Transport for London has published a report revealing that congestion in the city is as bad as it was before the introduction of the C-charge. Though 21% less traffic (amounting to 70,000 cars) enters the zone compared to 2002, a "decreasing level of road space" owing to roadworks and traffic calming measures means that jams are just as lengthy. The western extension, already under review, has seen 30,000 fewer vehicles daily. Despite seemingly not......

Westminster City Council has announced that it is trialling a budget parking scheme in its Queensway car park. Using a pricing structure based on that of Easyjet, the hourly rate will vary depending on how full the car park is when the driver enters. When it is nearly empty customers will be charged as little as 20p per hour for the duration of their stay, a price which will rise on a scale to......

Just who do the AA think they are? Jamiroquai? Joining celebrity motorcyclists across the city, the 4th Emergency Service have announced they are to trial a fleet of electric scooters and motorbikes, in a bid to beat the traffic, and reach our capital’s ailing motorists faster. A response to the findings of a city motorists’ average speed league table, compiled by someone at the AA’s HQ with a whole lot of time on their......

With the situation showing little sign of improvement at the brand new T5, London's aviation bosses are keen to turn the public's attention to plans for dealing with the real elephant in the Heathrow departure lounge - the traffic congestion caused by still only having two runways. Yesterday saw the first test of a solution that could be in commercial use as early as next year. The bold plan seeks to double potential runway......

We've not lately delved into what's been bubbling away in the run-up to London's elections next year. So Wilkommen, Bienvenu, Welcome to this new and possibly occasional feature to catch up with what's going on out there. Let's have a rummage and see who's up and who's down: Mayor Ken fights back in a hefty spat with Evening Standard over a hatchet-job on his race advisor. Standard's tactics are questionable, but the story went......

Langdon Park DLR station opened yesterday, to initially no fanfare, until Ken turned up with some free Oyster cards. Diamond Geezer has blogged in heartfelt detail about the "shiny alien mothership" lighting up a neglected, marginalised area. Langdon Park now easily links up with Canary Wharf and Stratford, where a second platform was also officially opened yesterday, possibly anticipating the immediate influx of people escaping Tower Hamlets for a day. TFL are consulting about......

It seems Ken Livingstone isn't content with the new, faster Eurostar, but wants to make London actually resemble Paris. He is proposing pedestrianised, tree-lined streets a la the French capital and even wants to get us our own version of the famous Paris Plage, the artificial beach that takes over the Right Bank of the Seine. For this, the Mayor wants to shut a section of the Victoria Embankment's four lanes from traffic. Other......

Fans of pomp and circumstance will line the streets of the City tomorrow to watch one of London’s fine old traditions unfold. Each year, the City of London gets a new Lord Mayor (most certainly not to be confused with the more well-known mayor who inhabits the glass testicle near Tower Bridge). Indeed, the office of Lord Mayor is so tied up in the ceremonial that the official web site doesn’t even bother to......

All cars must pay the congestion charge if they enter the congestion zone. That's £8 a day unless you are driving a taxi, a police car or one of those little buggies that runs on jam. Of course, Londonist sidesteps having to pay the charge by bounding around the city on the back of a giant mechanical deer. However, a number of enterprising individuals are registering their cars as taxi cabs in order to......

Congestion charge leads to rise in stolen and counterfeit number plates. New study into aircraft noise finds that people don't really like it. Keats house being restored. When the pinkie breaks: Led Zeppelin reunion delayed thanks to a broken finger. Jimmy Page presumably wearing a whole lotta glove. Woman's head hit by train while leaning over platform to be sick. Another stunning image courtesy of Homemade via the Londonist flickr group.......

IBM will run the congestion charge. Will Haw's Law be revoked? London Grand Prix not ruled out. Got an opinion about Tube accessibility? Help TfL decide priority stations for step-free access. Read the background on Diamond Geezer. Did we mention that it's our birthday? Image courtesy of Homemade via the Londonist flickr group.......

Modernisation of the Thameslink railway route that runs North-South through central London has finally begun; this news today must come as a relief to anyone who has the displeasure to share packed morning trains with this Londonista. Supposedly, the £5.5 billion project will bring "more seats, less crowding, more direct services and better connections in London," according to Andrew Mitchell of Network Rail. Longer station platforms, more peak-time trains and new rolling stock are......

It may be up there with "dog bites man" as a redundant headline, but it's true: traffic in London is slow. Four years of congestion charging may have swelled the coffers of TfL, but it hasn't done much to relieve the blood pressure of motorists. Despite a 20% reduction in traffic since 2003, snaking jams of snarling drivers are common, and things are slower than in the days of horse and cart. So we......

Our Ken’s been getting a little hot under the collar of late – what with tubes strikes aplenty and London landscape controversies, lest we forget the fast tick-tock till election day – the time has never proved more ripe to woo the electorates of his London. The latest in Ken’s bid for our affection? Cheap housing! Yep, angered by what he perceives as individual councils aligning themselves against the acquisition and distribution of affordable......

The sixth in our series of interviews with potential candidates for next year's Mayoral election. Previously: Victoria Borwick (Tory), Andrew Boff (Tory) and Warwick Lightfoot (Tory), Sian Berry (Green), Fiyaz Mughal (Lib Dem). Chris Prior is an independent mayoral candidate standing on a very firm 'Stop Congestion Charging' ticket. We asked him why, and, as with all the other candidates, we also enquired whether he'd ever been sick on the Tube. Chris is the......

From BBC News: London must become car-free if it is to substantially cut carbon dioxide emissions, according to a new report. Crikey. In response to the findings London Green Party member Jenny Jones said: "I have asked the London mayor to do a feasibility study into creating a car free pedestrian zone in central London linking all the main squares and parks. "We need to show that the car no longer rules in London......

The fifth in our series of interviews with potential candidates for next year's Mayoral election. Previously: Victoria Borwick (Tory), Andrew Boff (Tory) and Warwick Lightfoot (Tory), Sian Berry (Green). Today: Liberal Democrat candidate Fiyaz Mughal. He's competing with fellow LDs Brian Paddick and Chamali Fernando to represent his party in next year's elections. Would you vote for him? Read his ideas below. Where do you live in London and what do you like best......

The fourth in our series of interviews with potential candidates for next year's Mayoral election. Previously: Victoria Borwick (Tory), Andrew Boff (Tory) and Warwick Lightfoot (Tory). Sian Berry is the Green's candidate for next year's elections. Unlike the Tory rivals we've previously interviewed, she is a strong supporter of the congestion charge. She's the only person we've ever known to use the words 'The North London Line is good'. And she's also got a......

Sting starts Thames race, then goes from river police to rhythm Police, as the old band reunites for Twickenham concert. The real police are going to start using lie detectors in Lambeth (to detect trapeze artists). Trafalgar Square pigeon congestion charge gets an extended zone. Puma sighting. Again. This is getting tedious now. Can someone spot something more original like a numbat or a vampire octopus? Image of The Gathering Scottish festival courtesy of......

A day after possibly the strongest entry for the most risible right-wing attempt at 'humour' since Jim Davidson was allowed near prime time television, Boris Johnson emerged from his summer holidays (it's silly season all year round for him really) and set out his stall for taking on Ken Livingstone next May. And what a stall it is. Thrill to his delight at being able to buy mango juice in newsagents! Listen to his boast......

Chicagoist is gearing up for this weekend's annual Air & Water Show along the lakefront. In what's becoming an annual tradition around there, staff member Todd McClamroch even got to fly with one of the participants. Chicagoist's decidedly opinionated readership was also appalled that one of their staffers found a popular local brewpub to be a great place to bring a kid. They also think that an unlikely activist for immigration rights should just take......

The third of our interviews with the Tory candidates for London Mayor. Previously, Victoria Borwick and Andrew Boff. Warwick Lightfoot has, no doubt, spent a lifetime tolerating jibes about his Tolkeinesque name. He's also acquired an outstanding CV that includes stints as Mayor of Kensington and Chelsea, Special Advisor to the Chancellor and 20 years experience as a councillor. Most impressively of all, he's the first Tory candidate to admit to vomiting on the......

Hot on the heels of the pay as you go pups comes brilliant news that Ken Livingstone has ordered a feasibility study into a pay as you go bike scheme for London. We were in Paris the other week and saw the excellent Vélib' (freedom bike) set up. Specially designed, heavy grey cycles are stationed at bike stands all over the city, available for hire for as little as 1 Euro for half an......

The second of our interviews with the Tory candidates for London Mayor. Previously, Andrew Boff. Victoria Borwick is a born and bred London lass whose Mayoral campaign carries the tagline 'A red head not Red Ken'. She has 25 years of management experience and is currently a councillor for Kensington and Chelsea. She has four children, doesn't like tinny techno and knows a thing or two about Cleopatra's Needle. But does she have the......

Despite evidence to the contrary from Dr Who, alien visits to the UK appear to be on the wane. Newly released Ministry of Defence figures suggest a drop in UFO sightings, as LondonNet reports: In 1995 128 strange events in the skies over the UK were reported by the public, but by 2006 that figure had dropped to 97. As a comparison, in the same period, human tourism to Britain increased by close to......

Four Tories want to be our next Mayor. We contacted each of them to see where they stand on London's most pressing issues. And, of course, whether they've ever been sick on the Tube. Andrew Boff was the first to return answers. As Mayor, the Boffmeister would shrink the Boroughs, remove the C-charge...and use Second Life instead of the airports? Where do you live in London and what do you like best about it?......

This week ended with the launch of the seventh and final Harry Potter installation. But while the world was consumed with Pottermania, it's important to remember that there were more serious things going on in the world, too – two of them in -Ist cities. Sampaist was shocked when a passenger jet crashed into the center of Sao Paulo, killing at least 200 people. The airplane, an Airbus A320, skidded off the runway at the......

Flying’s not been getting good press lately what with us all worrying about our carbon footprints and the end of the world being nigh. With summer holiday season approaching, then, and with us having quashed our environmental guilt and said, ‘Dammit, I deserve my cheap, Mediterranean jaunt in the sun’ it is rather disheartening to learn that the big boss of Heathrow has openly admitted his airport makes him cringe and we’re all in......

New York and London have always had a bit of rivalry going on, about who's best. In recent times, London seems to have got the edge - New York's Mayor, for example, expressed worries that London was moving ahead as the world's financial centre. And frankly, we know that our chocolate's a hell of a lot better. But now Mayor Bloomberg has gone further. Announcing his new plans to combat climate change, he commended......

Ken, you have a contender. John Bird, successful businessman and founder of The Big Issue, announced his candidacy for Mayor of London and unveiled the accompanying manifesto. Mr Bird, running independently but courting interest from the Conservatives, said his platform would be one of ‘social inclusion,’ targeting youth crime, irresponsible businesses and housing problems in the capital. "The first thing I would do as mayor would be to look at the great oxygenators of......