Go Ultra Low Cities winners announced

We’re excited to announce that from today, four UK cities will become international pioneers of green vehicle technology, after winning a share of £40 million to boost the number of plug-in cars on their roads.

The winning Go Ultra Low Cities – Nottingham, Bristol, Milton Keynes and London – will receive funding that encourages thousands of people to consider switching to an electric car. In turn, this will support the UK’s thriving green vehicle sector, improve air quality in urban hotspots and help the government meets its emission-cutting targets.

So what are the cities proposing? Here are some examples of how the electric motoring revolution will be rolled out:

• London has been awarded £13 million to create ‘Neighbourhoods of the Future’, prioritising ultra low emission vehicles (ULEVs) in several boroughs across the capital. Proposals include over a dozen streets in Hackney going electric, with charging infrastructures such as car-charging street lighting; while Harrow will develop a Low Emission Zone, offering parking and traffic priority to owners of plug-in vehicles.
• Milton Keynes will receive £9 million to open a city centre Electric Vehicle Experience Centre – a ‘one-stop-shop’ providing consumer advice and short-term vehicles loans. The city also proposes to open up all of its 20,000 parking bays for free to electric vehicles, and will co-brand bus lanes as ‘Low Emission Lanes’, giving plug-in vehicles the same priority at traffic lights as local buses.
• Bristol will get £7 million to offer free residential parking for ULEVs, over 80 rapid and fast chargers across the city, and a scheme encouraging people to lease a plug-in car for up to four weeks – helping them to better understand the range of benefits that electric vehicles bring.
• Nottinghamshire and Derby will use £6 million of funding to install 230 charge points and will offer ULEV owners discount parking, as well as access to over 13 miles of bus lanes along key routes across the cities. The investment will also pay for a new business support programme, letting local companies ‘try before they buy’.

In addition, the government has also set aside £5 million of the total £40 million fund for specific initiatives in Dundee, Oxford, York and the North East region, to help ensure more people than ever before are going ultra low. Congratulations to everyone involved!