Author name: Steven Edwards

Damian CarringtonLast modified on Thu 17 Dec 2020 04.37 GMTAir pollution is the invisible killer, unseen but also unacknowledged on the death certificates of the 40,000 people it sends to an early grave in the UK every year. But on Wednesday, for the first time, the lethal impact of toxic air was given a name and a face – Ella Kissi-Debrah, a nine-year-old girl from south London.

Politicians have been told for many years that dirty air kills but have ducked the decisions needed amid the noisy honking of the motoring lobby. The coroner’s conclusion that air pollution was a cause of Ella’s death means those politicians can no longer pretend that illegal levels of pollution are a victimless crime.

For the first time, air pollution has been recognised as a cause of death. The dangers are known, and people of colour are most at risk

I live less than five minutes from the road that killed Ella Kissi-Debrah. Like so many in our community, I spend much of my life near the South Circular, a major road that runs through south London, whether I’m walking to the train station or catching a bus, and I can often hear the traffic. In a landmark ruling, Ella has now become the first person in the UK to have air pollution officially recognised by a coroner as a cause of death.

Emily Brooke, founder and chair of Beryl, writes on how further roll out of bike share schemes could help drive gender parity in cycling and ultimately create a new wave of custom for bike shops…
Rightly or wrongly, cyclists in this country have a stereotype. Frequently, cyclists are perceived as predominantly male, white and middle aged. In places, the data seems to support this, the proportion of women cycling in London is described by Transport for London as “relatively low” – 27% on most routes – while Sustrans figures show that women make up just 33% of cyclists in Greater Manchester.

Modifying Transport Behaviour – module handbook 2020-21 draft
There is limited space for people to take the module as “stand-alone study” so, if you’re keen, please write to activetravelacademy@westminster.ac.uk, including a brief CV and a short statement (<200 words) explaining your interest in the course.  Feel free to send any questions you may have about the course to the same address and we’ll try to answer them.

Sandra Saville Wed 16 Dec 2020
Until now, the statistics on air pollution deaths have been presented in black and white – numbers on a page that estimate between 28,000 and 36,000 people will die as a result of toxic air pollution every year in the UK.
But the life and death of nine-year-old Ella Kissi-Debrah is in full colour: from the pictures of her wearing her gymnastics leotard hung with medals, to the image of her mother and siblings holding aloft her photograph, when they no longer had her to hold on to, as they campaigned for the truth.
As Prof Sir Stephen Holgate told the coroner, behind the often-quoted statistics lie individuals whose lives have been cut short. “Every single number that goes into these studies is a single person dying,” he said.

Opening of key route along Chiswick High Road delayed while traffic lights put in place
A temporary (but eventually permanent) segregated cycleway on a major road in London will open on Friday. But the removal last week of a pop-up cycle lane on Kensington High Street by the Royal Borough of Kensington & Chelsea will deprive cyclists in the west of the capital of a safe route all the way into the city centre and beyond.
The route being opened in the coming days forms part of what, when it was announced more than a decade ago, was billed as Cycle Superhighway 9, and runs along Chiswick High Road.
Due to opposition from Conservative councillors in Chiswick, which lies in the south east corner of the London Borough of Hounslow, even before the coronavirus pandemic struck, it had been one of the most bitterly fought-over pieces of planned cycling infrastructure in the capital.

With a larger proportion of the workforce choosing to drive to work in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic, rising congestion could cost everyone in the UK more than £2,000 a year, according to Cycling UK. The charity has therefore called for improved walking and cycling networks, arguing that the cost of failing to provide alternatives to car travel are too great.

He said: “As a person who grew up in Mexico City, I can appreciate what the council is trying to do with the LTNs.”