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Flawed Report Suggests Motorcycles to Pay for Congestion Charging
A recent report from: Robert B. Noland - Mohammed A. Quddus - Washington Y. Ochieng – more experts from the Imperial College London and Loughborough Univ.– entitled “The effect of the London congestion charge on road
casualties: an intervention analysis” states, “that there has been a significant increase in motorcycle casualties in the Congestion Charging zone since its inception in 2003”, they suggest a 16% increase and based on that assumption, the authors conclude that, “these results do suggest a ‘potential problem’ and one solution is to also charge motorcyclists who enter the congestion zone”.
MAG says that this is Ouija Board research!
I can't help but wonder if the authors are in need of more money for research, now that congestion charging and road pricing schemes are high on the agenda.
Who knows?
What is clear is that their analysis is in complete contradiction to the data released by Transport for London. According to the TfL Street Management report 2007. ‘Regarding progress towards the 2010 casualty reduction targets, KSI casualties in Outer London showed the greatest reduction between 2005 and the 1994-98 average, falling by 12% compared with 7% in Inner London.’
But, analysis of the boroughs within the Congestion Charging zone demonstrates that the overall reduction of KSIs for PTWs is 14% which is a higher reduction than both Inner and Outer London.
P2W user casualty rates per 100 million vehicle kilometres travelled by P2W in Greater London 1993 to 2005. This clearly illustrates the steady fall in the casualty rate since 2000.
My thanks to Leon Mannings for the heads up on this report.
Trevor Baird
General Secretary MAG UK
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