Bath Clean Air Zone

Bath is a World Heritage Site, with many tall, historic tenement buildings ranged along narrow streets. Although much of the central shopping district is pedestrianized, traffic pollution has long been an issue.^[11] Citing high levels of nitrogen dioxide, a March 2017 report for the BBC Inside Out West TV news programme claimed "At times Bath's air quality is as bad as Beijing".^[12]

Later in 2017, then UK government environment minister Thérèse Coffey directed Bath and North East Somerset Council to produce a clean air plan that would improve Bath's air quality in the shortest possible time; the council announced its plans for a clean air zone in October 2018.^[13][14] According to Robin Kerr of the Federation of Bath Residents' Associations (FOBRA), writing in the Bath Chronicle, the council had been "handed a golden opportunity finally to tackle Bath's transport problems... [and] air pollution... which blights the World Heritage site".^[15] Other local people expressed concerns that the scheme would lead to deserted streets with harmful effects on the tourist trade.^[16]

Following a six-week public consultation,^[17] the council decided it was fairest to implement a scheme that would primarily target large, highly-polluting vehicles (such as commercial vehicles and buses) and exempt all ordinary, private motorists from the charge.^[4] The council also announced £9.4 million of financial support, which had by 2023 helped over 1,500 people to replace 938 polluting vehicles.^[4][18] Taxi and van drivers can apply for grants of up to £4,500, while bus, coach, and HGV operators are eligible for up to £35,000 of financial support.^[19]

Originally scheduled to launch in November 2020, the Bath Clean Air Zone was delayed by the COVID-19 pandemic,^[20] and became the first Clean Air Zone outside London when it was finally launched on 15 March 2021.^[2]

In 2021, Bath and North East Somerset Council announced that nitrogen dioxide (NO₂) measured at 121 sites in the city (both inside and outside the clean air zone) had fallen by an average of 22 percent.^[2][8] In 2023, Bath's Clean Air Zone became the first in the UK to pass a "State 3 assessment" by the UK government's Joint Air Quality Unit, a technical milestone that means nitrogen dioxide levels have fallen to and remained inside guideline levels.^[21] There was some uncertainty over how much of this was attributable to COVID-19 restrictions and the closure of the city's historic Cleveland Bridge for maintenance.^[21] Some parts of the city, including its most polluted street, Chapel Row, experienced a significant increase in NO₂ in the months after the scheme opened.^[6] In 2022, the Council reported an average 26 percent reduction in NO₂ compared with 2019, noting that the number of polluting vehicles entering the zone had fallen by 71 percent between the scheme's inception in March 2021 and December 2022.^[8]

Some 30,000–40,000 vehicles enter the Clean Air Zone each day, of which fewer than 5 percent are non-compliant; following the introduction of the scheme, some 28,000 motorists were fined in the first 100 days.^[22] Efforts to collect fines from drivers were initially mixed; after the first three months, the council revealed that only two-thirds of those fined were paying promptly, within seven days.^[19] Between March 2021 and December 2023, over 174,000 fines were issued to drivers who entered the zone in non-exempt vehicles, raising a total of £7,102,980.^[3] According to the council, this money has been "reinvested back into Bath and North East Somerset to support further improvements to air quality and sustainable transport".^[5]

Critics of the scheme have argued that it has caused an increase in traffic congestion elsewhere in the city^[23][24] and in parts of neighbouring Wiltshire, notably on the A36, A363, B3105, A361 and A350.^[5][19][25] Wiltshire Council's research suggests the scheme, coupled with lengthy closure of the Cleveland Bridge, increased HGV traffic through Westbury by 20 percent.^[25] Shortly after the Bath scheme was launched, Wiltshire Council requested air quality monitoring of Bradford-on-Avon and Westbury to assess its wider, potentially negative impacts on West Wiltshire, but the request was turned down by the Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs.^[26]