While his party leader talks about trying to help the poor and looking out for their concerns, London Mayor Boris Johnson unveils crippling 20% fare-rises for London’s commuters.

A year ago Boris did exactly the same: hiking up transport fares across London and trying to blame Ken even though the previous administration left him with a 5% growth in budgets.

That’s two years in a row he has brutally punished London’s commuters – hitting hardest London’s poor who rely on public transport. In some cases, as Tom points out here, fares have risen by a third.

During that time he has sucked to the City and defended the very bankers who caused the recession, been ‘bought off’ by hedge funds, wasted a huge amount of money scrapping bendy buses, and created a financial black-hole by getting rid of the Western Extension Zone and of course described his £250,000 income from writing as “chicken feed”.

He’s creating his own negative narrative.
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Boris Johnson is threatening to kill some children and worsen the educational outcomes of many more.

The reason for this is straightforward. He intends to remove the western extension zone of the congestion charge, and delay phase three of the low emission zone, which would charge polluting vans more for entering London.

The effects of these will be to increase congestion and emissions of carbon and nitrogen oxide. Such emissions, however, are quite strongly associated with pre-natal health, as a new paper by Janet Currie and Reed Walker demonstrate.

They studied the impact of the introduction of E-Z Pass in New Jersey and Pennsylvania. This system allows cars to travel onto toll roads without stopping to pay manually. They therefore greatly reduce congestion and emissions around the toll plazas.
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It costs me about £25–30 in petrol to drive the 55 miles from my home in Hackney to Brighton, and the same 55 back again. First Capital Connect is asking north of £90 for a return ticket for our family this weekend, starting from London Bridge. So if there’s a traffic jam on the northbound M23 this Sunday evening (inevitable), you can blame me.

If I lived in Florence, a family return trip of similar length to Livorno (birthplace of the PCI, home of the cacciucco) comes to about €33. From Brussels, a weekend rail trip to Bruges, 90km away, would cost us just over €49. A slightly longer journey in France, from Lyon to Chambery and back, comes to €59. continue reading… »