Transport for London Bus Lane Fines — London's red routes
How many bus lane Penalty Charge Notices Transport for London issues across London's red routes, how much it raises, and how often challenges succeed — from data released under Freedom of Information (ref FOI-1304-2627/GH).
255,950
PCNs issued in 5 years2021/22–2025/26
£14.28m
gross income, 5 yearsnet of costs not held
131,277
PCNs in 2025/26
42%
paid at the £80 discount2025/26
67%
of challenges upheld2025/26
This page reports data released by Transport for London under the Freedom of Information Act (FOI-1304-2627/GH, responded 2026-08-13). Figures are the council's own. BusLaneCheck is independent and not affiliated with the council. Compare every UK authority →
Bus lane PCNs issued per yearGross PCN income per year
Red route bus lane enforcement has grown roughly sevenfold in five years, and almost all of it happened after spring 2024. TfL issued 18,886 penalties in 2021/22 and 15,967 in 2022/23; by 2025/26 it issued 131,277 — more in that single year than in the previous four combined. The turn is visible to the month: 2,396 penalties in June 2023 against 9,718 in June 2024, and the monthly count has not dropped below 9,000 since. Income followed, from £1.13m to £6.63m a year, £14.28m over the period. Two things are worth saying about what this does and does not show. It is not a per-camera figure — TfL withheld that — so it cannot tell you whether more cameras went live or existing ones got busier. And the money is gross: TfL does not record what red route enforcement costs to run, so unlike Newcastle, which does, there is no way to say what it keeps.
Where the cameras are
TfL would not say which red route cameras issue the most penalties, so there is no league table on this page — see the note on section 31 below. It did release the underlying location list: 391 enforced stretches of red route bus lane and bus gate, with the operating hours of each. Almost all of it runs around the clock. 379 of the 391 stretches operate at any time, Monday to Sunday, and only 12 keep to restricted hours — a handful of peak-only stretches on Church Road in Northolt, Camden High Street, Kennington Park Road, Upper Street, Streatham High Road, Lordship Lane, Denmark Hill and London Bridge. BusLaneCheck lists the red route bus lanes road by road at /bus-lanes/tfl-red-routes/; where a road carries several stretches with different hours, the lane page states the strictest, because that is the one that decides whether you are fined.
Challenges & appeals — do they work?
Formal representations to the council, and appeals to the independent London Tribunals (the Environment and Traffic Adjudicators). Drivers made 32,754 formal challenges over 5 years.
Year
Challenges
Upheld
Rejected
Success rate
To tribunal
2021/22
2,929
1,320
276
45%
66 (6 allowed / 26 dismissed)
2022/23
2,885
1,425
283
49%
55 (5 allowed / 14 dismissed)
2023/24
3,536
1,725
364
49%
54 (5 allowed / 25 dismissed)
2024/25
11,602
4,762
1,505
41%
255 (26 allowed / 104 dismissed)
2025/26
11,802
7,883
2,370
67%
402 (19 allowed / 162 dismissed)
The council's own figures show the share of challenges upheld went from 45% in 2021/22 to 67% in 2025/26 — so a well-grounded challenge is worth making. This is one of the strongest cases on the site for challenging a penalty. TfL accepted and cancelled 17,115 of the 32,754 formal representations it received, against just 4,798 rejected — and in 2025/26 alone it accepted 7,883 of 11,802, two thirds of everything put to it. Beyond that, the appeal numbers are unusual. Only 832 drivers appealed to London Tribunals in five years, a tiny fraction of 255,950 penalties, but of the 749 that reached an outcome TfL simply did not contest 349 of them, and adjudicators allowed a further 61. That is 55% of decided appeals going the driver's way, with TfL declining to argue nearly half. Note that a third of representations were still open when these figures were compiled, so the accepted and rejected counts do not sum to the total received. See our guide to appealing a bus lane PCN for the grounds that win.
The fine itself
A bus lane PCN from Transport for London is £160, reduced to £80 if paid within 14 days. It is a civil penalty — there are no licence points. £160, halved to £80 if paid within 14 days. TfL confirmed the history in this response: before 17 January 2022 a red route bus lane PCN was £130, reduced to £65, and it rose to the current £160/£80 on that date. The change lands in the middle of the period below, so the earliest years mix both rates.
What the council does not hold or publish
Which red route cameras issue the most fines. Refused under section 31 of the Freedom of Information Act — law enforcement. TfL argued that naming the busiest and quietest camera sites would show drivers where enforcement is least likely and encourage them to ignore restrictions there, and it cited the Information Commissioner's decision notice ic-69434-n9n7 as having accepted that reasoning before. It is the only authority so far to withhold the per-location split on these grounds; most that refuse cite cost instead. So there is no camera league table on this page — the figures below are the whole red route network.
Bus lanes and bus gates cannot be separated. TfL records both under the same contravention code, so every figure here covers red route bus lanes and bus gates together.
Cost of running the cameras. TfL does not record operating costs specifically for bus lane enforcement, so the income here is gross. It is not what TfL keeps.
Challenges still open. 10,841 of the 32,754 representations — a third — were still recorded as open when the response was compiled, and 83 tribunal appeals were awaiting a decision. TfL explains that a case can sit open for procedural reasons rather than delay, for instance where liability has been transferred to a registered keeper or a statutory declaration has sent the penalty back to an earlier stage. The accepted and rejected counts here therefore do not add up to the total received.
Borough roads are not in these figures. These numbers cover the Transport for London Road Network only — the red routes TfL manages directly, about 5% of London's roads. The bus lanes on the other 95% are enforced by the individual boroughs, most of which have their own page on this site.