To ask Ocado customers to stand in solidarity with parents at a north London Primary school?

[Thesunrising]

Ocado has submitted plans to build a diesel refuelling depot for delivery vans adjacent to a primary school in Islington - literally metres away from their playground.

Prolonged exposure to diesel fumes containing deadly toxins like benzene and from the lorry tailpipe emissions - nox and particulates - is proven to triggering asthma, stunting lung growth and brain development and in the long-term associated with stroke, heart disease, COPD, dementia and other life-threatening diseases. Sites like this should be nowhere near a school.

I don’t live in London but I’m an Ocado customer with children, one of who has respiratory problems. I would be furious if this was happening next to my own child’s school and I am furious on behalf of the families whose children go to this school.

If you shop with Ocado and feel this is a terrible plan on their part, you can:

• watch a video made by the parents which shows the insanity of this plan twitter.com/andygrieveair/status/1218084229898297345?s=21
  

• contact Ocado customer services - [email protected] to register your concern and/or tell them you will not be using their company again until they withdraw the planning application (due for decision by the council at the end of this month)
  

• sign the petition set up by the school’s parents on change.org www.change.org/p/islington-council-stop-ocado-building-a-diesel-delivery-depot-next-to-our-school
  

• follow the parents’ campaign on Twitter using the hashtag #nocado
  

If you wouldn’t want this depot next to your child’s school, then please stand in solidarity with other parents to help them successfully challenge Ocado and get them to change their minds.

[Thesunrising]

Gah - clicky links fail

Film > twitter.com/andygrieveair/status/1218084229898297345?s=21

Petition > www.change.org/p/islington-council-stop-ocado-building-a-diesel-delivery-depot-next-to-our-school

[BigFatLiar]

Looks like the area next to the school is a light industrial/commercial area. An Ocado depot is probably going to be no more polluting than many other options.

[recrudescence]

Cut off for editing is 5.25 and I still haven’t had a good look at the flash sales. Thanks for the reminder!

[NeedAnExpert]

How many of the parents sit in the school car park, engines idling, giving not a shit about particulates poisoning the air around a school?

[MustardScreams]

Yeah, I’d be more obliged to campaign against lazy af parents that drove the 2 minutes to school instead of walking, or idle constantly tbh.

[thehorseandhisboy]

Over-development is a big problem in London, as is the air pollution that our children are exposed to.

It is just a leetle bit ironic that the parents of children at Yerbury are probably some of the biggest Ocado consumers in the area.

I would have plenty of solidarity if these parents were campaigning for the rights of all children to breath clean air, even all children in Islington tbh.

This NIMBY approach, not so much.

[BirthdayCakes]

I've signed OP

[Thesunrising]

Wow - tough crowd.

Yes the area to one side of the school is already light industrial use. This is a location in north London where the legal air limits will likely already be being breached regularly.

Building a depot servicing hundreds more vehicle movements every day will make it much worse.

[Baaaahhhhh]

Agreed not ideal. But as a pp stated, by biggest gripe is parents in massive 4x4's with running engines sitting outside schools belching diesel. I have often knocked on windows to ask them politely to turn the engines off, but most just tell you to piss off. Ironically I am sure they would be the first to object to a development like this.

[TinyTear]

I will sign, I have already stopped being an ocado customer since last summer though... since the day when the driver for the 6pm-7pm delivery called me at 6h10 to say i wasn't home (when my husband was and he didn't ring the bell) and when I rang back at 6h20 said he was already off the area so nothing he could do and wouldn't go back

[tttigress]

"stand in solidarity" lol, don't you think that's a bit ott?

No wonder it takes so long to build out any infrastructure in this country, as every little thing is protested against.

[Thesunrising]

This isn’t a NIMBY campaign.

Planning decisions like this set precedents. If one supermarket is allowed to build a refuelling depot next to a school, another supermarket might well do the same elsewhere.

[Thesunrising]

Idling outside school by parents is a serious issue and feeds into a greater problem on air quality that needs to be tacked in many fronts including (but not limited to) improvements to public transport and cycling & walking infrastructure, and taxation of polluting vehicles & their manufacturers.

This particular challenge relates to the specific issue of the Ocado refuelling depot at a school in north London.

[Therunecaster]

I've signed

[WhatTiggersDoBest]

LMAO are there not tons of schools next to petrol stations/roads in this country already?! Anyway, why would diesel fumes be an issue at what is basically a private petrol station for a specific company? You have to turn off your engine when you refuel.

[Thesunrising]

The depot will generate hundreds of additional lorry trips in and out of the site each week. Delivery lorries will often not turn off their engines when stationery because of the refrigeration units keeping the food fresh. So many of the lorries will be stood with their engines idling.

Benzene is an invisible toxin that drifts from the pumps and is proven to cause cancer. Studies of cancer rates of refuelling station attendants has demonstrated higher incidences of cancers. That’s why children shouldn’t be playing g and studying alongside them for 6/7 hours a day.

[Cheesecake53]

I've signed, too, this is outrageous. Since January I am not ordering on Amazon and I'll add Ocado to that list.

[thehorseandhisboy]

It strikes me as very much a NIMBY campaign.

Do enlighten us as to how the campaigners have/are linking up and offering support to other parent-led campaigns about the dangerous levels of nitrogen oxide that over a quarter of London schools have OP.

Yerbury is one of the few Islington schools that doesn't exceed the EU's legal limit. If they're focusing their campaign just on their school and are happy for developments to happen next to other schools where other peoples' children go, then yes it's NIMBYism.

An article in the Standard reflects the connections of the school's parents, not how unusual this issue is.

I wonder if Ocaco submitting campaigns to use this site for a refuelling station might have something to do with how many people locally use them?

[thehorseandhisboy]

Oh, and irony of ironies... I cycled past this school just before Xmas during school drop off. There were loads of cars stuck in queuesof traffic with their engines on in the nearby roads, as there were several huge lorries blocking the streets to drop off building supplies to yet another house having a basement/extension done.

Probably inhabited by one of the very parents objecting to this.

[Skysblue]

Wow what depressing responses.

[JellyfishandShells]

God, I loathe the term NIMBY. Those parents are perfectly entitled to object to a specific plan that specifically affects their children without having to - what exactly ? What is it those whining NIMBY want them to do about general pollution In London ? What specific action ? And sitting in idling cars, 4 x 4s or not, is a dreadful thing as is driving when they can easily walk but how do the accusers of NIMBYism know that these are the same people ?

[TheyWentToSeaInASieve]

I am suprised to hear about all the 4X4s. I don't think that's true. The catchment area for the school is tiny -- it was 400 metres when we looked. I don't think anybody is driving that distance unless they moved away.

Unfortunately, Islington Council pays zero regard to community objections. It is an extremely safe seat and they can do whatever they like. I am sorry to say, OP, it is unlikely the petition will do anything.

[phpolly]

What's your connection with this school, OP?

I agree with the poster above who pointed out that it would perhaps be more helpful if the Islington parents had been campaigning all along against the dire air quality near the majority of London schools.
For that matter, we should all be joining together to pressure Sadiq Khan for more measures to improve London air quality, which is slowly making all of us - including our children - ill.

[Onceuponatimethen]

I agree op - change has to start with small protests

I’ve written to Ocado as suggested

[Onceuponatimethen]

I lived in N1 and I had concerns but did nothing