Drivers. Unions. Residents. I'm going to sue the lot of them

Suddenly, congestion charges are violations of human rights, up there with arbitrary arrest, torture and state murder

She reminded me of Charles Laughton as the hunchback of Notre Dame, did the young woman driving the yellow Beetle that came round the badly parked lorry at speed yesterday, turned the corner and nearly killed me. Her shoulder was raised grotesquely to her ear, thus trapping a minute mobile phone between the two, but rendering her right arm pretty useless. In her left hand – now forced to do all the work of changing gear, steering and making obscene gestures – was a lighted cigarette. Even more Quasi-esque were the two vowels, coated in glottal stops, that she threw back at me, careering across the road, after I remonstrated with her.

Bloody drivers. Bloody cars. There's no end to them. Now, after two years of our local traffic-calming scheme, they've worked out that no one polices the no-entry signs, and so they take them at speed, on their way back to leafy avenues in Edgware and Potters Bar. Soon we'll have to close the road altogether to give our children a fighting chance of surviving to puberty.

Further down the High Street a small queue of disconsolate travellers sat and stood around the number 46 bus stop. Their body language suggested that they had been there for hours. The presence of two policewomen argued a recent history of disputes between would-be passengers and bus drivers about how many people can ride in a 40-seat vehicle.

Bloody tubes, bloody RMT. This city depends upon its overpriced Underground trains running through their ancient tunnels on their antique rails. And now Bob Crow and his merry men, in an almost entirely concocted dispute about safety under a new Private Public Partnership regime, close down the network and pose, smiling for the cameras outside Leytonstone Tube. Next time he might like to put in an appearance at the number 46 bus stop.

I know many of you don't live in London and get fed up with metropolitan complaints about how the effects of economic growth are blighting our lives. But bear with me, because most of the issues raised by London's transport travails have some significance for other cities in the UK and for those who dwell in or travel to them.

At the moment all attempts to improve London's transport problems seem to be stuck with Jarndyce v Jarndyce in Chancery. There is a La Ronde of court cases going on. The PPP against which Bob Crow is cawing is stymied by the continuing series of court actions brought by the Mayor, Ken Livingstone. In June 2001 he lost to a ruling from Mr Justice Sullivan that, whatever the Mayor thought, the government, according to legislation, should "have the last word".

There were many who sympathised with the predicament of a directly elected Mayor of London who could not make a decision on transport in the city, but even they were rather hoping that this was the end of the matter. However expensive PPP may turn out to be, most Londoners simply wanted the work to start. But with the matter back in court since last month, just about nothing has happened.

The irony in this is that Ken is now facing similar delays as a result of legal challenges to his decision to press ahead with congestion charging on vehicles entering central London. Cities all over Britain have been watching the High Court since Monday, when Westminster Council and a group of citizens from Kennington brought their action for judicial review of the Mayor's decision. Under Ken's scheme, from next February motorists will be charged for driving into central London between 7am and 6.30pm from Monday to Friday. Cameras will snap number plates, which will then be checked against a database to see if the charge has been paid. There will be discounts for residents – and doctors, midwives and others will be exempt. The fine for not paying your charge will be £120. Ken says that charging will raise a £130m a year for public transport improvements, and cut traffic in central London by as much as 15 per cent.

It sounds pretty good to me, and I thought Ken was elected by Londoners to do it. But no; according to Westminster and the Kennington folk, Livingstone is not just wrong, but his plan is actually a "breach of residents' human rights". So it's up there with arbitrary arrest, torture, and state murder. One Kenningtonian told journalists that he was "very concerned about the effect the charges will have on residents and businesses. This boundary will split the community... the elderly are worried that people will not visit them if they have to pay to come into the zone." Westminster adds that many people will be cut off from doctors' surgeries, schools and shops.

Isn't that mad? The mayor is suggesting a road toll, like the one which you have to pay to get into New York over any of its bridges, and Westminster Council starts invoking the Berlin Wall. Communities cut off because occasionally someone might have to pay a fiver to travel by car? Do parking charges "cut" communities off? Or cul-de-sacs? Is the definition of connection anywhere that we can manoeuvre our motors?

But, of course, without any ideas of their own for how to deal with this car madness, the objectors claim that they are not opposed per se to charging. Kit Malthouse, Westminster Council's deputy leader, stresses that it's all about due process. "We need a proper debate," he says, "on the merits and practicalities of the scheme. Above all," he weasels, "we need to have a proper public transport infrastructure before a congestion charging scheme can be introduced."

Of course! Let's wait 25 years until we have one of those, and then take action. Meanwhile, the Kennington activists argue that their streets will be turned into rat-runs and illegal parking areas, which would infringe their human rights. Though they too are not actually against the idea as such. Two weeks ago a Mr Mark Rogers organised a road-blocking protest in Kennington, the main zonal area south of the Thames. Said Mr Rogers: "No, we are not against congestion charging – we think it's a good idea, but we think the zone boundary should be the river." So Mr Rogers either thought that it was fine for north Londoners to suffer what he could not stand, or believed that charging should only exist for those wanting to drive into the Thames itself.

Faced with this threat, Ken is quoted as having said, "Every one of my decisions has been looked at by barristers and subject to proper legal study. We have done everything possible to proceed lawfully and we hope that we will be allowed to proceed on this basis." Which is, of course, exactly what the government has said about the legality of PPP.

Well, if Westminster council believes that pollution and rat-running are contrary to peoples' human rights, perhaps all of us should now take to the courts. I have it in mind to sue the Kennington activists for capriciously ensuring that pollution and gridlock in central London will continue and get worse. And I might sue Bob Crow while I am about it. I could always argue that Quasimetta was only driving her yellow car because she couldn't get the Tube. Hell, hand the whole lot over to the judges.

David.Aaronovitch@btinternet.com