BETTER PARTSThe court makes way for Diesel-driving bans
Leipzig, 27. February 2018
The much anticipated judgment of the Federal administrative court in Leipzig on the topic of Diesel-driving bans is like that: The presiding judge Andreas Korbmacher rejected the Revision, as from the matching media voice reports. This paves the way for Diesel-driving bans in the municipalities.
Action of the DUH successfully
The German environmental aid, DUH, had complained, among others, before the administrative courts in Stuttgart and Düsseldorf, and demands that the two cities tighten their clean air plans. The two courts had given the DUH right. Thus, the municipalities were committed to the establishment of bans, the European limit values for oxides of nitrogen (NOx). However, the Baden-württemberg and the North Rhine-Westphalian state government had filed a Revision. Since this was dismissed by the Federal court, the judgments of Stuttgart, and Düsseldorf is now valid, and the municipalities need to improve their air quality plans. This is to pay attention to proportionality.
Difficulties in the implementation of
How the communities respond specifically to the judgment, it remains to be seen. You should stand in front of a wide range of implementation problems. The road traffic act does not provide signs for this purpose. A further difficulty is how the bans are monitored and enforced. It starts with, there is no labelling of cars that are exempt from the driving ban. Because the introduction of a blue badge has been rejected by the Federal government strictly.
Driving bans are not from today to tomorrow
The DUH believes that the cities of six to twelve months to update their clean air plans. In any case, it is not expected that diesel drivers are already in danger of soon driving bans. For Stuttgart, the Federal administrative court said that for reasons of proportionality, first of all, only older Diesel (Euro 4 and lower) should be affected. Euro-5 Diesel should not be in front of the 1. September 2019 be assigned is Prohibited.
The retrofit brings something?
The DUH vertseht the judgment as a slap in the face for the Federal government and as a debacle for the car manufacturer. The automobile club ACE welcomed the decision because it would lead to more legal certainty and driving bans are the only effective measure for clean air. The ADAC calls as a consequence of the judgment, as quickly as possible the Euro-5 Diesel engine with an SCR-exhaust gas cleaning retrofit. The automobile club have proven with Tests that it will lead to significant emission reductions. However, the ADAC makes no forecast of whether this will be enough to reach, for example, in Munich the limit value, the NOx annual mean value is about the Double of the limit value. In addition, the question of financing is not cleared: A retrofit costs between 1,500 and 3,000 euros per vehicle. The Central Association of the German motor vehicle industry ZDK (the workshops) are for obvious reasons also for retrofitting, the car manufacturer, however.(sl)