Video: The council’s taxi strategy for 2017-2020 (Video: Nottingham City Council)
Half of all of Nottingham’s Hackney carriages will be electric by 2025, the city council says.
The authority has outlined its new taxi strategy, which includes a plan to make all licensed vehicles completely electric by 2030, 10 years ahead of the Government’s planned ban on the sale of new petrol and diesel cars.
In the meantime new, economic petrol and diesel cars are due to be considered for use in the Hackney carriage fleet in September to drive down pollution in the years before the fully electric fleet arrives.
Richard Antcliff, the council’s chief licencing officer, said: “We want to improve our fleet of vehicles and are looking at carriages which have a Euro 6 rating – the most economic petrol and diesel powered category.
“There are three available – a Ford, Vauxhall and Mercedes – now which go to committee in September for approval. A number of other manufacturers are working on new vehicles powered by electricity or which are hybrids.
“We want to ensure that we have cars with a minimum rating of Euro 6. The cars would produce much less emissions which would help in our quest to get cleaner air in the city.”
The council has been given £1 million from central Government to help with the scheme.
Mr Antcliff added: “The taxi trade has stood still for a number of years and this is going to a push into the future. Our priority is to get the right infrastructure in place, such as accessible charging points for our taxis.
“Drivers will realise the benefits of driving a clean vehicle too from a monetary point of view. It will cost as little as one pound per day to fill up an electric car whereas diesel can cost up to £15 or £20 per day.”
The city council wants to reduce the age of the fleet of Hackney cabs as part of an overall goal of cutting harmful pollution in Nottingham city centre.
Levels of harmful particles on traffic-clogged streets have already attracted the attention of the World Health Organisation and the city is also on a Government list of areas in need of urgent air quality improvement.
Mr Antcliff said: “We have a really old fleet of cars at the moment with the average age of our Hackney cabs around 14 years old. We want to reduce this to 10 years for diesel-powered cars but keep it at 14 for electric powered cars.
“It would make tax and maintenance costs cheaper because the cars would be much newer.”
