London makes two steps forward with congestion charging and tolls

In the past couple of weeks two significant changes have been announced regarding road pricing in London:

• Removal of the Cleaner Vehicle Discount (more widely known as the EV exemption) from the London Congestion Charge from 25 December 2025;
• Proposed time-of-use based tolls for the Blackwall Tunnels and the new Silvertown Tunnel.

Congestion Charge Cleaner Vehicle Discount abolished

Since 2003, the London Congestion Charge has provided a concession, in the form of a 100% discount, for lower emitting vehicles.  Initially the discount applied to Alternatively Fuelled Vehicles, which initially meant vehicles powered by natural gas or hybrid or electric vehicles.  Over time that discount has been tightened, with the most recent change in 2021 restricting the discount to pure EVs (not hybrids) and hydrogen-fuel cell vehicles. 

It is a 100% discount for such vehicles which register for the discount and are identified through the UK’s motor vehicle register. Owners have been required to pay a £10 annual fee for this registration. Over 112,000 cars and light commercial vehicles are registered for the discount, with another 16,000 private hire vehicles (i.e., Uber and app/phone booked minicabs) also registered. Transport for London (TfL) has provided no data on the estimated impacts, either in terms of traffic or in financial terms as it has not prepared annual impact assessments for 19 years. Given reports from several years ago, it seems likely that abolition of the Cleaner Vehicle Discount should increase the number of vehicles that the Congestion Charge applies to by between 10-20% per day, and so should have an impact on reducing congestion within and approaching the Congestion Charge zone.

Note the latest TfL annual report (PDF year ended September 2023) indicates the operating costs of the London Congestion Charge consume around 37% of gross revenues.

Note also that the entire area of the London Congestion Charge has been an ultra-low emission zone since 2019, applying a £12.50 per day charge (on top of the Congestion Charge) for vehicles that do not meet specific standards. At present that standard is a minimum of Euro 4 for petrol vehicles (generally any vehicles manufactured from 2005) and Euro 6 for light diesel vehicles (generally any vehicles manufactured from 2015).

Blackwall Tunnel and Silvertown Tunnel toll/time-of-use pricing announced

The Blackwall Tunnel is a pair of two-lane, one-way tunnels (one built in 1897 and another in 1967) under the Thames that comprise part of a major arterial highway from north-east to south-east London. The route (A102 and A12) is the eastern portion of the never completed Ringway 1 – an inner London orbital motorway proposed in 1966, but mostly cancelled in 1973.  More details on the route here.

Location of Blackwall Tunnel

The Blackwall Tunnel is the eastern-most fixed road crossing of the Thames within the boundaries of Greater London (the next crossing is the Dartford Crossing 26km to the east, which comprises part of the M25 orbital motorway). The northbound tunnel handles around 49,000 vehicles per day and the southbound around 53,000. It is one of the most heavily congested corridors in Greater London with severe delays all day during weekdays and for many hours in the weekends. The tunnels have never been tolled.

To help relieve congestion and improve network resilience, the Silvertown Tunnel is being built to the east connecting the approaches from the south of the Blackwall Tunnel to the suburb of Silvertown and main arterials towards the east and the centre of London. It is currently under construction and is planned to open in 2025. It will have two-lanes in each direction, albeit one lane in each direction is dedicated to trucks and buses only. It will be the first new road crossing of the Thames since the QE2 Bridge at Dartford Crossing in 1991. 

Location of Silvertown Tunnel

The road has been controversial in some circles, concerned that any road building contributes to congestion and emissions, but given half of the new capacity is for freight and buses, and tolls are to be applied, in part, to manage demand, it seems highly unlikely that the new tunnel will make congestion worse. It is far more likely that the combination of pricing and new capacity will improve conditions for both traffic, but also the environment. More detail on the tunnel here.

The Mayor of London had always proposed that the Silvertown Tunnel be tolled to pay for most of the capital costs of the tunnel, but also that the Blackwall Tunnel be tolled, to ensure that demand between the tunnels was not distorted by having tolls on one crossing. Furthermore, it was expected that applying time-of-use pricing to the Blackwall Tunnel would help relieve the chronic congestion on that route.

The Mayor of London has now proposed a time-of-use toll to apply to all tunnels as follows:

• Peak charges between 0600-1000 northbound weekdays and 1600-1900 southbound weekdays only

• Off-peak charges between 1000-2200 northbound weekdays and 0600-1600 and 1900-2200 southbound weekdays, and 0600-2200 weekends

• No charges between 2200-0600 all days.

The price schedule is below. Autopay applies if vehicle owners register their vehicle number plate with TfL to be automatically detected and have their bank account or credit/debit card deducted for crossing each day.  

Proposed Silvertown and Blackwall Tunnel tolls

Taxis, blue badge vehicle holders (disabled), buses, coaches, minibuses, emergency vehicles, military vehicles, vehicles in disabled tax class and NHS vehicles exempt from vehicle tax and zero-emission/wheelchair accessible private hire vehicles are all exempt.

Low income drivers in east London (in any of 13 boroughs) may register for a 50% discount. This is determined based on being in receipt of one of a range of means-tested benefits such as Jobseekers Allowance.

A £1 discount at off-peak times only applies for registered small businesses and charities located in the Royal Borough of Greenwich, and the Boroughs of Newham and Tower Hamlets.

Furthermore, three new cross-river bus services and the new cycle bus will be free for local residents for the first 12 months, as well as further enhanced public transport services and Docklands Light Railway trips between two station pairs.

The cumulative effect of the new tunnel and the time-of-use tolls is expected to be up to a 20-minute reduction in peak period travel times. Part of this relief is from a 50% increase in capacity, but also expected is some demand management as drivers shift travel to off-peak periods and some demand shifts to the new bus services.

Estimated gross revenue from tolling the tunnels will be £123m per annum, which should fully recover the construction cost of the Silvertown Tunnel in just over 10 years (indicating that there is more than adequate demand for the additional capacity and new connection).  

Conclusion

Removal of the Cleaner Vehicle Discount is a useful step forward for the London Congestion Charge, as there is already an Ultra Low Emission Zone applying across of London which is the tool for emissions. The Cleaner Vehicle Discount undermines the effectiveness of the congestion charge in managing congestion, so removing it should help wind back some of the congestion growth in recent years.

It is rational to apply tolls to both the Silvertown and Blackwall Tunnels, as the Silvertown Tunnel will directly relieve the Blackwall Tunnels, so it is fair for users of the latter to pay for the former. The benefits of reduced congestion will be significant.  Furthermore, it is a welcome leap forward for London to effectively trial time-of-use pricing at peak periods by direction. London needs more congestion charging on existing roads to manage demand at peak periods, and this should be seen as a pilot for implementation on other routes.  Hopefully shoulder periods will be introduced too, to encourage peak spreading.