The public needs to be made more aware of the connection between fast driving and carbon emissions, a campaigner has suggested as new statistics revealed an increase in cars exceeding speed limits.
In January to March 2021, the proportion of cars exceeding the speed limit in free-flow road conditions in Great Britain was higher than the same period in 2020 and 2019 across all three road types covered.
On motorways, 50% of cars exceeded the 70mph speed limit in the latest quarter..
Pollutionwatch: time to rethink London’s red routes | The Guardian
In many cities around the world, major roads have been restructured to ease air pollution
Gary Fuller 4/6/21
The decision to reroute instead of rebuild the earthquake-damaged Cypress Freeway in West Oakland, California, eased the air pollution burden experienced by local communities and opened new areas for housing and the creation of parks.
Other examples include the unbuilding of part of the Inner Loop in Rochester, New York, the removal of a 12-lane motorway in Utrecht, the Netherlands, to restore the canal that once surrounded the city centre, and the Cheonggyecheon River project in Seoul, South Korea; where a multi-lane expressway was removed to reveal a buried river, creating a green-transport corridor and a place to picnic and relax. These schemes could provide a blueprint for our major urban roads.
£90billion road revamp planned despite drive for green travel | The Times
The roads funding plan came days after the government pledged £2 billion to boost cycling
Tuesday May 26 2020
Tuesday May 26 2020
A £90 billion upgrade of England’s motorways and main A-roads is planned despite commitments during the pandemic to fund green transport.
An official document shows that Highways England, the government-owned company, has proposed significant improvements to the country’s busiest roads over the next 15 years.
This month the government announced a £2 billion package to promote cycling and walking. Last weekend it unveiled a further £283 million to increase bus and tram services.
In the March budget, the chancellor announced a £27 billion investent in motorways and main A-roads in England over the next five years.
At the same time, the Office of Rail and Road, the official watchdog, published its own “efficiency review” into Highways England’s longer-term plans.
There is no business as usual when modelling climate change – Phil Goodwin – transportxtra
We live in a disequilibrium world, where chaos is always close and business as usual an illusion. Model-based assessments are under challenge, says Phil Goodwin. In these circumstances, the roles of scrutiny and challenge are supremely important
Embedded in decades of transport modelling is the assumption that the future will be sufficiently like the past that any relationships observed (or thought to be observed), were stable enough to use as a guide to the future, and reliable enough to support decisions, with a few modest caveats. This philosophical starting point underpinned the rationale for the key transport models used to forecast future movement and support major projects. Brexit, Covid19, and climate change all challenge the credibility of that view.
What Is A Dutch Style Roundabout? – The Ranty Highwayman
Look, I don’t want to be that guy, but when I see a UK cycling scheme trumpeting a “Dutch-style” roundabout, it’s going to get my attention and I’m going to give it a closer look. > North Tyneside Council is currently consulting on a raft of cycling schemes which are being delivered over the next couple of years using funding from the UK Government’s Active Travel Fund (ATF) and the Transforming Cities Fund (TCF). The former is essentially part of the response to Covid where 2020/21’s fund was more about pop-up and interim active travel works with 2021/22 being about making things permanent or extending them. The latter closed to applications in 2018 and is about investing in public and sustainable transport in city regions. Both funds are for England only.
“Richmond Park is just horribly dangerous”: Drivers stream past child cycling in the park | road.cc
4/6/21
We put it to you lot…how can we stop beauty spots being mobbed by drivers? The question comes after this morning’s video from Richmond Park and the photos from the Lake District over the bank holiday.
cqexbesd gave it a lot of thought…
Provide a decent bus service, bike hire scheme, train service (that carries bikes). Ban cars entering without permits. Permits available for short periods and long periods. Permits require you scoring enough points (because we all like a good points system). Points for disability and infirmity. Infirmity can be both temporary or permamnet (i.e. through old age, very young age, pregnancy etc). Points for genuinely having to carry a lot of stuff (e.g. tradespeople working in the area). Maybe limited short term permits for full vehicles (i.e. you can drive as long as there are at least 4 people in your car). Points for people who actually live in the area…
Thoughts?
The media is still mostly failing to convey the urgency of the climate crisis | Mark Hertsgaard and Kyle Pope | The Guardian
Thu 3 Jun 2021
We asked the world’s press to commit to treating climate change as the emergency that scientists say it is. Their response was dispiriting
The TV newsman Bill Moyers likes to tell the story of how Edward R Murrow, the pre-eminent US broadcast journalist of his time, insisted on covering what became Germany’s invasion of Poland in 1939. Murrow’s bosses at CBS News had other priorities; they ordered Murrow’s reporters to cover dance competitions in Hamburg, Paris and London, explaining that Americans needed some happy news. Murrow wouldn’t do it. “It’ll probably get us fired,” he told his colleagues, but he sent his correspondents to the German-Polish border; they arrived just in time to witness Hitler’s tanks and troops roar into Poland. Suddenly, Europe was at war. And Americans heard about it because journalists at one of the nation’s most influential news outlets defied convention and did their jobs.
The evidence is in: low-traffic neighbourhoods are popular | Julian Bell | The Guardian
Wed 2 Jun 2021
Are measures to make streets safe for walking and cycling unpopular? Are they vote-losers? Have we failed to take communities with us – and will we, as local politicians, pay the price?
As a former Labour leader of Ealing council in west London, I was at the heart of this debate. The low-traffic neighbourhood schemes we installed in my borough, using cameras to stop rat-running in more than a hundred streets, caused a row noisy even by the standards of cycling scheme rows. Demonstrators marched to the council offices with “Julian Bell – end this hell” placards. The “Bell” and the “end” were placed together to make a further well-loved phrase.
The infrastructure was vandalised. I was accused of not consulting or listening to people’s views – though the schemes, as trials, were themselves consultations. The schemes were often labelled “unpopular” and “controversial” in the local press.
April) ‘This is it. If we don’t amp up, we’re goners’: the last chance to confront the climate crisis? | The Guardian
When it comes to addressing the climate emergency, there have been hopeful moments before that ultimately led to nothing. Now, hope rises again
Jeff Goodall Fri 16 Apr 2021
The Earth’s climate has always been a work in progress. In the 4.5bn years the planet has been spinning around the sun, ice ages have come and gone, interrupted by epochs of intense heat. The highest mountain range in Texas was once an underwater reef. Camels wandered in evergreen forests in the Arctic. Then a few million years later, 400 feet of ice formed over what is now New York City. But amid this geologic mayhem, humans have gotten lucky. For the past 10,000 years, virtually the entire stretch of human civilization, people have lived in what scientists call “a Goldilocks climate” – not too hot, not too cold, just right.
Master Plan to promote cycling in Europe – transportxtra
02 June 2021
A pan-European Master Plan for Cycling Promotion has been drawn up by the PEP, a joint programme of United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) and the World Health Organisation (WHO).
The Master Plan aims to help national and local stakeholders streamline efforts to promote cycling. Its objectives include:
Contributing to sustainable economic development and stimulating job creation.
Membership