How to read these numbers
Every figure on this site comes from the enforcing authority's own response to a Freedom of Information or Environmental Information Regulations request. We publish what the council sent, we link its original documents on each authority's page, and we do not estimate or fill gaps.
That means the table above is a comparison of disclosures, not a like-for-like league table, and there are four things to keep in mind before quoting it:
- Year ranges differ. Most authorities released five financial years; some hold fewer. The “all years” column says how many years it covers, and the “latest year” column names the year.
- Definitions differ. Some councils count only contravention code 34J (“being in a bus lane”); others fold bus gates and bus-only streets into the same total, or cannot break the figures down by code at all. Each authority's page states what its figures cover.
- Income is gross. Where income is shown it is the amount received, before the cost of running the cameras and the back office. Councils are generally unable or unwilling to give a net figure, and by law any surplus must go to transport purposes.
- Bigger authorities issue more PCNs. A raw total mostly measures how large a council is and how many cameras it runs. The cameras column is the more useful denominator.
If you spot something that looks wrong, the source documents are one click away on each authority's page — check them, because the council's own response is the record.
Which authorities are missing?
Any authority not listed above either does not enforce bus lanes with cameras, or has not yet answered our request. Requests are outstanding with the remaining enforcing authorities across England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, and this page grows as responses arrive. Councils have 20 working days to reply.
Can I reuse this data?
Yes. The underlying figures are the councils' own and are released under the Open Government Licence. If you are writing about it, please link back to the authority page you took the numbers from so readers can reach the original FOI response. The full terms cover the lane records too, which are a compilation and are not OGL.