The Greater Manchester Clean Air Plan is underpinned by local data and air quality modelling (the process of forecasting, understanding and managing future levels of air pollution).

We have worked closely with the government’s Joint Air Quality Unit to help guide us in developing measures that will meet legal limits for nitrogen dioxide on local roads in 2026.

Work to develop the investment-led Clean Air Plan was also informed by targeted engagement and research with key impacted groups.

This included working with vehicle-owning groups (like the taxi trade) and representatives of other impacted individuals, such as community and equality-based groups.

In March 2020, the government directed Greater Manchester to implement a city‑region wide Category C charging Clean Air Zone. This would have applied daily charges to some older, more polluting vehicles, including buses, taxis, vans and heavy goods vehicles, but not private cars.

The direction was based on the government’s framework, evidence and criteria available at the time, which identified that a charging Clean Air Zone would be the fastest measure to meet the government direction to reduce roadside pollution.

From the outset, Greater Manchester made clear that any charging Clean Air Zone would only be fair and workable if backed by enough national funding to help businesses, drivers and operators upgrade to cleaner vehicles and avoid charges.

However, the situation changed significantly following the COVID‑19 pandemic as economic conditions worsened, and vehicle prices and supply problems intensified. Greater Manchester submitted evidence to the government that the plan for a charging Clean Air Zone was unworkable, would not deliver compliance with legal limits for nitrogen dioxide by 2024 and would cause hardship to local residents and businesses.

In February 2022 after reviewing the evidence, the government withdrew the direction to introduce a Clean Air Zone, allowing Greater Manchester to develop an alternative investment-led approach to achieving legal air quality limits.

Circumstances have changed significantly since the original Clean Air Plan proposals. Following the pandemic, Greater Manchester now has far fewer locations where nitrogen dioxide (NO₂) levels exceed legal limits on local roads.

Our investment in the Bee Network – and cleaner buses and HGVs through early Clean Air Plan funding – has had a positive impact on air quality. The remaining air quality issues were largely in the regional centre.

In developing the Clean Air Plan, we were instructed by the government to compare the investment-led proposals against a charging Clean Air Zone in the regional centre (the centre of Manchester and bordering areas of Salford).

This showed that only the investment-led, non-charging approach would achieve the government’s direction to meet legal limits for nitrogen dioxide by 2026.

The plan includes a range of targeted measures – including zero emission buses, cleaner taxis and road improvements – that are all helping reduce nitrogen dioxide emissions.

As a result, Greater Manchester is now on track to reach its legal air quality limits by the end of 2026, with air quality seeing genuine, sustained improvement thanks to major investment in the city region’s transport network.

Different areas need different solutions to improve air quality. In Greater Manchester, our evidence showed that investing in cleaner buses, taxis and targeted local road measures can meet legal limits in the shortest possible time.

Because this approach is approved by government, a charging Clean Air Zone or Ultra Low Emission Zone is not needed.

The Clean Air Zone signs and Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR) cameras installed for the formerly planned Clean Air Zone and associated costs have been fully funded by government.

As Greater Manchester will not now have a Clean Air Zone:

• The ten Greater Manchester local authorities have now removed the vast majority of signs on the local road network, with funding from the government’s Joint Air Quality Unit.

• National Highways has also removed the signs on the Strategic Road Network.

• Greater Manchester Police (GMP) will now take ownership of the ANPR cameras to bring them into their existing ANPR network to help tackle serious crime. This follows overwhelming backing for the move during a six-week consultation, with nearly 90% of respondents in favour.

• GMP will share ANPR camera data with TfGM to support transport planning and to monitor the efficiency of the Clean Air Plan.

With Clean Air Plan funding from government, we have worked with Manchester and Salford City Councils to manage traffic flow on roads in Manchester and Salford and bring nitrogen dioxide within legal limits on Regent Road and Quay Street, including:

• Signal timing adjustments at A57 Regent Road and adjacent parallel routes to improve the flow of traffic, reduce congestion and emissions.

• Reducing the speed limit on A57 Regent Road from 40mph to 30mph to improve the flow of traffic, reducing emissions from drivers speeding up and slowing down.

• Yellow box enforcement along the A57 Regent Road corridor and the A34 Quay Street to improve the flow of traffic, reduce congestion and emissions.

The latest air quality monitoring data for 2024 shows that air pollution had fallen compared to 2023 and is significantly lower than levels recorded pre-pandemic in 2019.   

In 2019, air quality monitoring data showed 129 locations of nitrogen dioxide exceedance. This has now fallen to 38 sites across the city region, down from 64 in 2023.   

This gradual improvement in air quality is in part driven by investment in the Bee Network, as well as people upgrading to cleaner vehicles, and through existing Clean Air Plan investments in cleaner vehicles. 

You can see all Greater Manchester’s air quality monitoring data on the Clean Air GM Data Hub.