TfL spend on river crossings proposals set to top £20m

In response to a formal question tabled by Darren Johnson AM, the Mayor of London has revealed that Transport for London will spend a further £6million in 2013/14 investigating options for new river crossings in east London. The Mayor stated last week “We are going to do a Blackwall 2 tunnel by 2020”(1).

The £6million to be spent in the coming year will be in addition to more than £14million previously spent preparing proposals for river crossings. £10million was spent between 2000 and 2004 preparing for the Thames Gateway Bridge (2) in addition to £4million spent between July 2007 and June 2008 funding the related public enquiry (3).

Darren Johnson AM commented,

“It is very disappointing to learn that TfL and the Mayor are ploughing such a large sum of money into building their case for new Thames crossings. The £6million would have been far better allocated to making our roads safer for cyclists and pedestrians or tackling the pollution caused by the cars already clogging up London’s roads. I urge the Mayor to introduce a trial toll of £2.50 on the Blackwall tunnel which would remove the need for a new road crossing to be built at all.”

ENDS

1)      http://www.lbc.co.uk/ask-boris-on-lbc-973-as-it-happened-67470/liveblog/3 (The Mayor interviewed on LBC Radio, Fri 15^th Feb 2013).

2)      Darren’s question to Mayor Ken Livingstone, 28^th Jan 2004: http://mqt.london.gov.uk/mqt/public/question.do?id=4482  

3)      Darren’s question to Mayor Boris Johnson, 16^th July 2008:  http://mqt.london.gov.uk/mqt/public/question.do?id=22541  

4)      Darren Johnson is available for comment