By Steve Bargeton, political editor

MINISTERS LOOK set to be asked this week to give the green light to controversial plans that could see commuters paying £80 a month to use the Forth road bridge.

At a meeting of the Forth Estuary Transport Authority board on Friday, members will be asked to rubber stamp an application to the Scottish Executive to approve a road user charging scheme for crossing the bridge.

The key element of the road charging scheme is to penalise motorists who use the bridge at peak times.

It is proposed that between 4-6 pm cars could be charged £4—a £1 “maintenance charge” and a £3 “demand management charge”—to cross the bridge, with a 50% reduction if the vehicle has more than one occupant.

Every day about 35,000 people commute from Fife and beyond to Edinburgh.

Those working five days a week in the capital who travel by car on their own will have to pay £20 a week to get to and from work.

FETA have set out a range of charges from £1 to £4 for cars crossing the bridge depending on the time of day.

However, the average car charge is £1.59—up from the current £1 toll.

If board members back the plan this week, FETA believes that the new charging regime could be in force within two years.

They hope that ministers will give their approval in February of next year when public consultation would begin.

Anticipating a raft of objections and a public inquiry, they expect that ministers could give final approval in September 2007 with the scheme coming into effect the following month.

FETA is pressing ahead with its road charging policy despite the fact that the Executive has not yet made public its long awaited review into tolls on the Forth, Tay and Erskine bridges.

The review was expected this month, but The Courier understands that it will not be made public until the new year.

It is also understood that ministers will back removing the tolls from the Erskine Bridge but keeping them on the Forth and Tay bridges.

The whole issue of road tolls looks set to become highly charged in the run-up to the Holyrood elections in May 2007 and it is by no means certain that ministers will approve the massive rises in charges on the Forth bridge at that time.

Yesterday the Executive said it was impossible to comment on the FETA road charging plans before any application had been made to ministers.

“However, we have said in the past that ways of tackling congestion should be considered,” said a spokesman.

“We are in favour of road user charging schemes where appropriate.”

But last night Mid Scotland and Fife MSP Bruce Crawford urged board members to reject the road charging plans.

Mr Crawford said, “There are three good reasons why FETA board members should throw out these proposals.”

“One: how can they say to their customers they should pay more when the service they are getting is worse with repairs and delays?

“Two: if the rumours are true, they are about to lift the tolls on the Erskine bridge at a time when they are being asked to hike the tolls on the Forth bridge.

“And three: there are no real alternatives for hard-pressed commuters using the Forth bridge.

“No matter how many buses, trains or ferries they put on, most people have to use the bridge to get to work and back.”