In order to reduce air and noise pollution in urban environments, low emission zones (LEZ) are being introduced in many cities worldwide. This paper deals with design of a LEZ-anticipating control strategy for a Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicle (PHEV) given in a P2-type parallel powertrain configuration. A control-oriented backward-looking model of the PHEV powertrain is used as a design basis. The core control strategy is based on combining a rule-based (RB) controller including an explicit battery state-of-charge (SoC) controller and an equivalent consumption minimization strategy (ECMS), and it is superimposed by generating an optimal SoC reference trajectory aimed at enabling pure electric driving through forthcoming LEZs and minimizing the overall fuel consumption. The optimal SoC reference trajectory is generated by minimizing its length over travelled distance. The proposed control strategy is verified by means of computer simulations and by comparing the corresponding simulation results against the dynamic programming-based globally optimal benchmark for several LEZ scenarios and various driving cycles.