Drivers face Tyne Tunnel toll price hike while transport chiefs expect lockdown to see traffic plummet

The crossing between Jarrow and Howdon currently charges cars and family vehicles £1.80 per trip, but a rise in inflation is due to see 10p added on to this.

News of the possible increase comes as transport bosses have predicted traffic levels will fall by more than a third this month, due to the latest national coronavirus lockdown.

“There’s the prospect, based on Retail Price Index (RPI) increases since the last time the class 2 toll was increased for a 10p increase,” said Paul Darby, deputy chief finance officer at the North East Combined Authority (NECA).

He added: “When RPI inflation is higher it will trigger more frequent increases, but inflation has been historically low for the last few years, which has meant fewer increases.”

Darby was speaking at a meeting of the North East Joint Transport Committee’s Tyne and Wear Sub Committee, which was held by videolink and broadcast via YouTube.

If approved, the proposed toll rise would apply to ‘class 2’ vehicles, covering cars, vans and buses which are ‘less than 3m high with 2 axles’.

Payments for ‘class 3’ vehicles – ‘LGVs, buses and vans more than 3m high or three axles’ – were hiked in the summer, to £3.70.

Plans for the possible increase are still being worked on, with more details expected to be presented to the panel in January 2021, which any price change expected to come into force from ‘about May’.

If implemented, it will be the third 10p rise in the toll since 2016.

The committee also heard from tunnel bosses, who said traffic levels had ‘reduced dramatically’ at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic in March and now faced fresh falls, despite a summer recovery.

Tyne Tunnels Manager Fiona Bootle said: “[Traffic levels] got up to 85% of normal levels by the end of August, but traffic has dropped again during the tiered restrictions and is back down to 74 per cent of normal levels.

“With lockdown starting [again], the estimate is about 58% of normal levels is what traffic will drop to during November, but tt is hoped it will increase again after that.”

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