AIBU to ask you to read this, and then think twice before you make any unnecessary journeys by car?

[ArcheryAnnie]

I'm not talking about those essential trips where you are transporting a wardrobe/tools of the trade/someone with mobility difficulties/fourteen tiny children/etc etc etc. I'm talking about all those local trips where it's just you, and you aren't going far, and walking might add on a bit of time to your chores, but walking or cycling would also avoid one more car on the road for that day.

(I so, so feel for the grieving mother in this story, below. I live on a main road and now that I've learned more about things like this, I really worry about the effect that it's had on my son's lung development when he was smaller.)

Court ruling about nine year old who died of an asthma attack.

"...lawyers for the family presented new evidence to the attorney general that directly linked Ella’s serious form of asthma and her death with the heavy traffic on the South Circular near her home. Her death coincided with one of the worst air pollution surges in her local area."

www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/dec/07/mother-asthma-death-girl-knew-nothing-toxic-air-ella-kissi-debrah-london?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

Ellas death is devastating. But it’s not down to individuals going to Tesco and individuals won’t solve it alone.

1. Break the hold fossil fuel industry has in lobbying and investment industry
2. Reform standards for emissions so cars that kill can no longer be sold. So that car manufacturers can’t get rich for selling polluting vehicles.
3. Put electric charge ports everywhere and subsidise the hell out of electric cars.

This is so tragic and bloody terrifying. We live in central London. My daughter has asthma which presents as a continuous cough. When I first raised it with the GP, she (GP) asked if it improved whenever we spent time away from the city (it does) and said in her opinion it is linked to environmental pollution and that she sees so many children affected in the same way.

We don’t have a car. One of the main reasons that we chose to live in London is because it was one of the few places in the UK we could live a full life without one. And I know it’s a controversial view and I’ll get my arse flamed, but far too many people in this city make journeys by car simply they can’t be arsed to consider alternatives, and it’s choking our children.

SomeoneInThe I think that's passing the buck. Each person that climbs into their car for a journey they could do by foot or cycle is making a choice that is harming other people, especially kids. I think if people realised that they might, just might, choose differently.

Mrsfrumble I am sorry to hear about your daughter's asthma, and agree entirely about there being too many car journeys made.

Am I allowed to drive my electric car?

It's not a question of "allowed", Pontiac, it's a question of getting people to think about their small conveniences, a few minutes shaved off a small chore they are doing, and then set it against someone else's reduced life expectancy.

If you have an electric car that doesn't belch pollution into the air, well done you, gold star, and all the rest of it. But it's also worth remembering that electric cars create traffic every bit as much as any other type of car, and so when you are sitting in a clogged-up traffic jam, you may not be creating emissions as you sit there, but the diesel car behind you will be. Clearer roads are the goal - clearer of every type of car. (Though electric is a step forward.)

I don't think it's possible for everyone to use a car where they can walk. I agree that we all should try n do our but as n when we can. I try to use reusable, avoid plastic , save water etc. I can't walk to my kids school, nor using a public transport is convenient mostly due to the distance, weather, lack of time. I couldn't afford an electric car though I really wanted to, just to avoid adding more fumes into the air but here i am, I am doing the best I can clearly not best enough for many others..

My sister drives her car to the corner shop 5 minutes walk away 🤭

That's awful. But you're going to get slammed - MNers are generally very protective over their right to cars, overseas holidays and daily meat meals.

Something like 40,000 deaths due to poor air quality in the UK every year, much of it from traffic. But it isn't generally spoken about. Hopefully, this tragic case will raise awareness.

Although I don't think that individual actions will solve it completely, they do have a big role to play. People need to stop using their cars so much. Would be good also to see car idling banned, including outside schools (and including the person I saw at school today who left his car idling for 10 mins on the double yellow lines right outside school WHEN THERE WAS NO ONE ACTUALLY IN THE CAR!).

@PontiacBandit

Am I allowed to drive my electric car?

As well as the points the OP made about electric cars, they also create significant particulate pollution still, from brake and tyre dust.

Although society has been built around car use, the vast majority of people using one could change their lives in order to use it less or not at all. They just don't always want to.

The way to reduce pollution from car emissions is to make driving and car ownership so prohibitively expensive that people are forced to think of alternatives. The reality is that I’ll get in my incredibly high polluting sports car tomorrow to drive to the supermarket because, let’s face it, I’m not that bothered about some child I don’t know. And of course, I’ll be flamed for saying that - but it’s how a huge number of people think, so sad stories about dead children isn’t going to deter them from owning a car. Make it hurt me, financially, and you’ll get your desired impact.

Part of the problem is that the government is well aware that electric vehicle charging infrastructure is too inadequate and likely to be so for years to come. Greater investment in that (rather than a ban on the sale of new petrol cars from 2030, which simply means that we’ll be keeping older and more polluting vehicles on the road for longer) is crucial.

Unfortunately I'm physically disabled and need my car for any travel away from the home, I'm considering an electric car for my next one but there is a very poor range of those that can take my hoist for my scooter and are also high enough for me to get in and out. If public transport was better for small mobility scooters I could use it more, but as my local train company don't allow them and buses are hit and miss as to whether there is space in the wheelchair area its too difficult unfortunately.

All well and good if you live somewhere where you can walk to the shops, the doctor etc, but many people live in rural areas where there is little or no public transport, and what there is isn't at the time you need, neither does it go in the direction you want.

Solve those issues first, and people might then use their cars less.

Not really possible if you live in a village three miles from a post office and five miles to a food shop. I could get a train but it's a mile walk to the supermarket from.the station and with kids too feed I would need to go every other day and buy two bags which realistically is all I could carry.

Buses have been cut, you cant live here really unless you drive and you have to live where work is. On the plus side, work is two minutes walk out the back door.

Pollution and global warming was a massive issue twenty plus years ago when i did my degree in Biology. People should have acted back then when they knew our path. It's never urgent, until it's too late. Cuts in infrastructure, less small local schools, building more more houses in already gridlocked cities. It all adds up. There will come a day when our personal choices run out. Karma for the selfish nature of all humanity.

I don't think the air pollution is about the "little journeys". It's a problem with people having to commute to work for whatever reason. (I used to commute 40min one way through a town centre, past 3 schools directly. I had no choice, as no suitable public transport available, or a job closer to home. I bought a demonized diesel, because it was the cheapest way to get to work. I wasn't in a position of not working either.)

Sadly, electric cars are not the complete answer. There are still huge problems with batteries - really covering everything from safety, over life span to disposal.
Facing out fossil fuel cars, will hopefully give the car industry the incentive to sort this out. But as it stands, they are different, not better.

That’s fine if you live in city. I live in a small village in Scotland with no buses and the train doesn’t go anywhere near a supermarket.

I heard that on the news tonight so sad. I have asthma and so does two of my kids.

I live about five miles from any shops and about ten miles from a supermarket. We don’t have trains stopping though there is a line and the bus is once a week and run by volunteers and isn’t running at the moment. There is a network set up if anyone needs anything. They can put a request up. We don’t really do unnecessary journeys and I have always tried to combine any visits.

@SomeoneInTheLaaaaaounge

Ellas death is devastating. But it’s not down to individuals going to Tesco and individuals won’t solve it alone.

1. Break the hold fossil fuel industry has in lobbying and investment industry
2. Reform standards for emissions so cars that kill can no longer be sold. So that car manufacturers can’t get rich for selling polluting vehicles.
3. Put electric charge ports everywhere and subsidise the hell out of electric cars.

Electric cars are not a magic bullet though, as with mobile phones they take rare natural resources to create and creating anything new is not great for the environment. Walking or public transport are the 2 best solutions.

The fossil fuel industry is also where most pensions are held so that can be something that individuals lobby about.

Any action taken by individuals is helpful, however small. Look at what using eco bulbs has done, it took a long time but has made a massive effect collectively.

It is better to run cars to death before creating new ones and think that there will be better tech than electric cars before long although I don't know how safe they can make hydrogen cars. Retrofitting would be even better.

I agree with you OP, but there also needs to be a campaign for a better nationwide public transport system.

And what about all the mumsnetters who post "Should I have a third [fourth/fifth] baby"? Adding to journeys, adding to landfill, accelerating climate change... Someone coming on to post "AIBU to ask you to think again about that next baby?" would get quite the kicking. ..

Its not just the responsibility of car drivers though, flying creates a massive burden on air quality, if you read the statistics on that it far outstrips the damage one car making unnecessary journeys does, so are you going to ask people to think about those irrelevant trips popping to Barcelona for a stag do? Understand those stats and you will realise the small trip car driver will have a marginal impact.

Its also the Council and their Highways department looking into their convoluted one way systems that send people on 2 mile journeys to cross one place to another. Its also sequencing of lights, the irrelevant implementation of traffic lights all day and night regardless of volume.

Its also people choosing a polluted lifestyle for themselves and their families buying into and renting homes along busy roads where its clearly polluted and not making the educated decisionthat isn't a good enough option.

Wasting electricity had a terrible impact on air quality, open fires etc etc

These are just a few areas thst need to take responsibility, all have a responsibility to understand their impact on themselves and others.

I dislike this finger pointy focus on individual people, most of which doesn't make an iota of difference. Our entire lives are organised around burning fossil fuels one way or another and it will take time to get to the stage where we don't use them on a large scale for the things that keep our economy going and thus keep us all housed, clothed and fed.

Most measures that narrowly concentrate on small everyday habits make life more difficult for people and distract from the need for structural change. For example, supermarkets charging us for bags to carry our shopping home in while they simultaneously wrap every item in layers of plastic aren't making much of an effort themselves but they get to greenwash their advertising nonetheless.

Similarly energy saving bulbs that have us all spending 500% more on lighting that doesn't light our homes well and that interferes with circadian rhythms of birds and other wildlife, are fairly pointless. Domestic lighting only ever accounted for 6% of emissions globally anyway and the shit expensive bulbs reduce that by 80%.

So yes you abu.

Ellas story is one I follow closely - her family live close to where I do. They live next to the south circular, a main road across London, it isn’t full of 5min journeys. Ironically (or catastrophically) the local council have introduced LTNs (low traffic neighbourhood schemes) around that road which have actually pushed more traffic onto it-
Oh and tfl have cancelled our bakerloo extension to the area and Sadiq Khan wants to charge for the black wall tunnel pushing more traffic onto the route of approved.

I don’t believe many people drive for fun in London, however rather than lobby for more people to cycle I think we should be pushing for better, more reliable, economical public transport. Far more realistic!

Humans are irrational, cars are dreadful but we are resistant to change. I ummed and ahhed for ages, finally got rid of the car at the height of the diesel scandal.

It was a major change. It has undoubtedly meant some choices are limited.

I would with hindsight do it again though, the benefits have outweighed the costs. Everything I worried would be really difficult has been less of a problem than I expected.

There are many who can't do without a car. But there's a huge number who could, and another huge group who could halve their journeys.

I really dislike cars, I hate what they've done to our cities and I hated what they did to my decision-making in my life. They are a barrier to excellent public transport and clean quiet safe public spaces.

I feel sad that our children have high asthma rates, reduced lung capacity, poor mental health etc. as a result of air pollution.

Individual electric cars are better than individual petrol/diesel cars, but they still pollute and still have a high environmental price. The real answer is to reduce dependence on individual car ownership.