ULEZ DATA – Compliant + Non-Compliant Vehicles – PAY-PER-MILE Charging

Dear Mr Macleod

Our Ref:         FOI-1277-2324

Thank you for your request received on 24 July 2023 asking for information
about the Ultra Low Emission Zone (ULEZ) and future road user charging
proposals.

Your request will be processed in accordance with the requirements of the
Environmental Information Regulations and our information access policy.

A response will be sent to you by 18 August 2023. We publish a substantial
range of information on our website on subjects including operational
performance, contracts, expenditure, journey data, governance and our
financial performance. This includes data which is frequently asked for in
FOI requests or other public queries. Please check
[1]http://www.tfl.gov.uk/corporate/transpar... to see if this helps you.

We will publish anonymised versions of requests and responses on the
[2]www.tfl.gov.uk website. We will not publish your name and we will send
a copy of the response to you before it is published on our website.

In the meantime, if you would like to discuss this matter further, please
do not hesitate to contact me.

Yours sincerely

Gemma Jacob

Senior FOI Case Officer

FOI Case Management Team

General Counsel

Transport for London

[3][TfL request email]

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Dear Mr Macleod

Our Ref:         FOI-1277-2324

Thank you for your request received on 24 July 2023 asking for information
about the Ultra Low Emission Zone (ULEZ) and future road user charging
proposals.

Your request has been considered in accordance with the requirements of
the Environmental Information Regulations (EIR) and our information access
policy. I can confirm that we hold some of the information you require.
You asked:

Please provide the data which supports the claims of the Mayor + TFL.

The data for outer London (in November 2022) shows that 9 out of 10 cars
seen driving on an average day meet the ULEZ emissions standards, so their
drivers will not need to pay the ULEZ daily charge or take any action
ahead of the London-wide ULEZ expansion.

The information you have requested is available on our ULEZ pages on the
TfL website:

[1]https://tfl.gov.uk/modes/driving/ultra-l...

The Mayor and TFL have claimed that there are no plans to introduce
pay-per-mile or pay-per-minute driving.

This follows claims in Parliament that the Mayor and TFL are working on
ways that road pricing might be introduced across London.

Please provide answers to the questions below.

In order to assess the accuracy of the first claim, it is necessary to see
the actual data, including the location, date and time of the
observations.

This needs to include a spreadsheet listing each location, and the numbers
of compliant and non-compliant vehicle at each, broken down by car, LGV
and HGV.

As TFL have now installed many hundred ULEZ cameras to enforce their ULEZ
expansion, there can be no reason not to confirm the 106 locations where
the data was collected.

The precise location is not required, just the actual section of road and
direction of travel monitored.

The data was taken from the breadth of the expanded ULEZ area, it is the
average daily number of vehicles measured over the entire month of
November 2022.

Questions on TFL’s ULEZ scheme

A – What is the estimated installation cost, operation / maintenance cost,
and revenue to TFL from the ULEZ expansion to outer London in each of the
first 5 years of operation?

The ULEZ is not a money-making scheme, and within a few years, as
compliance increases, it will actually make a net loss. A successful
expanded ULEZ will lead to cleaner air and at the same time generate ever
smaller net revenues, as has been the case with the previous expansion to
inner London where people switched to greener vehicles. We are already
seeing 90 per cent of cars driven in outer London on an average day
complying and compliance levels are increasing all the time.

The estimated costs to set up the expanded London-wide ULEZ are in the
range of c£160m.This includes costs of signage, detection and enforcement
infrastructure and systems, marketing, project overheads and risk.

TfL estimates that the London-wide ULEZ could generate up to £200 million
a year for the first two years following expansion on 29 August but that
this will decline sharply to approximately £50 million in 2025/26. It is a
statutory requirement that any net revenue generated by our road charging
schemes (the ULEZ, LEZ or the Congestion Charge) is reinvested back into
London’s transport network, including investing in improving transport
links in outer London. All money received from the ULEZ is reinvested into
improving London’s public transport network, such as expanding bus routes
in outer London.

By 2027/28 net proceeds from the ULEZ are projected to be negligible.

Further information on the projected revenue is available in the Four-Year
General Programme:

[2]https://content.tfl.gov.uk/lez-four-year....

B – Where someone has registered for auto-pay, will TFL provide a bill
which shows when and where any charges applied have been incurred, so that
the driver can check they have not been wrongly billed? That means each
ULEZ camera that recorded a charge event, even if there is only one charge
incurred.

Yes, a monthly statement is sent via their preferred contact method that
details the journey dates over the statement period and the total amount
payable. The customer has the option in their online account to get more
details of each charge, this includes an image of the vehicle along with
the location. If a customer believed a charge has been incorrectly applied
then they can dispute it.

C – What does TFL do with the data collected of vehicle movements by its
network of ANPR cameras?

D – What is TFL’s data destruction policy – how long does it retain data
on each vehicle?

E – Is any data passed to any body outside of TFL? If so what data and
why?

F – Is any data passed or retained anonymised, so noone can backtrack the
movements of any individual vehicle?

The information that you have requested is available from the road user
charging scheme privacy page of our website:

[3]https://tfl.gov.uk/corporate/privacy-and...

Questions on TFL plans for road pricing.

1 – Have the Mayor or TFL stated, or will they state clearly that they
respect and support the right of the public to choose their mode of
travel, and their right to drive their cars on the road and park there –
with no new charges to make their travel by car more expensive?

2 – Have the Mayor or TFL pledged, or will they pledge that TFL will never
introduce any pay-per-mile or pay-per-minute scheme so long as Sadiq Khan
is mayor?

3 – Can the Mayor and TFL confirm that they are unaware of any work
undertaken by TFL or anyone employed by TFL to consider whether and how
any such schemes could be introduced?

We have no current plans for any such schemes.

If this is not the information you are looking for, or if you are unable
to access it for any reason, please do not hesitate to contact me.

Please see the attached information sheet for details of your right to
appeal.

Yours sincerely

Gemma Jacob

Senior FOI Case Officer

FOI Case Management Team

General Counsel

Transport for London

[4][TfL request email]

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TfL Ref: IRV-085-2324

Thank you for your email which was received by Transport for London (TfL) on 21 August 2023

You have expressed that you are dissatisfied with the handling of your request for information under the Freedom of Information Act.

A review will be conducted by an internal review panel in accordance with TfL’s Internal Review Procedure, which is available via the following URL:
https://tfl.gov.uk/corporate/transparenc...

Every effort will be made to provide you with a response by 18 September 2023. However, if the review will not be completed by this date, we will contact you and notify you of the revised response date as soon as possible.

In the meantime, if you would like to discuss this matter further please contact me.

Emma Flint
Principal Information Access Adviser
FOI Case Management Team
Transport for London

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FOI would like to recall the message, "FOI Internal Review Appeal - IRV-085-2324".

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FOI would like to recall the message, "FOI Internal Review Appeal - IRV-085-2324".

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Dear Kelvin Macleod

I am contacting you regarding your request for an internal review
concerning the response provided to FOI-1277-2324. Following your email of
21 August a review has been carried out by an Independent Review Panel
(‘the Panel’) consisting of individuals who were not involved in the
handling of your request.

To confirm, your original request of 24 July specifically asked the
following –

1 - The Mayor and TFL have claimed that over 90% of vehicles seen in outer
London are ULEZ compliant.  This is based on data from 106 cameras.

Please provide the data which supports the claims of the Mayor + TFL.

The Mayor and TFL have claimed that there are no plans to introduce
pay-per-mile or pay-per-minute driving. This follows claims in Parliament
that the Mayor and TFL are working on ways that road pricing might be
introduced across London.

Please provide answers to the questions below.

In order to assess the accuracy of the first claim, it is necessary to see
the actual data, including the location, date and time of the
observations.  This needs to include a spreadsheet listing each location,
and the numbers of compliant and non-compliant vehicle at each, broken
down by car, LGV and HGV.

As TFL have now installed many hundred ULEZ cameras to enforce their ULEZ
expansion, there can be no reason not to confirm the 106 locations where
the data was collected.

The precise location is not required, just the actual section of road and
direction of travel monitored.

Questions on TFL’s ULEZ scheme

A – What is the estimated installation cost, operation / maintenance cost,
and revenue to TFL from the ULEZ expansion to outer London in each of the
first 5 years of operation?

B – Where someone has registered for auto-pay, will TFL provide a bill
which shows when and where any charges applied have been incurred, so that
the driver can check they have not been wrongly billed?

That means each ULEZ camera that recorded a charge event, even if there is
only one charge incurred.

C – What does TFL do with the data collected of vehicle movements by its
network of ANPR cameras?

D – What is TFL’s data destruction policy – how long does it retain data
on each vehicle?

E – Is any data passed to any body outside of TFL?

If so what data and why?

F – Is any data passed or retained anonymised, so no one can backtrack the
movements of any individual vehicle?

Questions on TFL plans for road pricing.

1 – Have the Mayor or TFL stated, or will they state clearly that they
respect and support the right of the public to choose their mode of
travel, and their right to drive their cars on the road and park there –
with no new charges to make their travel by car more expensive?

2 – Have the Mayor or TFL pledged, or will they pledge that TFL will never
introduce any pay-per-mile or pay-per-minute scheme so long as Sadiq Khan
is mayor?

3 – Can the Mayor and TFL confirm that they are unaware of any work
undertaken by TFL or anyone employed by TFL to consider whether and how
any such schemes could be introduced?  

Your subsequent email of the 21 August stated -

1 – The first webpage you reference does not provide the data that was
requested.  It merely quotes daily averages for total number of cars
detected, total number of compliant cars, and total number of
non-compliant cars, leading to a proportion of 90.0% compliant.

This FOI asked for full details of the data. That means here the number of
compliant and non-compliant cars at each of the 106 locations on each day
surveyed. The location of these 106 sites is required.

In addition, TFL was asked about vehicle types.

Did TFL only collect data on cars?

Did TFL ignore vans ie LGV types?

Does TFL have any data on how many compliant and non-compliant LGV type
there were observed?

If TFL has this data, then it is required. If TFL did not collect this
data, then TFL is required to explain why this was not collected.

2 - Questions on TFL plans for road pricing. The FOI contained 3 clear and
specific questions. None of these were answered in the response. Instead a
bland statement was made, that does not address the issues raised: “We
have no current plans for any such schemes.”

That is unacceptable. TFL are obliged to address and answer the questions
asked. The first two questions contained two parts:

Have TFL or the Mayor ….

Will TFL or the Mayor ….

Each requires 4 separate answers, two for TFL – have they or will they,
and two for the Mayor, has he or will he. In this case, TFL means any
senior TFL officer with responsibility for making public statements in the
topic area. The third question requires each of TFL and the Mayor to state
whether they are or are not aware of any work of the type described.

The panel have reviewed your original request, the response provided and
your complaint email of 21 August.

With regards to the data used broken down by each location /  vehicle type
etc, we do not record this granular level of information and compliance is
not assessed by vehicle type broken down at individual cameras. We can
confirm that the data from November 2022 was the average daily compliance
of cars over a 24 hour day, using each of the days of the calendar month.
This was then subject to the Office for National Statistics review and is
reported on the website.

Concerning the disclosure of the locations of all 106 cameras in
accordance with the Environment Information Regulations (EIR), we are not
obliged to supply the information as it is subject to a statutory
exception to the right of access to information under regulations
R12(5)(a) – international relations, defence, national security & public
safety (in this instance specifically public safety), regulation 12(5)(b)
– the course of justice, the ability of a person to receive a fair trial
or the ability of the public authority to conduct and inquiry of a
criminal or disciplinary nature – (in this instance specifically the
course of justice), and regulation 12(5)(e) – confidentially of commercial
or industrial information where such confidentiality is provide by law to
protect a legitimate economic interest.
The rationale for this is explained in more detail in a published response
to a previous information request which is available on our website here:
[1]https://tfl.gov.uk/corporate/transparenc...

Lastly with regards to your 3 questions concerning pay-per-mile –

1 – Have the Mayor or TFL stated, or will they state clearly that they
respect and support the right of the public to choose their mode of
travel, and their right to drive their cars on the road and park there –
with no new charges to make their travel by car more expensive?

2 – Have the Mayor or TFL pledged, or will they pledge that TFL will never
introduce any pay-per-mile or pay-per-minute scheme so long as Sadiq Khan
is mayor?

The above 2 questions require statements of expression or opinion rather
than recorded information held, therefore they do not fall within the
remit of the Freedom of Information Act and should be directed to the
Greater London Authority / Mayors Office -
[2]https://www.london.gov.uk/contact-or-vis...

3 – Can the Mayor and TFL confirm that they are unaware of any work
undertaken by TFL or anyone employed by TFL to consider whether and how
any such schemes could be introduced?  

As advised in the response to your FOI request, we have no current plans
for any such schemes.

I hope the above response provides clarification concerning the
information that you seek, however if you are dissatisfied with the
internal review actions to date please do not hesitate to contact me or
alternately you can refer the matter to the independent authority
responsible for enforcing the Freedom of Information Act, at the following
address:

Information Commissioner’s Office

Wycliffe House

Water Lane

Wilmslow

Cheshire SK9 5AF

A complaint form is also available on the ICO’s website
([3]www.ico.org.uk).

Yours sincerely

Emma Flint

Principal Information Access Adviser

FOI Case Management Team

Transport for London

[4][TfL request email]

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Dear Kelvin Macleod,

TfL Ref: FOI-2804-2324

Thank you for your further request received by Transport for London (TfL)
on 5^th November 2023.

Your request will be processed in accordance with the requirements of the
Freedom of Information Act and our information access policy. 

A response will be sent to you by 4^th December 2023.

We will publish anonymised versions of requests and responses on the
[1]www.tfl.gov.uk website. We will not publish your name and we will send
a copy of the response to you before it is published on our website.

In the meantime, if you would like to discuss this matter further, please
do not hesitate to contact me.

Yours sincerely,

David Wells

FOI Case Officer

FOI Case Management Team

General Counsel

Transport for London

show quoted sections

Dear Kelvin Macleod,

TfL Ref: EIR-2804-2324

Thank you for your further request received by Transport for London (TfL)
on 5^th November 2023.

Your request has been considered in accordance with the requirements of
the Environmental Information Regulations (EIR) Act and our information
access policy. 

Your questions are answered in turn below:

Question 1 – You say, “compliance is not assessed by vehicle type”, and
then “average daily compliance of cars”.

The ULEZ expansion to outer London impacts both cars and small vans.

Please confirm whether TFL’s data only relates to cars, and ignores all
other vehicles, notably small vans, ie under 3.5t.

Answer: We assess data for all vehicle types subject to the ULEZ. The data
is gathered for the whole zone, in this case outer London, and then
collated into vehicle types and compliance status. We recently published a
ULEZ First Month report which details compliance rates by different
vehicle types at different time points including November 2022. The report
is available online via the following link:

[1]https://www.london.gov.uk/programmes-str....

Question 2: How did TFL separate “cars” from “vans” and then all other
vehicles, eg buses and HGV?

Answer: For the ULEZ, we determine vehicle type based on the vehicle
category code for each vehicle contained in the vehicle records shared
with us by the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency.

Question 3: How many vehicles recorded by the cameras did TFL therefore
exclude at each site on each day?

Answer: No vehicles subject to the ULEZ are excluded from assessment of
ULEZ compliance.

Question 4: Why did TFL only produce data for cars, when it is generally
believed that many more vans than cars are not ULEZ compliant?

Answer: The data on our ULEZ compliance webpage at the time only referred
to cars in outer London because the purpose was to substantiate the same
compliance rate that we used in a press release in March 2023 and in our
scheme marketing. Our press release and marketing focused on the car
compliance rate because this is the largest vehicle group subject to the
ULEZ in terms of volumes. The ULEZ also applies to motorcycles, vans and
specialist vehicles (up to and including 3.5 tonnes) and minibuses (up to
and including 5 tonnes). Vans have a lower compliance rate than cars but
there are lower volumes in London so overall more cars than vans do not
comply with the ULEZ standards.

Question 5: How does TFL justify its claims by only counting cars, when
this is clearly grossly misleading in terms of vehicles affected by the
ULEZ expansion?

Answer: As above, we analyse compliance rate and vehicle volumes for all
vehicles subject to the ULEZ and this data has been provided in our recent
ULEZ First Month report.

Question 6: - In terms of the traffic data, in order to arrive at a total,
it is necessary to collect the data from each of the 106 cameras, and then
combine this into a total.

You say that data was collected on every day during November 2022,
presumably at each of the 106 sites.

That means at the least TFL must have collected a set of registration
numbers at each camera for each day.

This FOI requires the numbers of these registration numbers.

That is a spreadsheet with 106 rows, one for each camera.

30 columns for each of the days in November 2022.

The number of vehicles seen at each location can then be provided.

That data must be provided.

The obvious course of action for the analysis would be to then use the
registration numbers at each site on each day to obtain the number of
compliant vehicles at that site on that day.

This is important in order to validate whether there is any significant
variation between the sites, and between different days of the week and of
the month.

Please confirm whether TFL did in fact do this.

Answer: This data is not held. Data from individual ANPR cameras is never
used to assess ULEZ compliance. The cameras are arranged into zones and
only the total for the zone is counted and then analysed. Since cameras
are positioned on a mix of both major and minor roads it is not helpful to
consider cameras in isolation.

Question 7: If TFL did do this, then please provide the numbers of
compliant vehicles at each location on each day.

This would be a second table.

Answer: As above, this data is not held.

Question 8: If TFL did not do this, please explain why, given that it does
not involve significant extra labour, and it would provide useful
information, beyond the gross totals that TFL has published.

TFL could provide this data now, and it would be in the public interest to
do so.

Please consider doing so now.

Answer: As above, this data is not held.

Question 9: In terms of the locations of the 106 cameras, this information
is essential and indeed vital in order to validate TFL’s claims.

For example, there would be likely to be a big difference between the
numbers and proportion of non-compliant vehicles seen by a camera near the
outer London boundary, compared with one near the inner London boundary.

In order for the public to have confidence in TFL claims, it is essential
to examine the locations of each of the 106 cameras, to ensure that they
do fairly reflect the total outer London area.

Answer: As previously stated, in accordance with the Environment
Information Regulations (EIR), we are not  obliged to supply the locations
of cameras as it is subject to a statutory exception to the right of
access to information under regulations R12(5)(a) – international
relations, defence, national security & public  safety (in this instance
specifically public safety), regulation 12(5)(b)  – the course of justice,
the ability of a person to receive a fair trial  or the ability of the
public authority to conduct and inquiry of a  criminal or disciplinary
nature – (in this instance specifically the  course of justice), and
regulation 12(5)(e) – confidentially of commercial  or industrial
information where such confidentiality is provide by law to  protect a
legitimate economic interest. The rationale for this is explained in more
detail in a published response  to a previous information request which is
available on our website here:

[2]https://tfl.gov.uk/corporate/transparenc...

Question 10: Please also explain how TFL came to choose the 106 locations
used, from among maybe 2200 then in situ.

Answer: The 106 locations are based on the cameras available in outer
London in November 2022.

Question 11: You claim an exemption, and refer to a previous request, and
your website.

Your claims have been examined.

They relate to revealing the current locations of the entirety of TFL’s
ULEZ cameras.

This FOI relates to the locations of 106 specific cameras one year ago.

The precise location is not required, for example, “facing NW, and sited
at traffic signals and 12.5m north from the southbound stop line, at
postcode XYN MPQ”.

“In Acacia Road and monitoring that road, close to the junction with
Brandon Road”, along with the postcode, for example, would be sufficient.

Given that the vast majority of TFL ULEZ cameras are readily visible to
the public, and maps have been published showing the precise location of
nearly all of more than 3100 cameras, there is no possible legitimate
reason among those you quote not to provide the location of the 106
cameras chosen by TFL for its survey.

Answer: See answer to Question 9 above. Any information that would allow
the identification of any ULEZ camera is excepted from disclosure.

Question 12: You say, “The above 2 questions require statements of
expression or opinion rather than recorded information held”.

The first question was “Have the Mayor or TFL stated, or will they state
…”.

Whether “the Mayor or TFL have stated” is a matter of fact.

Each either has or has not stated …, and under FOI TFL is obliged to state
that they have, or that they have not, or that TFL do not know if they or
the Mayor has stated … - or maybe that “TFL are unaware that the Mayor has
stated / TFL has stated …

In terms of “will they state”, TFL may be able to say that “they do intend
to state …”, or that “TFL and the Mayor have no plans to state ..”, or
that TFL do not know whether the Mayor and TFL have any plains to state …
One of the above must be true, and TFL have to say which.

In terms of “Have the Mayor or TFL pledged, or will they pledge …”,
similar comments apply – and of course it may be that the Mayor has said
something, but TFL has not, etc.

Again, one of the equivalent to the above must be true, and TFL have to
say which.

Answer: This appears to be asking us to revisit our answers to two
previous questions – this is addressed as follows:

Question: 1 – Have the Mayor or TFL stated, or will they state clearly
that they respect and support the right of the public to choose their mode
of travel, and their right to drive their cars on the road and park there
– with no new charges to make their travel by car more expensive?

Answer: We are not aware of any specific statements to this effect or the
contrary. The Mayor’s and TfL’s ambitions for transport in London are set
out in the
[3]([4]https://tfl.gov.uk/corporate/about-tfl/t...)
(MTS) (published in 2018).

Question 2: Have the Mayor or TFL pledged, or will they pledge that TFL
will never introduce any pay-per-mile or pay-per-minute scheme so long as
Sadiq Khan is mayor?

Answer: The Mayor has stated a pay per mile scheme is not on the table and
not on his agenda whilst he is Mayor. Please see the following statement
the Mayor made at Mayors Question Time on 14 September 2023.

[5]https://www.london.gov.uk/who-we-are/wha...

Question 13: In terms of the final question, your answer evades the point
and purpose of the question.

> 3 – Can the Mayor and TFL confirm that they are unaware of any work
undertaken by TFL or anyone employed by TFL to consider whether and how
any such schemes could be introduced? 

> As advised in the response to your FOI request, we have no current plans
for any such schemes.

The question did not ask if there were any “current plans for any such
schemes”.

The question asked quite clearly about any work undertaken by or on behalf
of TFL to “consider whether and how any such schemes could be
introduced?”.

It does not ask about any current plans.

It asks about any work undertaken to examine whether and how any such
schemes might be brought in.

That requires a factual answer to what was asked.

Answer: The Mayor previously 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. As stated
above, the Mayor has recently stated a pay per mile scheme is not on the
table and not on his agenda, and TfL is not working on designing a pay per
mile scheme.

If this is not the information you are looking for please do not hesitate
to contact me.

Please see the attached information sheet for details of your right to
appeal as well as information on copyright and what to do if you would
like to re-use any of the information we have disclosed.

Yours sincerely,

David Wells

FOI Case Officer

FOI Case Management Team

General Counsel

Transport for London

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