Fulham’s Clean Air Neighbourhood raking in fewer fines – and putting off visitors

By Ben Lynch, Local Democracy Reporter

Hammersmith and Fulham council is forecast to receive millions of pounds less than expected in parking fines for 2024/25 – largely because of the better than expected results of its clean air schemes.

The local authority is projecting a shortfall of £6.7 million for the year ahead in its parking service area.

While it has said there are multiple factors involved, a spokesman said the drop in Penalty Charge Notices from its Clean Air Neighbourhoods (CANs) is the biggest and most significant element.

In March this year, the council made permanent a trial scheme launched just over a year earlier covering an area west of Wandsworth Bridge Road.

This joined a separate CAN implemented to the road’s east, which had been in place since December 2021.

Unlike typical Low Traffic Neighbourhoods (LTNs), the CANs deploy cameras to fine out-of-borough drivers cutting through streets in a bid to reduce vehicle numbers and improve local air quality. Certain groups, such as black cabs as well as residents, are exempt.

Data published by Hammersmith and Fulham council ahead of the trial’s permanent adoption found it had removed an average of 7,000 vehicles from its roads every day, alongside cuts to carbon dioxide (CO2) and nitrogen oxide (NOx).

Those without exemptions caught driving through one of the access points of the CANs are fined £65 if paid within 14 days, or £130 if not.

Data released earlier this year revealed that for 2023, the two schemes pulled in £11.8m – £7.8m from the western zone, and £4m from the eastern.

In a report published ahead of next Monday’s cabinet meeting, the local authority records a ‘forecast variance’, or shortfall, of £6.7m for its parking service area.

In a commentary box next to the figure, council officers wrote: “The council has waived fines and introduced business visitor permits and visitors to support the local economy.

“There has also been a better than anticipated change in driver behaviours leading to a reduction in traffic volumes and forecast income.”

Hammersmith and Fulham believes some other factors are at play – including the reduction in Pay and Display charges and decreases in both car ownership and overall traffic volumes.

They added the number of contraventions by out-of-borough motorists cutting through side streets has dropped by about 80 per cent since the trial to the west of Wandsworth Bridge Road was launched last February, and that the council expects fines in 2024 to be about a third of those recorded in 2023.

Conservative councillor Afonso Jose, who sits on the borough’s climate change and ecology committee, said the fact people are ‘actively avoiding’ the South Fulham area ‘is not something to be celebrated’.

“This used to be a destination, where those from neighbouring areas came to shop at our local businesses, and freely visit family and friends,” he said. “The council has used this scheme as an easy way to balance the books, but the long term damage to our local economy and the division caused to the community is the real tragedy.”

A council spokesman said: “We are really pleased that out-of-borough motorists have stopped using residential streets as commuter cut-throughs in South Fulham.

“There are now 15,000 fewer cars every day using those streets while 1.4 tonnes of deadly NOx and two tonnes of climate-damaging carbon emissions have been removed from the air.

“Pollution from congestion has become a thing of the past. Residential streets are now quieter, cleaner and safer. Compliance by drivers is regularly over 98 per cent. This demonstrates that the Clean Air Neighbourhoods have been a success.

“We are now cracking on with our plans to transform Wandsworth Bridge Road into a clean and green place that puts people first, a destination high street at the heart of the community.”

Pictured top: A sign warning of the no-go roads for outsiders (Picture: Facundo Arrizabalaga)