Londoner? ULEZ expansion - wrong time?

[GrubzUp]

I like Sadiq Khan, in general I applaud green initiatives.

However it's been announced today that the original inner London low emission zone is to be expanded into outer London - meaning that if you have an older, more polluting vehicle it will cost you £12.50 every time you drive it anywhere in London (inside the M25 I think).

I live in outer London. There are a LOT of older, non ULEZ compliant vehicles on the road round here. At the moment, people don't need to be compliant for local trips, because unless they're heading inside the North / South Circular Rd, they are fine in their older cars.

I look out in the street and see my neighbours' cars: the people who tend to drive older vehicles are the young, the old, the disabled and the poor.

AIBU to say that hitting them with a big new tax for driving anywhere in the middle of a cost of living crisis is the WRONG time? If they can't afford a newer model they certainly can't afford to pay £12 every time they take it off the drive. I feel bad for these people. How are they going to afford it?

Note that public transport here is not what it is in inner London, you can't just "jump on the tube".

Wouldn’t it just be great if our kids weren’t breathing in crap? Some playgrounds around Greenwich and Tower Hamlets are measuring dangerous levels of pollution. Because of climate change London is going to get hotter and hotter. We need to get rid of cars as much as possible.

Wouldn’t it be better to limit air travel for the whole country instead of doing this just London boroughs? So everyone gets 1 (return) air trip per year allowance . Surely that would make a bigger impact and would affect mostly holidays rather than the day to day lives of a smaller group with non ulez complaint cars ? Work trips aren’t as necessary now things can be done online. There could be an energy act application system if someone had a sick relative overseas for example ? Or would that not suit because it would ruin people’s fun rather than the lives of the vulnerable and poor

Emergency not energy act (autocorrect !)

@Devoutspoken you’re clearly talking from a very privileged position where people have thousands to go spend on these bikes to transport heavy objects. People can’t afford to replace their cars and they can’t afford these bikes either, particularly in the current cost of living climate. Also I haven’t found any cargo bikes for children - only for transporting children which my nine year old is a bit big for! I’m not sure why you continue with your ridiculous arguments. I have nothing against cycling. Good job really given that I live in the country surrounded by roads full of men in Lycra! However, I am not so naive to believe that they can replace cars in every situation. I am lucky, one of our cars is ULEZ compliant but I know many people have cars that are not and cannot afford to replace them, such as my 75 year old dad.

So everyone gets 1 (return) air trip per year allowance

Like a ration book you mean? Should we get an allowance for food too?

It appears now they are really starting to crawl out of the woodwork

There could be an energy act application system if someone had a sick relative overseas for example?

Should we also apply if we need to get out of our 15 mile radius?

Why is that idea so bad though compared to the current ulez expansion? It seems that people are all for it when it’s not going to affect them ….

Why would that have a bigger impact? Are you denying that the air quality is worse in London than the rest of the country?
How would changes to flights change the air quality outside schools and hospitals in London, many of which are over dangerous levels?

You’re conflating two totally different issues.

www.bromley.gov.uk/news/article/366/no-to-mayor-of-london-s-ulez-expansion-proposals this was Bromley's response to the extension proposal. It's worth a read. There are other approaches than the blunt extension of a policy designed for inner London.

I commute into an inner London Borough (by train). The air quality is noticeably worse and the streets more congested than in my outer borough. There are a few cargo bikes though!

Why is that idea so bad though compared to the current ulez expansion?

Both ideas are horrific

I agree !! I just wanted to see if an idea about air travel would be seen as worse by those who agree with ulez if suddenly it affects them

Those areas are already under ulez so should already have cleaner air considering ulez has been in place quite some time now

Lizzy, just to be clear I don't own a cargo bike, nor have I ever done, but I do know cars are very expensive things to run, over all more so than a cargo bike. Cities are changing, we can't live purely car reliant lives any more, the future will indeed be more pedal power.

How can it be worse when those innter borougjs have been under ulez for over a yr now...surely the air quality should have improved with those poullting vehicles having been reduced. Oh wait are we admitting that ulez isn't really having much of an effect then?

Spectre8, so ukez should be scrapped in the inner city as well? What is the solution? Should kids breathe polluted air because people want the right to drive 10 minutes to pick up a bag of shopping?

I live in Bromley and back our main on this. Utteely ridiculous especially when you read this

given that even TfL’s own interim reports suggest that the recent changes there have only made very marginal improvements and even then, that can’t necessarily
be credited to ULEZ either”

How can ppl say ulez is helping wheb tfl even admit that they can't be sure ulez is the reason for any marginal improvements

I know someone who works for tfl, they have to find ways to plug the funding gap, and ulez is one of them, that is also why they are looking at road user charging.. anything that can generate revenue is being considered....not for any social or environmental reasons purely financial

I'm not pro the ULEZ extension. It's anti-democratic (60% against in the 'consultation') and is going to cost me a lot of money, but I already use public transport a lot. Psychologically, if you force people to pay more for a compliant car or van, they're going to drive it more, aren't they? (which is I think what we see I e.g. Dulwich...imagine what they paid for the house with parking!)

The rail strikes have changed my mind on the driving vs public transport issue. I need to be able to get to work.

Plenty of people cycle to work

I'm pointing out that livàing in a borough that already has the cleanest air but also doesn't have the type of public transport that inner boroughs do e.g. tube isn't right. My journeys aren't 10mins to pick up food. Its journeys to go care for my parents who live further down into Kent. I can't cycle due to ongoing back problems from a slipped disc and the amount of walking I can do is also limited I'm only just able to walk half a mile without my back hurting. So im reliant on my car alot more until my back gets better.

Either they help ppl beyond those on benefits to scrap cars or give us 2yrs to do so. A bit more support than whats on offer now

I could cycle. I'd rather change job than have to do that. I'd be so scared of getting killed.

Bromley had 204 early deaths due to pollution, the highest of any London borough. That was reported in the Times, backed by research done by Imperial College.

I would take that more seriously than Bromley Council.

Bromley had 204 early deaths due to pollution

It's truly amazing that they could unequivocally link all these sad deaths to 'pollution'. Isn't it? Given that in many bog standard cases the cause of death is inconclusive

Take it up with Imperial College. Better brains than Bromley Council

That's not a terrible idea IMO (if you had a transferable allowance it would be redistributive).

But it's a measure to reduce greenhouse gas emissions rather than local pollution. Two completely separate issues. It's like saying that we should address the problem of kids in Tower Hamlets getting asthma by switching to reusable water bottles and not using plastic straws.

No, she's saying that a hugely congested very urban area with enormous amounts of vehicles which are 90% ULEZ compliant has worse pollution than a less urban area with half the traffic density which is 75% compliant: but still significantly better than it would have been with more traffic and less compliant.

I'm actually agnostic on whether the ULEZ is appropriate in outer London. But it's clear that it has made a difference to some aspects of local air pollution in Inner London.