Germany Has Started To Ban Older Diesels From City Centres

The Northern German industrial city of Hamburg has begun to prepare a ban on diesels in the city centre, after receiving backing from Germany’s highest court.

Around 100 signs have been placed around the city centre, diverting older diesels away from two key streets, presumably where pollution is worst and pedestrian populations are highest.

Hamburg authorities are still waiting for the legal say on whether the ban can apply only to Euro 4-standard diesels from 2009 or earlier, or to Euro 5 cars built as recently as 2014. Either way, the ban will start to be enforced later this month.

Critics of the plans, approved in February and granting appropriate powers to all German city councils if they want to introduce bans, say that effectively blocking certain streets just forces drivers of more polluting diesels to drive longer distances through the city as they navigate around the centre.

Germany, like the UK, is facing massive fines over the level of pollution in its cities. German political power is bolstered in making anti-diesel moves by the fallout from the dieselgate scandal, which is said to be proving extremely motivating for the country’s law makers.

Monthly sales of new diesel cars in the UK have fallen by as much as 25 per cent versus last year, but demand for used diesels has actually risen. There’s a deep irony in there somewhere.

Source: Autocar