Transport looks beyond congestion charging

The Government is finally to break the link between its Transport Innovation Fund and congestion charging which cost Oldham £3bn of public transport improvements.

Transport Secretary Lord Adonis said a decision has already been made and an announcement is due “quite soon”.

The Department for Transport has been looking for ways to save the fund — designed to promote innovation in tackling congestion — ever since the people of Oldham and Greater Manchester voted overwhelmingly to have nothing to do with the plan in December, 2008.

It meant that councils had to scrap plans which had cost millions to draw up because the Government was insisting that congestion charging had to be included.

Lord Adonis said: “We are looking at how we take forward investment in urban public transport on the basis that there are going to be very few congestion charge schemes going forward.

“We need to be realistic about the fact that the Manchester referendum is going to slow down the pace of congestion charge schemes and it going to be a while before we see any new ones. We don’t want to hold up all investment in new projects for local public transport simply because congestion charging isn’t likely to proceed in many places.

“That is the context of the new announcement — how we take forward spending on urban public transport where there are likely to be few congestion charge schemes in the next few years.”

Cambridgeshire and Reading councils have since submitted plans worth £500m and £330m respectively but neither has yet been granted the funds.

Officials in Greater Manchester have drawn up plans worth £1.5bn by forming a Greater Manchester Transport Fund to borrow against for future schemes.

The plan B saved proposals to bring trams into the heart of Oldham town centre. But Greater Manchester Integrated Transport Authority Councillor Keith Whitmore said they would look at any newly-constituted fund.