After Antwerp, Brussels and other cities now also have low emission zones and entry restrictions for cars with non-current EURO emission standards. In Belgian environmental zones, registration of the vehicle is mandatory before entering an environmental zone (Low Emission Zone LEZ). Older vehicles also require an environmental ticket, which is subject to a charge.
After Antwerp took the first step this year and introduced a low emission zone, Brussels will follow suit on 01.01.2018! Other cities will follow in the course of the year.
For the time being, the capital is excluding vehicles with EURO emission standards 0 and 1 from traffic. An exemption permit can be purchased for these vehicles, but only as a day ticket. Compliance with the rules is monitored with the help of intelligent traffic monitoring cameras. Every vehicle is scanned when it enters the low emission zone and compared with the city database. Even the parking ticket is sent automatically if the vehicle is not registered or is too old to enter the LEZ. It is therefore essential to register the vehicle before entering the zone.
Green-Zones brings everything simply to the point
Green-Zones brings together all this information on the LEZ environmental zones, handles the entire registration process for its customers (takes 2-10 days) and visualizes all the necessary information on an individually issued registry sticker. This means that owners of non-local vehicles have an overview at all times and can avoid high fines in the camera-monitored environmental zones.
An exception: the environmental ticket
Vehicles that do not meet the relevant EURO standard can purchase an exemption with the environmental ticket and then still enter the LEZ environmental zone. Depending on the vehicle type and age of the vehicle, the ticket can be purchased for one day or for a longer period. However, each city decides individually which EURO standards are excluded from traffic and for which period an environmental ticket can be purchased. It is therefore possible that the same vehicle may be allowed to enter one environmental zone but not another. The type of environmental ticket offered for this vehicle - i.e. whether it is a weekly, daily or monthly ticket - also varies depending on the environmental zone, especially as the regulations are tightened every year.
There is no central register for foreign vehicles, which means that foreign vehicles have to register individually for each city. Quite a lot of effort given the increasing number of low emission zones in Belgium!
Already four low emission zones in 2018
In addition to Antwerp and Brussels, there will be at least two more low emission zones in 2018: Willebroek and Michelen. Ghent has also already decided to introduce a low emission zone. This means that the three largest Belgian cities will soon have low emission zones with very different entry regulations, which tourists, logistics companies and bus companies will regularly drive through. An information portal is now available so that they can view all the regulations for all the cities centrally and without having to search too much. Here you will find all the information you need to plan a trip through Belgium and all the regulations that affect the major cities of Ghent, Antwerp and Brussels in particular.
