Marina BolotnikovaMar 11, 2020
As a kid, I was furious about SUVs with a passion that now seems embarrassing, telling all the suburban adults I knew that their ugly, gas-guzzling tanks were going to end life on Earth. I didn’t come up with this idea myself: Anti-SUV discourse was everywhere. Mainstream organizations like the Sierra Club — which famously renamed the huge Ford Excursion “Ford Valdez” after the catastrophic Exxon Valdez oil spill — helped create a cultural backlash against these hulking cars. A TV ad campaign run by the Evangelical Environmental Network — “What Would Jesus Drive?” — urged Midwesterners to rethink their addiction to big cars. New York Times reporter Keith Bradsher’s 2002 polemic High and Mighty sneered at the rise of “behemoths that guzzle gas, spew pollution, and endanger their occupants and other motorists.”

02/11/2021

We’ve seen Insulate Britain emerge onto their M25 stage in the last couple of weeks with their brave and dangerous protests. They are prepared to go to prison as campaigners try to wake the population up to the fact we are careering headlong into the worst crisis humanity has ever faced.

The M25 is an obvious target for campaigners. Like many roads, it is frequently congested in the same areas at the same times. Completed in 1986, within six years it was carrying more than twice the volume of traffic for which it was designed!
Transport is the largest carbon-emitting sector in the UK. This isn’t surprising when you consider that 62 per cent of car journeys are ‘single occupancy’. This doesn’t take into account taxi and private hire journeys, which are worse than single occupancy. Taking a one or two tonne vehicle with you for every trip is going to use a massive amount of energy that could easily be put to better use: heating homes, for example

Nafeez Ahmed reveals how the British Government is working with a top climate denial funder to promote unproven environmental solutions

The Government, which is hosting the COP26 UN climate summit in Glasgow, is being formally advised by Texas fossil fuel giant ExxonMobil – one of the world’s biggest funders of climate science denial – according to Government documents examined exclusively by Byline Times.

Transport emissions account for almost a third of global carbon dioxide emissions – and while other sectors such as the energy industry have reduced their emissions over the past three decades, transport emissions are growing. It is the EU’s second most polluting sector and the United Kingdom’s biggest single producer of carbon dioxide, with cars and vans making up the vast majority of these emissions. If we are to meet our net zero targets by 2050, as over 130 countries have committed to do, then something needs to be done about these gas-guzzling monsters. 

Pavement parking options being considered by ministers

DfT tells ADEPT it is reviewing pavement parking ban, TRO reform and revised network management guidance
01 November 2021
 Two possible approaches to implementing a ban on pavement parking in England are being considered by the Department for Transport (DfT).
The government has been analysing the results of a consultation on a ban on pavement parking with the aim of making streets safer for vulnerable groups including the disabled and children as well as parents with pushchairs.
Last month Sally Gibbons, DfT’s head of traffic signs and street design policy, was speaking to members of the local authority…

Marina BolotnikovaMar 11, 2020
As a kid, I was furious about SUVs with a passion that now seems embarrassing, telling all the suburban adults I knew that their ugly, gas-guzzling tanks were going to end life on Earth. I didn’t come up with this idea myself: Anti-SUV discourse was everywhere. Mainstream organizations like the Sierra Club — which famously renamed the huge Ford Excursion “Ford Valdez” after the catastrophic Exxon Valdez oil spill — helped create a cultural backlash against these hulking cars. A TV ad campaign run by the Evangelical Environmental Network — “What Would Jesus Drive?” — urged Midwesterners to rethink their addiction to big cars. New York Times reporter Keith Bradsher’s 2002 polemic High and Mighty sneered at the rise of “behemoths that guzzle gas, spew pollution, and endanger their occupants and other motorists.”

“Keen cyclist” Lord Cruddas, controversially appointed by Boris Johnson, appears not to share PM’s enthusiasm for bike lanes

by SIMON_MACMICHAEL THU, NOV 04, 2021