Edinburgh Residents Split on new Low Emissions Zone

Alba Party MSP Ash Regan MSP has called on Edinburgh City Council to act on findings that residents of the city are split on the roll out of a new Low Emissions Zone. 

The Edinburgh MSP has today (Wednesday 27th December) published the results of polling that shows that only 35% of those surveyed back the proposals that are scheduled to go live in the Summer of 2024. 

Excluding those that did not provide their view and the 19% of respondents that do not yet know if they support the new LEZ, residents of Edinburgh are divided over the plans with 50.66% in favour and 49.34% opposed. 

Ash Regan MSP says that this shows that Edinburgh City Council “have a body of work to do” to ensure that residents are ready for the scheme once it comes into force. 

In a similar scheme already operational in Glasgow City Centre the council made nearly £500,000 out of fines in its first four months.

Glasgow City Council said all the money earned by LEZ would only be spent to reduce air pollution within the city or meet the council’s climate change targets.

Commenting Alba Party’s Ash Regan MSP said: 

“We can see from the results of polling I have carried out that people across the Edinburgh City area are divided on the roll out of the LEZ and just over a third of those that responded said they support the plan. 

“We all want air in our Capital City to be as clean as possible but as we’ve seen in Glasgow a significant amount of motorists have been fined and the hospitality sector have said the Glasgow LEZ has negatively impacted on their businesses. 

“Therefore, in the 6 months of the new year before this scheme comes live we need to see a much greater effort by Edinburgh City Council to promote the benefits they say the LEZ will bring and to set out what support they intend to provide for businesses in our City that may be negatively impacted.”