At last, a reason not to go to Birmingham

[strangeangel]

7 hours ago, Inspector Morose said:

It will now cost me £8 to go to my local post office to pick up a parcel. Or I could do the 3 mile journey by bus, which would take me over an hour each way as there’s no direct bus.

I live about 3 miles from the city centre and I can honestly say that I’ve been to Amsterdam more times than Birmingham city centre over the past 12 months.

 

 

You now have all the reason you ever needed to buy an old moped/scooter. Even my 2T Vespa is allowed into B/ham and Leeds for free.

 

[LabRat]

Weirdly enough the mg6 isn't charged, even though it's powered by the vehicular equivalent of Brunel's boiler.

The wife's diesel Tivoli is also exempt, despite the fact that its diesel and therefore nuns and kittens are at risk every time we start it.

[Fumbler]

Micra, perhaps unsurprisingly, will need to pay to get into The Birmingham. Fine for Leeds though.

[Tadhg Tiogar]

Was there ever a reason to go to Birmingham in the first place? ?

[iainrcz]

The slowT 86 is exempt in Leeds and Birmingham.

Which is nice, I suppose.

Sent from my VFD 710 using Tapatalk

[Heidel_Kakao]

Birmingham now has a Lego store again in the Bullring so that's at least one reason to go into the city centre, beats going to Milton Keynes which was previously my nearest store. The Cedric is exempt so that's good to know.

[willswitchengage]

The Birmingham zone seems pretty reasonable as it's only the area within the inner ring road, although when I used to live there I drove along the A38 that bisects it all the time. The Leeds one seems to cover the entire city - a bit odd, probably bigger than the London LEZ in terms of proportional coverage. I wonder if anyone's done an impact assessment though? I would have thought something like <10% of cars driving through would actually be affected due to the proliferation of cheap brand new cars nowadays.

[Muniphobia]

As work decided to move the office into Birmingham city centre means I'm spending 3-4 hours a day commuting a day using public transport which is hopelessly unreliable.  I often have to wait 35-40 minutes to get a bus that is supposed to run every 6 minutes.  The sooner I can get a job out of the city centre the better especially as my workload just keeps increasing due to internal promotion and the determination not to take on any more staff means I single handed do the it support for over 500 people.

[red5]

25 minutes ago, willswitchengage said:

The Birmingham zone seems pretty reasonable as it's only the area within the inner ring road, although when I used to live there I drove along the A38 that bisects it all the time. The Leeds one seems to cover the entire city - a bit odd, probably bigger than the London LEZ in terms of proportional coverage. I wonder if anyone's done an impact assessment though? I would have thought something like <10% of cars driving through would actually be affected due to the proliferation of cheap brand new cars nowadays.

Cheap by who's definition? 

My wife's 2014 Insignia isn't exempt despite it being stop start, low emission taxation bracket. Faired in underside and shutter grill....

Euro 5

[Sloth in a bowl]

The Skoda is fine for Birmingham and Leeds. I commute into Birmingham city centre 4 days a week and by far the quickest way into the city is to cycle. The only time that I drive in is if I am picking up Mrs Sloth or dropping her off and then only well away from the rush hour. The A38 can make a useful cut through, especially if the ring road is screwed somewhere from an accident or roadworks. The council should be a lot more aware of the mess that closing that road to a load of traffic will make.

[Three Speed]

I’ve only driven in Birmingham once - last year in my Traction Avant. Apparently I’m welcome to do it again as often as I like. Same for my DSuper and my 6.8 litre New Yorker  - all free to enter Brum and Leeds with no charge. The euro 1 compliant Saab with its cataclysmic converter is not so welcome in Brum but Leeds is not bothered. I don’t think any of this will change my holiday plans.

[Shep Shepherd]

The area around the NEC is the closest I ever get to Brum by car, and that's only once a year at most. If I need to go to the city centre from there for any reason, I take the train from the airport.

[Frogchod]

3 hours ago, Tadhg Tiogar said:

Was there ever a reason to go to Birmingham in the first place? ?

I've been once. 

Came home in a V6 XM 

[Inspector Morose]

The wonderful irony of the Birmingham emissions zone is that it will move the traffic (and therefore extra pollution) to one of the most polluted junctions in Birmingham.

Revenue generation? Surely not.

[chaseracer]

This involves Birmingham City Council.  Your level of cynicism is understandable - and probably insufficient.

[Crispian_J_Hotson]

 

I might just go there and leave the V8 engine running for a while.

 

[brownnova]

The camper has insufficient information to give an answer... I’m claiming that as a win!! 

[Craig the Princess]

7 hours ago, skattrd said:

They need to have adequate public transport to properly implement this, or at least decent park and ride type options.

And it needs to be 24/7, the Cambridge park and ride is excellent but doesn't start until 06.20 and ends at 20.20 which is no use for shift workers or those on a night out.

[Justin Case]

It does seem a bit daft including the bit at the end of the Aston Expressway which means that you have to go through the zone to reach say the University or hospitals from the M6. Both our cars are OK but they will be making such a ballsup of Perry Barr that we will be lucky to get anywhere near the zone in the first place

[yes oui si]

They have something similar up here. My neighbour's a Shepherd called Les. 

[PhilA]

Funny

I remember the days of driving into Brum on the A34, parking in the car park under the flyover for a couple quid, walking up into the center of town past Toys-R-Us, grabbing a burger at the Wimpy or a hotdog at the guy with the barrow opposite Virgin Megastore, wandering up to the museum, looking in the windows, spending some money in the Bull Ring, Computer Exchange or the little comic store in the parade over the road by the Rotunda, then going back home. Either that or get the bus in which was pretty direct.

Went back a couple years ago, got forced to park in stupid multi storey car park out the back of the giant silver slug, went inside, found nothing of interest, went outside, there was hardly anybody walking about... Sad really

They made it shiny but inaccessible. Moronic

 

Phil

[Wack]

It's such bollocks , if they gave a shit about improving air quality in the area the M6 toll would be free removing the millions of cars a year that have to suffer stop start driving for 3 hours AM and 3 hours PM every weekday.

The worst kind of driving for causing pollution but it's easier to charge £8 than do anything about it.

The thing that really pisses me off about it is somebody rich can go on driving whatever they like wherever they want as long as they pay rather than an outright ban while the guy on minimum wage who might be unfortunate enough to work in the centre of birmingham now can' t get to work in a car.

My 15 plate mercedes B220 doesn't comply but the 5.0 mustang is fine.

[New POD]

14 hours ago, Muniphobia said:

As work decided to move the office into Birmingham city centre means I'm spending 3-4 hours a day commuting a day using public transport which is hopelessly unreliable.  I often have to wait 35-40 minutes to get a bus that is supposed to run every 6 minutes.  The sooner I can get a job out of the city centre the better especially as my workload just keeps increasing due to internal promotion and the determination not to take on any more staff means I single handed do the it support for over 500 people.

The sooner that you are allowed to work from home. 

[catsinthewelder]

I'd be happier with it if they charged all cars entering the zone in a bid to get people to use public transport or walk rather than buying modern toss that puts out just as much shit, just in smaller more harmful particles.

[captain_70s]

The only reason I drive into a city centre is to pick up bulky shopping, as lugging stuff on a train/bus is hateful. Although I am lucky enough to be 10mins from a railway station so the 2022 Glasgow ban will largely not affect me.

In the future I'll just not shop in town...

Of course on days like these, where public transport is crippled by bad weather it shows that anybody who relies on it to commute is fairly fucked. The cooncil want to charge my work for providing parking spaces, despite the fact it's essentially impossible to use public transport to get there because it's shift work with early starts and late finishes, when public transport doesn't run.

[Isaac Hunt]

On 2/8/2020 at 1:19 PM, strangeangel said:

 

You now have all the reason you ever needed to buy an old moped/scooter. Even my 2T Vespa is allowed into B/ham and Leeds for free.

 

I rode my Honda SS50 Ped down the Aston Distress Way once, by the time is saw the 'no mopeds allowed' sign it was too late......feckmit, just keep going.  In those days days, if the Fed's were not bout you were OK, these days it would all be on CCTV

[egg]

Quote

Vehicle registration XWC468F is exempt from all Clean Air Zone charges and there is no charge to drive it in any of the zones. The Ultra Low Emission Zone in London may have different exemption rules that you can check with Transport for London if you need to drive in London.

Ah two stroke smoke, yum.

[Remspoor]

On 2/8/2020 at 12:01 AM, clayts450 said:

The Birmingham Clear Air Zone goes live on 1/7/20, so the Govt have introduced a checker - covers Brum and Leeds, although the latter's start date is still up in the air:

https://vehiclecheck.drive-clean-air-zone.service.gov.uk/vehicle_checkers/enter_details

None of my cars pass and all attract an 8 quid charge in Brum. 

However, there's the usual brouhaha about data inaccuracy:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-birmingham-51415374

I used the first link. Said my car is non-UK and gave them the reg. So up pops the next page.

https://vehiclecheck.drive-clean-air-zone.service.gov.uk/vehicle_checkers/non_uk
 

Quote

 

Vehicle is registered outside of the UK

We only hold data on UK-registered vehicles.

You can find out if your vehicle will be charged in the zone you want to drive in by checking the emissions standards against your vehicle registration information.

If your vehicle does not meet the standards you will need to pay a charge.

 

No I cant.......Going around in circles then.

[Angrydicky]

I don’t like driving in cities anyway, but with such a lucrative potential cash cow on offer for local authorities, these old car charging zones will extend across the country over the next few years, probably to towns as well. There’s no onus on councils to provide exemptions for residents or for historic vehicles. They will continue unabated unless we make a stand against them, as anyone who opposes them is labelled a ‘climate change denier’ or some such bullshit.

This current anti-old car feeling is why I’m trying really hard to get my straight six back on the road, so I can enjoy it while I can!