TIE-d up in knots

THE public consultation on the city council’s proposals for congestion charging has generated a pathetically low response. The fact that 600,000 leaflets were distributed and fewer than 3000 people responded must surely cast doubt over whether most people received a copy. If they did, then it either represents is a worrying show of apathy or indicates that the majority of people believed the result was a foregone conclusion.

But the most remarkable thing to emerge from Transport Initiatives Edinburgh and the city council’s latest deliberations on congestion charging is that council leaders are preparing to go against the advice of both their own arm’s-length company and their own officials.

TIE has made it very clear that exempting those who live in rural west Edinburgh from paying the outer cordon toll would be unfair. They are not alone in that view, as the council’s city development director, Andrew Holmes, warns that this move would leave the council open to an increased risk of a legal challenge.

Yet the council seems prepared to go ahead with the exemption, flying in the face of the advice of its own wholly-owned company - of which transport leader Andrew Burns is a board member - and its own senior officials. This is another indication that the council’s congestion charging plans are in chaos.

Even attempts to iron out anomalies seem to be creating more problems than they solve. Motorists who drive out of Edinburgh to go to work will doubtless welcome the fact that they would not be charged to cross the outer cordon to drive back into the city.

But what about those residents who live within the city centre cordon? If they drive to work outside the city centre, they will still have to pay to cross the cordon to return home. It remains to be seen whether discounting their parking permits will be a sufficient incentive for people who live in the city centre or whether the cost of the toll will persuade them to move elsewhere.

The proposal to spend 3 million a year to promote shopping and leisure activities in the city centre also seems unlikely to placate angry retailers on Princes Street, who have warned they stand to lose 100million a year in lost sales. The tolls plan is also completely at odds with the council’s policy of regenerating Princes Street.

By the admission of the council’s own advisers, the congestion charging plans are unfair and face a very real risk of a legal challenge; the plans are also full of anomalies and there are doubts about the credibility of this consultation exercise.

The council is now tying itself in knots over a policy which seems doomed to failure. It should abandon it now.