Dubbed the Birmingham Mobility Action Plan (BMAP), the plans are intended to reinvent the city’s transport system, meeting current and future mobility challenges, to facilitate strong and sustainable economic growth.’
Included within the draft document are considerations about changes to the A38 tunnels, with the council saying it is looking to re-evaluate their future.
The document also says that the council are considering solutions to reduce harmful pollutants from road traffic including the possibility of applying a Low Emissions Zone (LEZ) for the city core following similar concepts adopted in London and other cities.
The document also says that the city council is looking at introducing a Workplace Parking Levy similar to the one in Nottingham, which currently charges employers (both public and private sector) £334 per parking space; when 11 or more spaces are provided. The council said it is estimated however that there is between 20,000 and 40,000 such spaces which could potentially fall into the scope of such a levy for Birmingham.
It added: ‘A levy of this kind is only one potential policy tool available to generate new sources of capital or revenue funding. If it were introduced then it would be the intention of the Council to ring-fence this funding and put it back into the transport system, investing in the schemes described in this document. Alternatively future revenue from the scheme for a five or ten year period could be leveraged or borrowed from the private capital market to create a significant pot of funding to help develop the BMAP vision.’
The document also looks at Green Freight Initiatives, such as consolidation of common supplies and logistics using local distribution centres and encouraging use of low emissions vehicles for freight movement.
Other areas in the report include a parking pricing structure review for the city centre, smarter use of the city centre car parking and encouragement to employers to reduce travel in general and introduce smarter ways of working as well as a proposed investment in walking and cycling provision.
Sir Albert Bore, the Leader of Birmingham City Council, said: ‘This is a transport plan, not for tomorrow but for over the next 25 years. We need an integrated transport system in Birmingham which we all need to agree on. This is why we are putting out this consultation document. Once this plan is agreed across the businesses and residents of Birmingham then we need to put in place funding programmes that will allow us to implement the plan over the coming years.
‘This is precisely what countries such as France and Germany have done over the last 20 years, and which is why their transport infrastructure is so much better than ours. We need to do better in Birmingham and this plan will allow us to deliver a transport system comparable to other cities in Europe.’
A public consultation will follow.
