Changes to access regulations in the EU and a new UVAR project

The COVID-19 pandemic has made many people rethink how cities should be used. Urban vehicle access regulations (UVARs) across Europe are changing, with a focus on cleaner air and fewer cars.

From 1 November 2020 in the Netherlands, Amsterdam will ban Euro 3 passenger cars from entering its low emission zone, creating an environmental zone within its A10 ring road. By 2022, lorries entering the zone will have to be at least Euro 6, whilst buses and coaches will need to be zero emission. By 2025 all vehicles entering this zone will need to be zero emission, except private cars. The current plan is for cars to have to be zero emission by 2030 at which point Amsterdam hopes to have an entirely emission free zone for all vehicles. Denmark, the French city of Grenoble and cities in northern Italy are also tightening their respective low emission zone restrictions.

Cities across Europe have also started to introduce new low emission zones. From 1 January 2023 there will be a low emission zone across the whole of the Belgian Walloon region, while the German city of Stuttgart will be enforcing a Euro 6 zone from October 2020. In France, seven cities are looking to implement new low emission zones in 2021.

A new EU project, UVAR Box, aims to help road users keep up with the ever-changing access regulations across Europe. The project aims to provide tools to structure data on UVARs in machine readable format that can be used in mobile applications, fleet management tools and navigation devices.

For more in-depth information see https://urbanaccessregulations.eu/  or the original articles on the following websites:

• Amsterdam bans Euro 3 passenger cars;
• Northern Italy re-starts & tightens its Winter LEZs;
• Grenoble Low Emission Zone has tightened;
• Denmark: Low Emission Zones in Denmark are tighter & now affect vans;
• Low Emission Zones to come in Wallonia;
• Seven potential new Low Emission Zones in France by 2021;
• Stuttgart: Euro 6 Low Emission Zone, 'Diesel Ban' enforced from October 2020;
• New EU project UVAR Box supports cities to help road users know about access regulations.