£3m to install charging points for electric taxis
THE streets of Birmingham could soon be lined with almost 200 electric taxi charging points in a bid to encourage drivers to ditch their polluting petrol and diesel cars.
Birmingham City Council has been given a £2.9 million Department for Transport grant to install the new charging points.
There will be two super charging points at Tyseley Energy Park, off the A45, and at Birmingham New Street Station’s Ellis Street car park, where black cabs queue for commuters.
Seven more locations have been earmarked including Star City in Nechells, Digbeth Coach Station, the QE Hospital and Sheepcote Street, near Brindleyplace. More points will be scattered around the A4040 Outer Ring Road, on or near to the main arterial routes into Birmingham.
They will be made available to both private hire cars, as well as Hackney Carriages.
Birmingham City Council has been ordered to take steps to reduce the dangerously high levels of pollution by 2021 or face a £60 million fine. Plans are advanced for a clean air zone under which high polluting vans, lorries and coaches will be charged to enter the city centre.
The council last month threatened to revoke licences for 500 older high polluting cabs by the end of the year and are in talks with the trade, which has objected to given to drivers.
Birmingham’s taxi fleet currently numbers 1,229 Hackney carriages and 4,060 private hire vehicles and the council is working towards a 50 per cent uptake of ultra-low or zeroemissions vehicles by 2020.
Councillor Lisa Trickett, cabinet member with responsibility for air quality at Birmingham City Council, said: “Everyone living and working in the short-notice the city has the right to clean air and our taxi fleet will play a key role in helping us to achieve this, so I am absolutely delighted that we have been successful in our bid for this crucial funding.
“We have worked closely with taxi drivers to identify these charge point locations, ensuring that they will benefit those working in the outer city suburban areas as well as those in the city centre itself.”