Western Extension will go

Forget my smart remarks of yesterday evening. The C-Charge western extension will be going, though not until 2010. I gather it can't happen before then because a new transport strategy has to be written first to make it legal. Wish I'd paid more attention to those mildly meaningful suggestions not to take anything for granted.

There will be a formal announcement late this morning in a location not unadjacent to a well-known west London street market. Meanwhile, lines to the mayor's press office have got rather busy all of a sudden. There will be a press release issued shortly.

A thought: I was promised at the TfL business plan launch that the consultation findings would be made public and in detail. If Boris was leaning towards Option 3 as he seemed to be only a decisive rejection of the scheme by Londoners could have persuaded him to do otherwise. He had, after all, promised to abide by the consultation's results.

Your comments, as ever, more than welcome.

Update, 10.29: Labour are first off the mark with a formal response. Val Shawcross:

The rolling back of the congestion charge is a foolish and backward step by Boris Johnson. It will lose TfL £70 million a year that could have been spent on improving our public transport system and will increase traffic and air pollution in one of the dirtiest and noisiest areas of central London.

London's environment as a whole will suffer and local residents will no longer enjoy having 30,000 fewer cars a day clogging up their streets. At a time when TfL's coffers are tight and the Mayor is scrapping major transport projects, they will now have the added costs of removing the cameras, changing road signs and removing street furniture, which cost £100 million to install.

The Mayor has shown his true colours today - petrol blue. The decision to remove the Western extension of the Congestion Charging zone shows that Boris is not interested in making London cleaner or improving life for cyclists and public transport users. It is yet another move in favour of the private car at the expense of walking, cycling and public transport.

Funny, that's just what the Standard said yesterday. They'll be wanting Livingstone back next.

Update, 10.38: the mayor's press release has just appeared on the GLA site. "Londoners have spoken and the mayor has listened" it declares:

The five-week informal public consultation attracted nearly 28,000 responses and overall 67 per cent of individual respondents and 86 per cent of businesses responding to the public consultation supported the removal of the zone. Nineteen per cent stated that they wanted the extension kept as it is, and 12 per cent supported changing the scheme to improve the way that it operates.

It continues:

Alongside the consultation, Transport for London (TfL) conducted a survey of the attitudes of 2,000 Londoners and 1,000 London-based businesses to gauge how representative the consultation responses were. Removing the Western Extension was the preferred option of 41 per cent of members of the public against 30 per cent in favour of keeping it. Half of businesses surveyed wanted the extension scrapped and 23 per cent supported keeping it. Fifteen per cent of members of the public and 14 per cent of businesses said they would change the way the scheme operates.

A quarter of stakeholders supported the removal of the Western Extension. Around half were in favour of keeping the scheme although some made their support conditional on other changes. A third supported changing the way that the scheme operates.

Hard to argue with those numbers. If Boris really did favour Option 3 - retaining the WEZ but with modifications - they left him little choice but to abandon it. And where do they leave the WEZ's supporters?

Update, 10.47: Helene Mulholland's news story, complete with background.

Update, 11.01: The Troll responds:

Boris will be putting his arm around traders at Portobello Market later on before being carried down Kensington High Street on the shoulders of Kit Malthouse and Stephen Greenhalgh. Bring your Porsche.

There's only one. Read on.

Update, 11.06: For the Greens, Jenny Jones:

The congestion charge has been an incredibly successful method of traffic reduction. Scrapping the Western Extension will almost certainly lead to a sharp rise in traffic, more congestion, more air pollution and more climate change emissions.

Abolition of the extension could lead to fare rises, as the Mayor struggles to cope with an estimated £70m annual drop in income. This would be a straightforward swap from motorists paying to bus and tube passengers paying. This is bad news not only for pedestrians and cyclists, but also for anyone travelling in London and everyone who breathes London's air.

The announcement comes only two days after the Mayor pledged to make London a 'greener' and more environmentally-friendly city. Boris's environmental commitment now appears to be little more than a charade.

Update, 12.05: Commenting below, Conservative former Transport Committee chair Roger Evans:

This is another manifesto promise fulfilled and Londoners will be grateful. the controversial extension was imposed against the wishes of the local residents, in the hope that they would learn to love it. The consultation results show just how mistaken that hope was. With such a negative response only an autocratic mayor could ingore peoples' views.

For retailers on the edge of the zone, the harm done to their businesses was all to clear. In the current economic climate they will see this decision as a lifeline which is more valuable than any of the government's tinkering. Their only regret will be the delay and they will be counting the days to its demise.

For those of us in outer London this marks the end of the march of the congestion charge. There will be widespread relief that it won't be 'coming to a borough near you'. Livingstone's flagship policy has met its Waterloo.

Update, 13.15: For the record, the Lib Dems are happy as we knew they would be. As for the future, I ought to stress that the mayor's decision will be subject to a statutory 12-week public and stakeholder consultation starting next summer and that TfL has to
carry out one too. I imagine WEZ supporters are already planning for these procedures. That's yer lot on this post. There will be others.