Aug/Sept 2008

It had to come – a tracking system to help transport operators deal with the draconian charges for failure to observe London's Low Emission Zone.

Navman Wireless, which claims to be the UK's largest manufacturer of vehicle tracking equipment, has launched a new 'zone report' tool, which can monitor vehicles entering the LEZ to ensure firms are not unnecessarily penalised. It also monitors entry into the congestion zone, which has different boundaries from the LEZ area.

The technology comes free as part of Navman Wireless's existing OnLineAVL2 system, and provides extensive information on driver behaviour, as well as giving real-time updates on location, speed and time spent inside the LEZ.

Although LEZ monitoring might seem to be an obvious candidate for geofencing in telematics applications, few suppliers have so far made a point of promoting its availability.

 

This may be because the charges for vehicles straying into the zone are extremely high by comparison with the congestion zone charges. Even the basic fee for entering the zone with a non-approved vehicle is £200 a day, and the fine for late payment is £1,000. Most goods vehicles of over 3.5 tonnes are affected, along with minibuses containing eight seats or more and vans exceeding 1.205 tonnes.

Some telematics companies may have judged that operators will be less interested in tracking unapproved vehicles within the zone than with making sure they don't stray anywhere near it in the first place.