Bikers have warned they are set to be hit with “disproportionate” parking charges in and around Bath which will see them pay more to park than most cars.
Bath & North East Somerset Council introduced emissions-based parking — where drivers pay extra to park depending on their vehicle’s emissions — at car parks in Bath in 2023.
Now the council wants to make £195,000 by rolling out emissions-based parking charges to more locations, upping the prices at Bath car parks, and making people pay to park motorbikes and scooters for the first time.
The emissions-based charges are intended to ensure “the polluter pays” but bikers have warned they will end up paying more than drivers of more polluting cars.
The Motorcycle Action Group (MAG) has warned that “commuter” motorbikes with smaller engine sizes could pay as much as luxury cars under the “frankly ridiculous” way the council plans to charge bikers.
Colin Brown, director of campaigns and political engagement at the Motorcycle Action Group (MAG) said: “The introduction of any parking charges is always going to be controversial.
“People who’ve never been charged before are obviously never going to want to be charged. But when you look at how it’s being implemented for Bath and North East Somerset, it appears to be disproportionate to another level.”
With emissions-based parking, pay and display machines look up a vehicle’s emissions from the DVLA and charge based on how much carbon is emitted or, if this information is not available, the capacity of the engine.
Mr Brown said that for nine out of 10 bikes on the road, the DVLA did not have any emissions data, meaning that most bikes would be charged based on their engine size.
Under the council’s plans, bikes and scooters follow a separate banding system than cars, meaning bikes with smaller engines would pay the same amount as cars with larger engines.
A motorbike with an engine capacity over 600cc would be charged the maximum amount, the same as the largest most polluting cars with engines over 2951 cc.
Mr Brown called it “frankly ridiculous”. He said: “Motorcycles will get charged more despite the fact that they are less polluting than cars.”
He added: “You have got a situation where somebody riding a 150cc moped is going to get charged the same as someone driving a one and a half litre car. There is no comparison there in terms of the CO2 emissions.”
When the proposal was first suggested at a council meeting in March, Independent councillor for Midsomer Norton North Shaun Hughes — a biker himself with seven motorcycles — pushed the council on this point.
He said: “If we’ve got a young lad got himself a 125 scooter or even a 50cc scooter to get to Bath because he’s going to Bath College, he’s got his first job, or he’s got an apprenticeship, am I right in saying he’s going to have to pay potentially £15 a day to park — £300 a month?”
Manda Rigby, the council’s cabinet member for transport, said that it was a suggestion of what could be charged if there was not emissions data on the DVLA system.
But she added: “We are going out to a consultation that says are we looking at this in the right way? Should we be charging motorbikes, and if so how should we be charging them?”
MAG have warned that the proposed bandings mean that bikes such as a Honda CB500F which does 82 miles to the gallon would pay the same as a Bentley Bantayga, which they said would do about 21 miles to the gallon.
Mr Brown said: “There’s various types of bikes but the kinds of bikes that are likely to be ridden into town centres and parked up in car parks are going to be commuter style bikes.
“We are not talking about fancy high-performance sports bikes and we are not normally talking about the large Honda Goldwing with all the panniers and the pillow seats and everything else that is used for long distance touring in America.”
He added: “When you set a charging policy, you’ve got to set some overall assumptions. The assumptions that have been taken are wildly off.”
He argued motorcycles and scooters have traditionally been seen as part of the solution — not part of the problem — when it comes to congestion and air quality, as they produce less emissions and take up less space on the road and in parking spaces.
It is still the norm in most places that motorbikes are not charged to park, although Mr Brown said this was changing across the UK.
One argument used by the council was that some motorbikes were now so large they took up a whole parking bay. MAG also dismissed the claim as “manifestly not true”.
In July, Mr Brown and Geoff Mills, MAG’s western region transport policy officer, had a meeting with council officers over the plans at the council offices in Keynsham, travelling to the town on their motorbikes.
Mr Brown said his 865cc Trimph Speedmaster is one of the many bikes for which the DVLA holds no emissions information but he had looked it up and produced 113 grams per kilometre of CO2.
He said: “The alternative I had was a one litre eco boost Ford car which emits 115 grams per kilometre. So the DVLA does hold that information, so Bath would be charging that at the lowest charging rate whereas the motorcycle — which although it produces slightly less emissions — would be charged at the highest band.
“So that’s the logic that’s been applied there.”
The charges would kick in from October. The consultation on the council’s parking plans closed on Thursday 8th August.
Launching the consultation in July, Ms Rigby said: “Our review of parking charges across Bath and North East Somerset was agreed in February as part of setting the council’s budget for the coming financial year.
“We are now asking for people’s comments on the wider roll out of proposed emission-based charges across Bath and North East Somerset.
“Our aim is to improve air quality, reduce congestion and encourage other ways to travel across Bath and North East Somerset and these proposals would be another step in the right direction to achieve this.
“We know the effect pollutants from vehicle emissions have, and this is one of a number of policies we’ve implemented to improve air quality and encourage more people to use sustainable transport, like Bath’s Clean Air Zone and our liveable neighbourhoods.”
John Wimperis, Local Democracy Reporter
