Mersey tunnels: Plans to increase tolls scrapped

The cash toll per journey will remain at £1.70 while motorists using the pre-pay Fast Tag will have their tolls reduced by £2 per week

Plans to increase the toll fee for cars using the Mersey tunnels have been scrapped.

The transport authority has decided to freeze the rate per journey at £1.70.

It had been expected to rise in April by 20p to £1.90 for drivers using the Kingsway and Queensway tunnels that link Wirral and Liverpool city centre.

It is the third successive year the fee has been frozen and comes almost a year after a taskforce was created to review the setting of prices.

Motorists who use the pre-pay Fast Tag will have their tolls reduced by £2 per week and it will no longer cost to use the tunnel on Christmas Day.

Emergency vehicles can now pass for free even when they are not responding to an emergency.

'Not far enough'

The leader of Wirral Council Phil Davies said he was "delighted" at the freeze and was "particularly pleased" at the reduction for commuters that pre-pay.

He said that there was "plenty of opportunity" to absorb the £3.5m this freeze will cost "given the surplus of about £10m per year" generated by the tunnel tolls.

The Mersey Travel Users' Association (MTUA) secretary John McGoldrick welcomed the creation of the review panel last year but hoped it would lead to the eventual scrapping of the "unfair" tolls.

Mr McGoldrick said that "faced with the alternative of an increase, it's good news" but that it does not go far enough.

"We would like to see a stop to the profit taking", he said.

The announcement will need to be approved at a meeting of the Merseytravel Committee on 4 February and must then be ratified by the City Region Combined Authority on 5 February.