Like many European countries, the Netherlands has major problems to meet European air quality standards, especially the NO2 standard coming into force in 2010. Exceedances of this NO2 standard often occur on major inboundand outbound roads on the outskirts of major cities, and in the centres of these cities. A potentially effective measure that countries can take isto establish environmental zones where high emitting cars or trucks are no longer permitted. From 2007, several Dutch cities have established environmental zones for trucks. Several are now considering environmental zonesfor cars. These zones will have a number of effects. Firstly, they will lead to a cleaner car fleet, because some of the people affected will replace their polluting car with a cleaner one. Secondly, the amount of car traffic will diminish because not every resident or visitor will be willing or able to buy a cleaner car. These people have the choice between using another transport mode (such as public transport, bicycle), choosing anotherdestination or not making the trip at all. All these changes will lower NO2 concentrations inside the environmental zone, but also outside because cars drive to and from the environmental zone. First assessments show thatan ambitious environmental zone for both passenger cars and trucks (vehicles older than 5 years are not permitted in the zone) could reduce the NO2concentrations in hot spots by 5 to 10 g/m3, and PM10 concentrations by 2g/m3. The Dutch Ministry of Housing, Spatial Planning and the Environmentasked Goudappel Coffeng and CE Delft to assess the effects of environmental zones for passenger cars on the air quality inside and outside the environmental zone. Information was collected on the costs for residents, and visitors of the environmental zone, the local government and businesses located in the zone. For this assessment two major cities and one smaller city were chosen as case studies. Three ambition levels were distinguished regarding the maximum emission level of cars still permitted inside the zone. The assessment was done for 2010 and 2015. The design of the assessmentwas as follows: traffic models provided traffic volumes per road section,distinguishing between residents, visitors and people only driving through the zone; traffic volumes also distinguished between mobility motives (commuting, business, leisure, school); for each ambition level, group of people and motive the behavioural choices were estimated, using an expert panel; for every road section in the traffic model the change in average emission factor was calculated, as was the change in traffic volume due to the environmental zone. These adjusted traffic volumes and emission factors were put into an air quality model which calculated the average concentrations alongside all road sections and the number of exceedances of air quality limits. These results were compared with the reference situation, without an environmental zone. The more cars that are prevented from entering the zone, the higher the cost for individuals. If the ban affects cars older than 15 years, a driver who is affected by the measure will be about EUR 300 worse off overall than if he/she had been able to continue to use his/her old car. If the access ban applies to cars older than 5 years, however, the average driver will be on average EUR 2000 to EUR 4000 worse off. For the covering abstract see ITRD E145999
Abstract