ULEZ compliance

[V]

I checked my Jeeps today on the TFL ULEZ checker and I was surprised at the result.

 

My 2001 4.0L XJ is ULEZ compliant, but my 1933 4.0L XJ isn't.

 

My 1993 has done most of its mileage on LPG and it consistently tests for lower emission on the MOT than the petrol only 2001. I'm not likely to ever visit London again so it doesn't matter that much to me. My 2001 according to DVLA pumps out 341g of CO2 per whatever (km, mile) but there is no data for the 1993 as records began in 2001. It appears 2001 registered XJs may be the only ones that are ULEZ compliant whereas the real world emissions between the 1992-2001 4.0L models may not be that much different. I guess anything made before 2001 taxed as PLG is automatically ULEZ non-compliant.

 

[doodle]

My 2001 4.0TJ isnt- But my JKU is, My 2003 WJ V8 was compliant as well

[V]

1 hour ago, doodle said:

My 2001 4.0TJ isnt

Was it registered before or after 1 March 2001?

[doodle]

16 minutes ago, V said:

Was it registered before or after 1 March 2001?

June 2001

[frosty]

On 01/07/2023 at 16:00, V said:

I checked my Jeeps today on the TFL ULEZ checker and I was surprised at the result.

 

My 2001 4.0L XJ is ULEZ compliant, but my 1933 4.0L XJ isn't.

 

My 1993 has done most of its mileage on LPG and it consistently tests for lower emission on the MOT than the petrol only 2001. I'm not likely to ever visit London again so it doesn't matter that much to me. My 2001 according to DVLA pumps out 341g of CO2 per whatever (km, mile) but there is no data for the 1993 as records began in 2001. It appears 2001 registered XJs may be the only ones that are ULEZ compliant whereas the real world emissions between the 1992-2001 4.0L models may not be that much different. I guess anything made before 2001 taxed as PLG is automatically ULEZ non-compliant.

 

Vince, it is not just London, my friend got caught last week, i think it was in Birmingham, it cost him 120 pounds. 

[JimC]

3 hours ago, doodle said:

My 2001 4.0TJ isnt- But my JKU is, My 2003 WJ V8 was compliant as well

My 2001 WJ 4.7 V8 is compliant as well.
Think it might be to do with the California emission rules as I believe that exported Jeeps complied to the CA regulations at the time.

 

[V]

Does your V8 have pre-cats in the down pipes?

My 2001 4.0L XJ doesn't, but I know the California models did. My Jeep has a California spec exhaust manifold and it still has the original equipment Federal spec no-pre-cat downpipe.

[doodle]

1 hour ago, V said:

Does your V8 have pre-cats in the down pipes?

My 2001 4.0L XJ doesn't, but I know the California models did. My Jeep has a California spec exhaust manifold and it still has the original equipment Federal spec no-pre-cat downpipe.

Unfortunately i got rid off my wj. Not entirely sure if it did or not. 

[Caroline12]

I checked @spookie the aardvark 4.7L V8 WG 2002 and that has 3 cats I think and is ULEZ compliant as well, so is Daisy Duck 2016 Trailhawk. 

[Raakhee]

ULEZ is a scam and is only in place to penalise drivers for not using TFL. The TFL database is not accurate. People are finding that the government website shows their vehicles to be compliant but as TFL does not have your info they automatically deem you non compliant. Some private plate owners are being penalised because the original plates are compliant but the private ones are not. Again, incomplete data and the assumption made that all vehicles are non compliant until proven otherwise. 

The way I see it, the government charges us an annual emissions tax, so no need to pay additional tax which is exorbitantly more expensive for an unproven penalty. There is no actual measure for each vehicles emissions on any given day so how can a blanket charge be issued when air cannot be contained. What guarantee do we have that London can maintain good air quality? Is there a magic bubble around London that the fairies have put up? The same fairies that make your vehicle magically compliant after you pay the charge?

So I call BS on this charge. 

[frosty]

my WJ ( 4.7) is also compliant. 

[UKTJ]

On 02/07/2023 at 14:48, doodle said:

My 2001 4.0TJ isnt- But my JKU is, My 2003 WJ V8 was compliant as well

Interesting, because according to the TFL online checker my 2002 4.0 TJ Is ULEZ compliant 

[Cameron]

My 2005 TJ 4.0 is coming up as not compliant

[doodle]

27 minutes ago, UKTJ said:

Interesting, because according to the TFL online checker my 2002 4.0 TJ Is ULEZ compliant 

Bonus.....

[TimC]

5 hours ago, Raakhee said:

ULEZ is a scam and is only in place to penalise drivers for not using TFL. The TFL database is not accurate. People are finding that the government website shows their vehicles to be compliant but as TFL does not have your info they automatically deem you non compliant. Some private plate owners are being penalised because the original plates are compliant but the private ones are not. Again, incomplete data and the assumption made that all vehicles are non compliant until proven otherwise. 

The way I see it, the government charges us an annual emissions tax, so no need to pay additional tax which is exorbitantly more expensive for an unproven penalty. There is no actual measure for each vehicles emissions on any given day so how can a blanket charge be issued when air cannot be contained. What guarantee do we have that London can maintain good air quality? Is there a magic bubble around London that the fairies have put up? The same fairies that make your vehicle magically compliant after you pay the charge?

So I call BS on this charge. 

 

I think it may be a little unfair to call it a BS scam, I think that there is a genuine desire to improve city air quality............however you are right, it is in place to penalise drivers for not using TFL and there may be some income generation in it as well. The ULEZ along with the congestion charge and the huge amount of road restrictions that have been put in place recently are designed to deter people from driving into London and reducing non essential city car journeys is not necessarily a bad thing in principle. To be fair to the mayor he is also reasonably honest about it, he's fairly up front about saying he just doesn't want people driving in London and that's OK, I don't mind honesty even if it's honesty I may not agree with. What makes it a bad thing is the failure to provide a good quality, clean, comfortable, cheap and reliable public transport alternative, even in London. The other thing that makes it a bad thing is that it is a very blunt instrument as you point out, it has many things that appear not to make any sense but I doubt that they put much effort into getting it right for the small minority of people with non mainstream vehicles as long as they cover the 95% that drive "normal" cars. As with most financial penalties, it is also something that massively disproportionately affects poorer people than rich people. Rich people don't care, they can drive where they want and pay, poor people can't it hits them much harder. I don't count myself as rich but I am well enough off to be able to afford the outrageous amount of road tax on my JKU even though the amount of CO2 it actually emits is minimal as it does so few actual miles. If I were less well off I'd be taxed out of ownership, which might be the point. 

I don't necessarily mind policies that openly want to deter vehicle use but doing it on a payment basis is unfair because it doesn't affect the rich. Simply replacing internal combustion powered  vehicles with electric motor powered vehicles is not the answer either. Whether you buy the CO2 thing or not having less vehicles on the roads, and therefore less congestion, has to be a good thing especially for those journeys that are essential. What is needed is good affordable public transport infrastructure and residential planning policies that don't make car journeys unavoidable, however since neither of these things are likely in the near future we are stuck with footing the bill for our choice of personal transport 

 

Apologies to anyone who has read this far without becoming comatose, I seem to have rambled a long way off topic 

[JimC]

On 02/07/2023 at 18:34, V said:

Does your V8 have pre-cats in the down pipes?

My 2001 4.0L XJ doesn't, but I know the California models did. My Jeep has a California spec exhaust manifold and it still has the original equipment Federal spec no-pre-cat downpipe.

Yes she does 
Just wondering if the 4.7 High Output also does

[Raakhee]

@TimC the outer London Boroughs do not benefit from the convenient TFL transport as the inner city does. The mayor doesn't recognise this. Also, Heathrow is right here where I live so will drastically affect any emissions reading in the area. Makes no sense to charge someone who drives a perfectly good car 10mins before leaving London. Work for us is in Egham and there is no direct public transport in a reasonable time compared to driving. Nobody is driving around the city for pleasure.  We get to work and back. But we are being penalised to do so. So this now translates as a tax on working. 

Yes, we want to improve the air quality but not by taxing people out of a job. It should be done by improvements to existing vehicles. Working with the public to retrofit vehicles is better than scrapping and then having to buy new vehicles at prices starting at £30,000 and upwards. This cuts off a whole generation of learning to drive and affording a first vehicle. 

 

My issue is that the mayor is using outdated results from a theoretical model done in 2019 (pre pandemic) to justify his expansion. People have changed how they work and commute during the pandemic. Most opting to work from home. This is an issue as TFL has had a massive drop in Revenue. That and the fact the government has stopped handouts to them had sparked this expansion. It is not cheap to travel on TFL so not even a viable alternative provided. When wages have stagnated, inflation has gone up so much, it is the wrong time to get anyone on board with this scheme. 

He is calling it a medical emergency. If that is so, then stop all non compliant vehicles. He will not do that as he needs the Revenue. Right now its all about money and not about the environment. Proof being that every green space around my area is being developed into multi storey flats. More people equals more council tax. No care about the extra congestion or extra pollution.

 

I apologise if I went off on a rant.

 

[Caroline12]

13 hours ago, JimC said:

Yes she does 
Just wondering if the 4.7 High Output also does

@spookie the aardvark is a High output and passes

[UKTJ]

Interesting reporting of this on Newsnight yesterday.  I think the overall thrust was very much in line with @Raakhee's points.

 

In short, compaŕing London to many other major cities the air quality is poor and the introduction of ULEZ in central London has had a positive impact.  But that comes at a cost, particularly small businesses in the ULEZ expansion zone.  They interviewed one giy who is shutting his business as the ULEZ related costs would be something like £7,000 annually and he said on top of trying to recover from the pandemic and deal with the impact of inflation that is just one thing too many.  One interviewee summed up this part of the discussion as a decision between health and wealth.

 

But for me the most interesting contributor was the disability rights campaigner.  It seems one of the groups challenging the expansion is the disability lobby, because of the impact it will have on disabled people.  He made a strong argument that the ULEZ expansion may be dealing with one health issue at the cost of another, arguing that for many diabled people the ULEZ expansion would in effect trap them in their homes.  Diabled people are typically poorer than the average so may not be able to afford the ULEZ charge and / or a vehicle upgrade, but even the limited public transport options that exist in the expansion zone are unusable in the form provided by TFL.  The result could be very negative from a physical and mental health perspective.

[Raakhee]

Yes Terry, the pensioners and vulnerable are at risk of becoming isolated. Social workers who are not paid fabulous salaries will not be able to attend people due to the added expense of using their perfectly functioning non compliant vehicle. Most people are just doing their best to survive. We have heard how the consultation was rigged by the Mayor's media people targeting young impressionable adults, some of the results being omitted as they would have tipped the vote. Even so, a majority still said they were not in favour of the expansion. The mayor then disregards this result because we now live in a dictatorship and not a democracy. 

 

I would like for him to spend a month living in the outer Borough, with the average salary, feeding a family of 4, driving a non compliant vehicle to and from his London office, with no benefits. This would be the only way for him to experience what we are living through.