Brighton & Hove City Council leader Jason Kitcat on a new Low Emissions Zone

While air quality has improved across much of the city since 2010, pollution levels remain stubbornly high in some areas – particularly in the city centre. Although measures to encourage cleaner transport options are working, we need to do more.

The problem is that there are both too many vehicles in the city centre, and there are many that are not very ‘clean’ in terms of the pollution they produce. The main source of the problem is diesel engines particularly commercial vehicles.

Poor air quality leads to and worsens serious health problems, especially if people are exposed to pollution in the long term. Impacts include increased heart attacks and strokes in adults. There are also links between traffic pollution from busy roads near schools and new cases of asthma in children. There is also a growing possibility of huge EU fines for poor air quality being passed down to councils by central government.

Given the seriousness of the problem, doing nothing is not an option. So we recently proposed a new Low Emissions Zone (LEZ) in the city centre to tackle air pollution from traffic. LEZs, such as in Oxford and London, limit the most polluting vehicles from entering certain areas or streets in order to reduce pollution and encourage cleaner vehicles.

A Brighton & Hove zone would focus on setting and working towards minimum standards in the city centre for vehicle fleet operators such as bus, taxi and delivery companies. We hope to be able to share some specific proposals for a zone later this year and we’re pleased that Brighton & Hove Buses have agreed to work with us on this.

By working with our transport partners to jointly set targets that are fair, challenging and achievable, we’ll be able to make real progress in dealing with the problem of air pollution in the city centre.