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C-charge extension ‘will hit businesses’

CITY Hall has warned that central London businesses will be hit the hardest when the Mayor of London’s controversial plan to extend the congestion charge zone comes into action in 2007.
Ken Livingstone wants the zone to extend westwards covering most of Westminster and neighbouring borough Kensington and Chelsea from February 2007.
But senior Westminster Council figures believe the extension will deter people from coming to the West End at all and could spell the end of dozens of small businesses.
Councillor Danny Chalkey, Westminster’s cabinet minister for economic development and transport, said: “We have seen in recent months that the retail trade in central London has been having a terrible time and we have been working as hard as we can to try to ehlp them.
“But the news that the congestion charging zone is to expand further will just be another worry to West End businesses and of course to those businesses in the newly expanded areas.
“With such a large zone covering the retail heart of London there is a real danger that people will simply decide that it is too much hassle to drive into the city to do their shopping.”
The dire warnings come just weeks after Mayor Livingstone’s announcement that he planned to increase the charge from £5 to £8.
Cllr Chalkey called for the Mayor to enforce the charge until lunchtime to help businesses.
He said: “Also if Ken can accept that bringing back the end of the charge to 6pm can help business then we would ask him to consider the impact of bringing it back to 4pm, 3pm or even lunchtime, as we have suggested.”
Mayor Ken Livingstone insisted that the extension of the zone would be beneficial.
He said: “Extending the existing zone will bring considerable benefits to this area of London.
“Congestion in the extended zone will be cut by 15-20 per cent.”



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