Deluge raises fears human-caused disruption is making extreme weather even worse than predicted
The intensity and scale of the floods in Germany this week have shocked climate scientists, who did not expect records to be broken this much, over such a wide area or this soon.
After the deadly heatwave in the US and Canada, where temperatures rose above 49.6C two weeks ago, the deluge in central Europe has raised fears that human-caused climate disruption is making extreme weather even worse than predicted.
Girl, 7, dies after bike crash with lorry in Wiltshire – BBC News
14 July 2021
A “beautiful and kind” seven-year-old girl has died after a crash with a lorry while riding her bike.
The girl, named only as Eloise, was taken to Salisbury District Hospital but died a short time later.
It happened on the A338 Church Street in Collingbourne Ducis in Wiltshire shortly before 18:30 BST on Tuesday.
She attended Collingbourne Primary School and headteacher Dan Crossman said the school sent her family “our sincerest sympathy and support.”
Cars are fuelling our isolation from strangers – Guardian
Letters Fri 16 Jul 2021
In his otherwise insightful article about how our interactions with strangers have changed (Remember hand shakes and small talk? The lost art of living with strangers, 10 July), Joe Moran omits to mention another important influence: cars, and our relationship to them. In the suburban neighbourhood where I now live, it is virtually impossible to encounter the strangers who are my neighbours, apart from those immediately next door.
Almost everyone else is only ever seen stepping from their front door to their car, parked a couple of feet away in what was the front garden, driving off, and then returning later to scuttle from car to front door. Few people walk to the local shops. One 88-year-old resident I chatted to at a community event confirmed this impression. When I asked why she didn’t know as many people in the street as she had in the past, she gave a one-word answer: “Cars.”
Isabella Stone Sheffield
Electric car “obsession” to see Net Zero goals missed, writes Oxford Uni Transport Professor – Cycle Industry News
Mark Sutton15 July, 2021
There is no feasible way the transition to electric cars can take place fast enough within the window “we can spare – the next five years,” writes Brand. It is estimated that it will take three to four times that period of time for a complete transition of the world’s fossil fuel car fleet.
“Tackling the climate and air pollution requires curbing all motorised transport, particularly private cars, as quickly as possible,” he writes.
Is the Government’s Transport Decarbonisation Plan up to scratch? | Campaign For Better Transport
16.07.2021 | Silviya Barret
While launching the Plan the Transport Secretary was at pains to say that people’s lives won’t change much: “We will still fly but in more efficient aircraft, using sustainable fuel. We will still drive, but increasingly in zero emission cars”. The good news is that – by contrast – the Plan itself recognises the need for modal shift and to reduce how much we travel, as well as how we travel. It reiterates the government’s ambition for public transport, cycling and walking to be “the natural first choice” for people.
Leicester presses ahead with plan for workplace parking levy – transportxtra
Outline plans for a proposed workplace parking levy (WPL) have been put out to public consultation by Leicester City Council.
The plans form part of the draft Leicester Transport Plan that focuses on the key themes and schemes that the city council proposes to deliver by 2036.
The city council says the WPL, which could start in 2023, would support delivery of the overall transport plan, alongside other funding opportunities.
Measuring the impact of Covid-19 on cycling – transportxtra
During the first lockdown in March 2020, there was a massive increase in cycling as the roads emptied of motorised vehicles and people turned to their bikes. Pop-up cycle lanes appeared in many towns and cities and the BBC ran articles on how the pandemic had sparked a “European cycling revolution”. As lockdowns have eased and road traffic is generally back to pre-Covid levels, what has happened to that cycling revolution?
The government has no plan for decarbonising transport – At War With The Motorist
Joe Dunkley July 14, 2021
There is much excitement in the transport sector, as the government has finally announced that they have published the long-awaited Transport Decarbonisation Plan. Social media is full of ministers with fancy videos claiming that they are doing something significant.
So I rushed to the DfT section of gov.uk and read what they have published. And I’m afraid it will be a massive disappointment.
There is no plan to decarbonise transport.
The government has not published any new actions that it will be taking to decarbonise transport. There is no plan for modal shift, there is no plan for decarbonisation of individual polluting modes and sectors. The government have made no commitments and have no policies.
For all their talk, Grant Shapps and his ministers are doing nothing at all to decarbonise transport in the UK. It’s business as usual on the Department for Transport website.
Climate scientists: concept of net zero is a dangerous trap
April 22, 2021
James Dyke, Robert Watson, Wolfgang Knorr
Sometimes realisation comes in a blinding flash. Blurred outlines snap into shape and suddenly it all makes sense. Underneath such revelations is typically a much slower-dawning process. Doubts at the back of the mind grow. The sense of confusion that things cannot be made to fit together increases until something clicks. Or perhaps snaps. Collectively we three authors of this article must have spent more than 80 years thinking about climate change. Why has it taken us so long to speak out about the obvious dangers of the concept of net zero? In our defence, the premise of net zero is deceptively simple – and we admit that it deceived us. The threats of climate change are the direct result of there being too much carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. So it follows that we must stop emitting more and even remove some of it. This idea is central to the world’s current plan to avoid catastrophe. In fact, there are many suggestions as to how to actually do this, from mass tree planting, to high tech direct air capture devices that suck out CO2 from the air.
Government update petition calling for public awareness campaign to address driver aggression | road.cc
Will Bolton Wed, Jul 14, 2021
The DfT has updated its response to a petition calling for a public awareness campaign to address driver aggression towards cyclists. While a paragraph has been added to the top to say the DfT “doesn’t consider that a campaign along the lines specifically requested by this petition is necessary”, it does now say that the departments THINK! campaign will be developing a behavioural change campaign.
The petition, started by Helen-Louise Smith, said: “The attitude that cyclists should not be on the roads needs to end.”
It called for motorists to be educated about ‘dangerous, inappropriate and aggressive behaviours that can lead to the injury and even death of cyclists.’