Only taxis, minicabs and Blue Badge holders may stop to drop off on Western Road's red route. The council leader re-approved it on 6 November after a challenge.

Drivers will not be allowed to stop on the Western Road red route to pick up or drop off passengers, unless they are a taxi, a private hire car or carrying a Blue Badge holder. Brighton & Hove City Council has confirmed the rule in an urgent decision taken on Friday 6 November.

The council’s leader also approved the red route afresh that day. The scheme had already been agreed by Cabinet on 17 September. It was taken again because the council received correspondence challenging whether that first decision was lawful.

Why it was decided twice

The challenge alleged that Cabinet had been “materially misdirected” about pick-ups and drop-offs. That is set out in the urgent decision report, published with the decision record on 6 November.

The report accepts that something said at the September meeting could have misled. “During the Cabinet debate, comments were made which could have been understood as suggesting that general pick-up and drop-off would continue to be permitted on the red route,” it says.

Officers say those comments were about how hard the rule is to enforce in practice. If they were taken as a description of the order itself, the report says, “they did not accurately describe its legal effect”.

The order is not being changed. The report says it “is correctly drafted”. The fresh decision exists so that “there is no doubt” the scheme goes ahead on accurate information.

The report does not say who sent the challenge or what remedy it sought.

No call-in this time

The decision was taken by the Leader of the Council under the council’s urgency procedure, not at a Cabinet meeting. The decision record says it is not subject to call-in.

That matters because the September decision was called in by fourteen councillors, which sent it to a scrutiny committee: our report on the call-in. This time the chair of the relevant scrutiny committee agreed the matter was urgent.

The report gives the reason. The order was due to come into force on 9 November, there was no time to convene Cabinet, and delay would create “uncertainty for residents, businesses, public transport operators and other users”.

Who can stop on the red route

The experimental order, published with the decision, says no vehicle may stop on Western Road between Holland Road and Montpelier Road at any time, except:

  • to let a Blue Badge holder get in or out
  • to let passengers get in or out of a taxi or private hire vehicle
  • a bus at a bus stop
  • emergency vehicles, council refuse and recycling collections, and vehicles doing building or utility work that cannot be done from another road
  • vehicles loading or unloading scaffolding or glazing for a building on the stretch
  • vehicles using a marked loading bay or disabled parking bay, within the rules on its signs

The Blue Badge and taxi exemptions apply only where the vehicle “cannot reasonably be used for the same purpose in any other road”. The order also marks four Blue Badge parking places on the stretch.

What is not on the list is a friend or relative stopping to collect someone. The report says a motorist who does that “would therefore be in contravention of the Order and may be subject to enforcement action, including the issue of a Penalty Charge Notice”.

It adds that enforcing this “may not always be straightforward or possible”, but that this “does not remove its force”. The wording, it says, is materially the same as on the city’s earlier red routes.

When it starts

The order’s own start date is Monday 9 November. Western Road itself has not reopened yet. The council’s latest update on the reopening says it expects to begin reopening the road on Tuesday 10 November and to have it fully open on Wednesday 11 November, after a red route protest delayed the final work: our report.

The council has not said when enforcement cameras or wardens will begin issuing tickets on the new layout. We will add that when it does.

Because this is an experimental order, the council’s notice takes comments until Sunday 9 May 2027, and the layout can be changed during the trial.

What it means for you

  • If you usually get dropped off or collected on Western Road, plan a side street instead. A private car stopping on the red line risks a penalty charge, even for a minute.
  • If you hold a Blue Badge, you can still be dropped off and collected on the stretch, and there are four Blue Badge bays.
  • Taxis and private hire cars can still stop to let passengers in and out.
  • If you run a shop on the stretch, deliveries must use the marked loading bays. What Cabinet was told about the bays is in our September report.
  • If you want to comment, the experimental order is open to objections and comments until 9 May 2027. The address is on the council’s notice.

Every road closure in the city this week is on our roadworks and travel page, and the car parks nearest the shops are on the parking in Brighton page.