Bath Lez zone starts March 15th (1 Viewer)

[cliffanger]

John lunarman reminded us of this when we met him this weekend, and just happened to mention that our van was due for an MOT today in our usual commercial MOT garage on the Lower Bristol Road.

When we got home, and after consulting the map, we spotted that the garage was in the clean air zone, and so went through the process for applying for the exemption permit to bring the £100 down to £9 for each trip in. Even though it’s an application for them to get money out of you, the application has to be approved, which will take up to 14 days, during which time, if you want to go into the CAZ it will cost you £100!

We rang the CAZ office and said we needed the permit by the next day, and the man said ‘no way, it takes up to 14 days. He then said “I shouldn’t be telling you this, but there is a grace period, so if you go and get your MOT done you will get a Fixed Penalty Charge sent out for the fine, but if you pay it within 7 days, by contacting the automated number, you will get it reduced to £9”! Thanks mate, but having had experience of trying to contact automated numbers to get a parking fine reduced before, I’ll give that one a miss!

The unbelievableness of it doesn’t end there however!

We contacted the garage to say we would be cancelling the MOT until our permit comes through, and it might be a good idea for them to tell future customers that they are within the CAZ and the girls on the phone were flabbergasted! They had been told by BANES that motor homes were exempt, so had no idea that anyone coming to them for an MOT on their PHGV motorhome would be charged £100, or maybe even given a larger fine!

Unbelievably it doesn’t end there!

After getting this sorted yesterday, I sat down and had a well earned coffee. It was then that it dawned on me that the Lower Bristol Road going around the Centre of Bath, where the garage is located (A commercial MOT centre by the way) is a nationally designated HGV route that avoids the centre of Bath!!!!! Can you believe that they have included an HGV route in the CAZ!!!!! All I hope is that the wealthy owners of houses in areas directly outside the CAZ are happy about the fleet of commercial lorries and vans that will be passing their lovely houses!

Yet another reason not to visit Bath, or its environs!

 

[Brains]

My 2018 Euro 6 Hymer at 3,800 KG is a 'car' and therefore free
But as the website advises, I'll bet there will be some changes over the next few months when they start see some big "cars" trundle through the city.
I'd be inclined to check each time before you go there.



View attachment 468136

On the site updated today, my 3,900kg Euro 6 Hymer is now classed as as "HGV" rather than a "Car", so just as inaccurate.
It is however still free in Bath & Birmingham

 

[Riverbankannie]

South glos council making efforts to show that the Bristol ring road exceeds pollution levels by pulling their usual trick of coning off one lane of a whole stretch of dual carriageway so that the grass can be cut on the roundabout at the end (yesterday) . Except that there were no workers, maybe getting ready for today? Anyway the result was a log jam of hardly moving vehicles.
Even if they wanted to keep traffic one lane away from the roundabout centre, it could have been achieved as there are 3 lanes around the actual roundabout so no closures necessary at all.

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[cliffanger]

South glos council making efforts to show that the Bristol ring road exceeds pollution levels by pulling their usual trick of coning off one lane of a whole stretch of dual carriageway so that the grass can be cut on the roundabout at the end (yesterday) . Except that there were no workers, maybe getting ready for today? Anyway the result was a log jam of hardly moving vehicles.
Even if they wanted to keep traffic one lane away from the roundabout centre, it could have been achieved as there are 3 lanes around the actual roundabout so no closures necessary at all.

Don’t get me started on the Ring Road Annie .....

 

[Gerby]

Just checked my 17 plate Peugeot Based Bailey, it comes up as PHGV (4250kg) but no charge Bath or Birmingham same as many others:

Results for number plate xx17xxx.

Clean Air Zone	Daily charge	Zone live	Map	Exemptions
Bath	No Charge	Now	Zone boundary	Bath and North East Somerset Council
Birmingham	No Charge	1 June 2021	<Broken link removed>	Birmingham City Council

The zones operate 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, every day of the year.

 

[cliffanger]

They should put the Highway Code instructions on HUGE signs on the Avon Ring Road - as it’s down to one lane for 99% of the time - use both Lanes in the run up to road closures and merge in at the end!!!! That would stop white vans/lorries/idiots from straddling the two lanes, and stopping cars from driving up the second lane and merging in.
I would love to put this sign up at the window when I get scowled at by drivers who won’t let me merge in ..,

Slow, stop-start traffic​

Where traffic is queuing and moving slowly you should use all available road space in both lanes with drivers at the front of the queues taking it in turns to 'merge in turn' or 'zip merge' as the Americans call it. This can help reduce the overall length of the queue significantly and minimises the risk of disruption at junctions further back up the road.

But as I said - don’t get me started on the Avon Ring Road!

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[Pausim]

They should put the Highway Code instructions on HUGE signs on the Avon Ring Road - as it’s down to one lane for 99% of the time - use both Lanes in the run up to road closures and merge in at the end!!!! That would stop white vans/lorries/idiots from straddling the two lanes, and stopping cars from driving up the second lane and merging in.
I would love to put this sign up at the window when I get scowled at by drivers who won’t let me merge in ..,

Slow, stop-start traffic​

Where traffic is queuing and moving slowly you should use all available road space in both lanes with drivers at the front of the queues taking it in turns to 'merge in turn' or 'zip merge' as the Americans call it. This can help reduce the overall length of the queue significantly and minimises the risk of disruption at junctions further back up the road.

But as I said - don’t get me started on the Avon Ring Road!

Agreed. All they do is push the queue further back so that it blocks other junctions.

 

[Despicable]

They should put the Highway Code instructions on HUGE signs on the Avon Ring Road - as it’s down to one lane for 99% of the time - use both Lanes in the run up to road closures and merge in at the end!!!! That would stop white vans/lorries/idiots from straddling the two lanes, and stopping cars from driving up the second lane and merging in.
I would love to put this sign up at the window when I get scowled at by drivers who won’t let me merge in ..,

Slow, stop-start traffic​

Where traffic is queuing and moving slowly you should use all available road space in both lanes with drivers at the front of the queues taking it in turns to 'merge in turn' or 'zip merge' as the Americans call it. This can help reduce the overall length of the queue significantly and minimises the risk of disruption at junctions further back up the road.

But as I said - don’t get me started on the Avon Ring Road!

cliffandger you're 100% right that cars should proceed to the merge point and then merge in turn, however, in the real world this has a major flaw: some vehicles will go to the merge point, as you suggest, but a lot of others will merge prior to that point. The result is that the merging traffic queue will always move faster than the lane that the traffic is merging into.
There will always be the individuals who do not want to let a vehicle to merge in turn, the same as there will always be the driver who thinks that being 2 inches from the rear of the vehicle ahead they can merge with them.
Solution? Apart from better signage and driver education*, I don't have any solutions for this.

* how many drivers have carried out any further training or read the highway code since passing their initial test?

 

[scally]

Just done my old H plate Talbot 8quid Bham 9quid Bath

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[Riverbankannie]

cliffandger you're 100% right that cars should proceed to the merge point and then merge in turn, however, in the real world this has a major flaw: some vehicles will go to the merge point, as you suggest, but a lot of others will merge prior to that point. The result is that the merging traffic queue will always move faster than the lane that the traffic is merging into.
There will always be the individuals who do not want to let a vehicle to merge in turn, the same as there will always be the driver who thinks that being 2 inches from the rear of the vehicle ahead they can merge with them.
Solution? Apart from better signage and driver education*, I don't have any solutions for this.

* how many drivers have carried out any further training or read the highway code since passing their initial test?

On the ring road, the queues build up so quickly that you don’t know which is the closed lane until you are in the wrong one! Trouble is, it’s the only way to get to anywhere from our house except for 20mph, traffic calming (back and neck jarring) pillows. I don’t mind the 20 mph it’s just the pillow humps. I was only going to Sainsbury’s.