the point, nobody is accusing you of being inconsistent on this thread, it’s just a bit hypocritical to ask why people would want to discuss politics on a football forum, and then spend your time doing exactly that.Fortune 82nd Minute said:
Not at all. I have consistently pointed out that UlLEZ is intrinsically linked with future plans for road pricing in London and it does no harm to publicise this fact.Bournemouth Addick said:
So my quick takeaway from this is that a few days ago you were heavily involved in a thread bemoaning any political content on the main forum, and indeed keen to see the HoC remain closed.Fortune 82nd Minute said:And here's the Telegraph article.Sadiq Khan investing £150m in ‘secret’ technology that could deliver pay-per-mile road charging
London Mayor employing 157 staff on TfL scheme amid claims he is stepping up war on motorists
Sadiq Khan is investing £150 million on a “secret” technology project capable of charging motorists a pay-per-mile road tax, The Telegraph can reveal.
The scheme, called Project Detroit, was set up by Transport for London (TfL) to create a “more sophisticated… new core technology platform for road-user charging”.
A series of Freedom of Information (FoI) requests show 157 staff are now working solely on the scheme, with some engineers being paid more than £100,000 a year.
In total £21 million has already been spent on the project, which started in 2021, but the “platform has an estimated final cost of between £130 million to £150 million”.
But Conservatives at City Hall claim Project Detroit, which is creating a single “road user charging” platform for the congestion charge, Ultra Low Emission zone (Ulez) and Low Emission Zone, could be used to introduce a charge based on the distance driven in cars within London.
One FoI response from TFL says: “The Detroit platform has the capability to be extended and we will be looking to build the system flexibly so that other forms of charging based on distance, vehicle type, etc could be catered for if a decision was made in future to do so.”
In 2018, the mayor’s Transport Strategy said an “integrated pay-per-mile charge could replace pre-existing schemes”, such as the congestion charge.
However, the furore over the expansion of Ulez and claims Labour is waging a “war on motorists” saw the mayor recently insist he would not introduce a pay-per-mile tax on cars in the capital.
Third term
Peter Fortune, the Conservative London Assembly Member for Bexley and Bromley, insisted that Project Detroit paves the way for pay-per-mile charging.
“Sadiq Khan can deny it all he wants but it’s pretty clear he plans to introduce pay-per-mile road-user charges for every motorist if he wins a third term,” he said.
“He has a history of saying one thing and doing the opposite. Remember he told us he wouldn’t expand Ulez, then did precisely that.
“Sadiq Khan relies on road-user charges to plug the black hole in TfL finances.Motorists will pay TfL one billion in ULEZ and other road user charges this year
“As the number of non-Ulez compliant vehicles inevitably falls, he’ll need to find new sources of revenue. He recently confirmed plans to charge motorists at least £123 million annually from 2025 for using the Blackwall and Silvertown tunnels.
TfL income
“Pay-per-mile is next in providing a steady source of income for TfL.
“He has confirmed TfL is developing new technology to integrate Ulez, congestion and other charges into a single payment. Charging motorists for each mile they drive won’t be difficult once this technology is in place.”
The latest FoI responses from TfL show how 41 of the 157 staff dedicated to the scheme are permanent. Of those, three are Band 4 employees earning between £76,000 and £111,800, a further 33 are in Band 3 paid between £58,300 and £85,8000, while five are on Band 2 wages, earning between £51,000 and £75,700. Meanwhile, 89 are “third-party consultants”.
The number of staff working on the scheme, begun in 2021, has increased from 97 in December 2022 to its current 157.
Ruled out
Mr Fortune added: “I know the team includes experts working on a pay-per-mile road-user charging scheme. It’s a very secretive project. I asked to visit the project team last year. I’m still waiting for an invite. ”
Asked to release “any correspondence sent to the mayor” regarding Project Detroit, TfL’s FoI team replied: “We do not hold any correspondence sent to the mayor during the requested period in which Project Detroit is referred to.”
A TfL spokesperson said: “Any work carried out or staff hired as part of Project Detroit has been in relation to TfL’s existing road-user charging schemes.
“This was part of TfL’s wider work to bring in-house the currently outsourced system for which the contract expires in 2026.
“Pay-per-mile charging has been ruled out by the mayor and no such scheme is on the table or being developed.”
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
By the way, ignore the bit about scheme having been ruled out. I spent a lifetime as a civil servant seeing such things (indeed sometimes writing them!) only for 6 months later seeing that conditions had now changed and although there were no plans at the time we said it, there are now because of those changed conditions!
Yet here we are discussing the upcoming mayoral elections, speculating about the motives of the incumbent and posting links to media which is overtly biased against both the mayor himself and this particular policy.
Hmm...
All I will say is that with a background in transport, ULEZ to me was always far more than about air quality. And I thought that worth raising.3 -
We've effectively been charged per mile for donkeys years, it's called fuel duty. But of course if we went fully electric it would cripple the exchequer and they are now selling less fuel, something needs to give.5
