London Congestion Charge

Road Pricing Zones
Status:	Draft (under way)
Proposed by:	amaroussi
Tagging:	type=toll
Applies to:	Relation
Definition:	Ways in which motor vehicles pay to drive in.
Rendered as:	A semi-transparent red boundary on Mapnik?
Draft start:	2013-02-20
RFC start:	*
Vote start:	*
Vote end:	*

The London Congestion Charge is a traffic zone where motor vehicles entering the area pay £10 a day (as of 20 February 2013) to drive on roads inside the Inner Ring Road. The toll operates from 6am to 6pm on weekdays, except public holidays, the school winter holidays. The toll can be partially or fully suspended during major incidents. At present, there is no standard to map the Congestion Charging zone.

In 2013, Amaroussi identified the need to map the ten-year old charging zone because some road navigation systems were using OpenStreetMap - the absence of such indicators meant that some drivers were accidentally driving into the zone without being aware of the cost.

It is extraordinary that in nearly ten years of OpenStreetMap, the London Congestion Charge or Singapore's ERP have not been properly mapped.

Tagging

The best solution to map the London Congestion Charging zone is by applying a relevant tag to highways within the zone which affected vehicles drive on. At present, there is no agreed method of doing this but a few prototypes are in use: more on that later.

Generally, if consensus agrees on a single tag, such as congestion_charge=london, then such a tag should imply that:

• toll:motor_vehicle=yes - global toll value for motor vehicles
• toll:motorcycle=no - bicycles exempt
• toll:psv=no - buses and taxis exempt
• fee=Mo-Fr 07:00-18:00 - operation hours using same syntax as opening_hours=*
• fee:amount=£10 per day - daily fee

The full list of automatic exemptions can be found at http://www.tfl.gov.uk/roadusers/congestioncharging/17098.aspx (Transport for London).

Similar schemes that need a system like this

Please be aware that vehicle class liability and toll fees may vary between schemes, but it supports the reason why a dedicated tag is needed as ways in urban centres start to contain many tags that eventually become hard to manage and update.

• Milan Area C (Italy): congestion_charge=milan
• Electronic Road Pricing (Singapore): congestion_charge=singapore
• Stockholm congestion tax (Sweden): congestion_charge=stockholm
• Durham City Congestion Charge (United Kingdom): congestion_charge=durham

These schemes will have their own values as the congestion_charge=* tag successfully rolls out (subject to approval). This will not work for Daktylios, because the restrictions are based on number plates and no fees are charged as far the the proposal writer knows.

Prototypes

There are a few prototypes covering, each a tiny area within the London Congestion Charge zone. All but the third method are run by Amaroussi.

Map	Way or Node	Used Tags	Description
	Way  4719898	toll=yes	A simple method of tagging affected roads within the London Congestion Charge and an interim measure, but it is not comprehensive and detailed enough because of the exemptions. MapQuest currently recognises this when calculating routes but it shows up when pedestrian and cycle trips are planned as well.
	Way  2199751	toll:motor_vehicle=yes toll:motorcycle=no toll:psv=no fee=Mo-Fr 07:00-18:00 fee:amount=£10 per day	A detailed method of tagging affected roads within the London Congestion Charge, but this could introduce difficulties updating ways if the fee amount changes. MapQuest does not recognise toll:motor_vehicle=yes, but ITO World does.
	Node  2037964073	barrier=toll_booth fee=10	A method of tagging all entry points into the London Congestion Charge. May not work for car journeys within the zone only, where liable residents still have to pay 10% of the charge after registration. Additionally, there are no physical toll booths contrary to what MapQuest's layer claims.
	Way  214454455	area=yes boundary=toll fee=Mo-Fr 07:00-18:00 fee:amount=£10 per day name=London Congestion Charge toll:motor_vehicle=yes toll:motorcycle=no toll:psv=no	A method of tagging affected roads within the London Congestion Charge, with an area.

Highway types

Relation members are: Motorways, Trunk/Secondary/Tertiary/Residential/Minor/Pedestrian roads, Tracks, and Service Roads if there is no "escape".

There is no evidence of toll zones charging pedestrians and cyclists!

Other options

We could create a relation using perimeter roads as the boundaries, but the challenge is to ensure that the boundary roads are not mistaken for roads within the charge zone.