Environment, transport and clean air

1. There's lots of talk (rightly) about diesel particulates in the air but no-one ever seems to mention cigarettes! Ever since the public spaces ban (which was of course a good thing) it has become almost impossible to walk down a street in London without partaking in some degree of passive smoking. I would like to see on-street smoking banned (streets are public spaces too!) and have it contained in specific areas if people really can't stop killing themselves. It's not fair that they are risking the health of others with proven carcinogens.

2. Re. Idling: there needs to be greater public education about how unhealthy and unnecessary it is, coupled with some actual enforcement, and perhaps a way for people to report it. I have spoken to many who have wanted to do something about it but are reluctant to approach strangers because they can (and often do) respond in a confrontational way.

3. It would be helpful to invest in more zero-pollution 'last-mile' hubs for local deliveries by bicycle / electric vans / on foot, so that fewer petrol & diesel vans are clogging up and polluting residential areas.

4. I'm very much looking forward to the ULEZ expansion; it can't come soon enough but it needs to go further from there in the future, both in terms of extended coverage and tighter thresholds for payment year on year.

5. Lastly, please do not invest too heavily in EV infrastructure. The money could be better spent elsewhere. Whilst electric vehicles are a clear improvement over combustion engine ones in some respects (mainly local air quality), overall they don't change that much - pollution from tyre / brake / road dust is at least as bad, and they do nothing to improve our depletion of the earth's resources for manufacture, general energy consumption, congestion, road deaths & injuries, obesity exacerbated by passive travel etc.

Thanks

Promoting reduction as the primary focus in waste management Eg. Incentives for plastic free businesses

Facilitating Community Energy projects. 

Protecting areas with significant biodiversity. No new roads cutting through them.

Scrap Silvertown Tunnel

Taxing car parking and using revenues to invest in buses. Car free zones

Improving public transport circumventing Central London 

I would like to see air quality addressed, so more trees planted and diesel vehicles banned from the centre.

To improve and encourage cycling we need better lanes that have a curb and are separate from car lanes and more cycling clubs to encourage cautious riders to do more riding.

Stop reducing bus routes! 

To support and encourage use of electric vehicles, need more on street fast chargers.

The continued lack of any noticeable improvement shows that London isn't trying hard enough.  If Bristol can ban diesels, why can't London? Until that happens, how about a few more signs in supermarket car parks etc telling the drivers not to idle their engines. 

And on the subject of people who are too ignorant to behave responsibly, or who just don't care, please create effective controls on rubbish burning by householders or contractors.  Unless the idiot in the White House has watered this down as well, US states at least had stringent measures in place to limit not only the particulate pollution produced by open burning, but the inevitable poisons created or released into the breathosphere such as dioxins and heavy metals.  Likewise in many European countries.  The pollution forecasts and warnings available here pale into insignificance when next door's treated timber fence is being disposed of in the cheapest and most entertaining way.

Investigate and control solid fuel fires within houses, particularly wood-burners.  Like outdoor rubbish burning, there is a substantial recreational element involved, at the community's expense, and I would suggest that very few are actually necessary.

Provide better warnings.  Earlier this month (Jan 2020) at the beginning of a high-pressure period, the BBC weather and Defra websites forecast "Very High" air pollution for London, a 10 on Defra's scale of 1 to 10.  This was reduced to a "High" on the day.  Nothing was heard on the local news, so I presume many asthmatics went out as normal, and engines were being idled and waste fires burned just as on any other day.  Figures for hospital admissions for that time could be revealing.

Do something about high particulate levels in the tube.  If still in place, reverse the ban on tube train drivers wearing smog masks.

Strongly support the tightening of the low emission zone standards and the expansion to the North Circular.

Strongly support the focus on walking and cycling.

Incentives for electrification of personal and commercial transport should be undertaken

Strongly support investment in Green Space

Continuing to develop the underground and overground network is essential

More funding for air quality work as it is grossly underfunded with the long ago privatisation of the TRRL, if it exists any more.

Fund Imperial College's work as they did a presentation @ Clean Air For Brent's AGM which was excellent

Enforce idling controls with fines

Extend ULEZ

Ban Diesels

Speed limits should be enforced outside and around schools

Publish air quality reports and do not bury bad results as Johnson the conman did

Talk to the London Cycling Campaign about dangerous junctions

Instigate a London Wide campaign, funded and DON't leave the Boroughs to find money they can't afford

Pay attention to the vital role trees play in alleviating pollution and stop Boroughs cutting them down to save money and allegedly protect trees

Rewild suitable spots to bring more greenery into the urban environmnet 

And the big one Education on pollution control and recycling as lots of people don't bother Fine people who blantently don't recycle so it could be self-funding and wake people who don't care up

Where's the environmental revolution that London needs? We have 10 years maximum. We can have anymore half-measures. 

We need a ban on personal cars in all of central london.

We need fast trains on the underground, and more buses, trams. We need school buses and disabled and elderly transport.

We need actual cycling superhighways where cars are banned from the "best", most direct routes and only bikes and public transport is allowed. 

We need a ban on all petrol generators.

We need a ban on all petrol and diesel infrastructure and vehicles. 

All school streets need to be pedestrianised.

All residential parking needs to be further restricted and moved out of London as the cars should only be used for leaving London.

We need a total greening of London.

No new infrastructure that doesn't include green walls, solar panels, green roofs.

We need to clean the canals. Affordable housing would take loads of the narrow boats off the canals, reducing the burning of wood and gas for heating. 

Air quality and the environment should be top priorities in a climate emergency. The time frames listed should all be accelerated, and the ULEZ should be expanded to cover all London boroughs please.

Create a London where children can walk and cycle safely.

At the moment you have to be a brave, unencumbered, able bodied adult if you are to cycle or walk in London.

Most road space is allocated to drivers - the most polluting, harmful, inefficient mode (both when its moving and when its parked)

Stop building roads like Silvertown Tunnel.

Put the money into walking, cycling and making the place pleasant to live. Cut rat running traffic by putting modal filters on all our residential streets. More priority crossings. Sort out side roads so people have clear priority.  Protected cycle routes so everyone can use them.

I respect Mayor Kahn for many reasons, however I am honestly confused by his stance on a cleaner environment for Londoners. On one hand he says this is a top priority for his administration, on the other he approves the building of the Silvertown Tunnel linking the Boroughs of Greenwich and Newham where the air quality is constantly in breach of legal limits of pollutants. He is doing this against advice from environmental experts, the remonstrations of both councils involved and the residents who will see an increase in HGVs and of course cars passing through the boroughs. So, Mr Khan, which is it?

I have little to add to the many comments that flag the fact that we need to do more, and more quickly, to make London clean and green, so mainly I'm commenting to agree with them. More needs to be done to reduce polluting traffic on the roads and make alternatives, like cycling, a safe and attractive option. (Such as campaigns to promote awareness of codes of conduct for pedestrians, cyclists and drivers on the use of cycle paths/lanes.)

More needs to be done to promote the planting of trees too. London has so many green spaces, which is wonderful, but emissions could be offset immediately - even whilst conversations are ongoing about how to reduce them - by planting trees; as many as possible. There are plenty of places where small woodlands could be planted, and as a strategy to combat pollution, it's relatively cheap and easy - and aesthetically pleasing. Schemes to get schools involved would have the added advantage og getting children outside and active, which is beneficial in so many ways.

Air pollution is the biggest environmental health concern and we are not doing enough about it.

We need to cut out all diesel from central London (including Euro VI compliant vehicles which continue to pump out particulates) and expand the ULEZ.

We need to encourage more cycling, by providing safe cycle lanes and with a positive public campaign - cyclists are often wrongly vilified by pedestrians and drivers.

For longer journeys we need an electric bus fleet. Bus pollution (including from hybrid buses which are left idling-an increasing problem) is appalling in London. We should also look at redesigning bus shelters so that they protect people waiting from breathing in pollution eg turn them around so that there is a barrier separating people waiting from the polluting vehicles in the road; have green walls and rooves and bug hotels. This would especially help lots of secondary school children who travel by bus to school.

We also need to ban wood smoke. It has become widespread in winter. Again, a public campaign is needed to educate people on the toxicity of wood smoke and its health effects.

We should focus on air pollution affecting the most vulnerable (especially school children) most urgently. We should start by providing free air quality audits for all schools and then look at providing free air filters for the worst polluted schools.

We should increase the use of green infrastructure to mitigate the effects of air pollution around schools and along main roads; protect and increase street trees and green space and ensure all new developments encompass green space for residents and encourage local living within walking/cycling distance.

This is so critical for the health of London’s residents so am agreeing with the many supporting comments on how important this is for us! 

Within the plans would love to see greater investment for some of the outer neighbourhoods, particularly along the South Circular where pollution is very high and initiatives often don’t reach us (even though only zone 3).

Greater support needed from local councils in investing in trees. In Lewisham new trees are funded by residents, not the council, which is not feasible for all residents

Increased resources are needed to deal as a matter of urgency with pollution from a number of sources, including commercial, private and public transport. The target dates in the current proposals are no longer fit for purpose - they do not take into account what we now know about the dire effects of pollution on the health of children, the elderly and other vulnerable citizens, and the changes in global heating that are much faster than expected.

What is needed to combat these problems will have a significant impact on peoples lives, progress will require greater involvement of the public in planning and decision making to find acceptable and practical solutions. There should be wider consultation, citizens assemblies and so on. The changes needed may be radical, but should result in London becoming a healthier and more pleasant place to live.

I agree with the plan to tightening low emissions standards - our children deserve to breathe cleaner air and people shouldn't be driving in Central London.

The hop on hop off bus fare (and freezing of fares) has helped a lot. All improvements to public transport are positive.

I agree with making roads less busy, so people can walk and cycle. Planting more trees and protecting green space and the non-built environment