Manchester Toxic Air Zone

Pete Owens
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Manchester Toxic Air Zone

Post by Pete Owens »

Looks like Andy Burnham has come out in favour of continuing to poison the inhabitants of the city:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-m ... r-61439444
Bmblbzzz
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Re: Manchester Toxic Air Zone

Post by Bmblbzzz »

The other thing Andy Burnham is ignoring it is that just as Congestion Zones are also about clean air, so Clean Air Zones are also about congestion. Both are (fairly weak) ways of reducing the many harms of over-reliance on cars.

However, there's politics of course.
Mr Burnham said the authority was "going into a negotiation".

"The red line is we will not accept a charging Clean Air Zone in Greater Manchester," he said.

"And if that is what the government wants, it will have to impose it."
Mr Burnham is probably throwing the government's (or governments' as it's not just the current one) approach back at them: they say it's down to local government to achieve central government's targets, which Westminster won't pass national laws for (because votes) – so Manchester is saying or hoping that it's really a national need and should be dealt with as such. (At least, I hope that's what Burnham's hoping.)
mumbojumbo
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Re: Manchester Toxic Air Zone

Post by mumbojumbo »

Surely most residents are poisoning themselves? No one is compelled to drive a car, and few people can be unaware of the armful consequences? In the end people take the easy option and damage their neighbour's children.
Pete Owens
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Re: Manchester Toxic Air Zone

Post by Pete Owens »

mumbojumbo wrote: 24 May 2022, 3:49pm Surely most residents are poisoning themselves?
Wrong, people who drive cars are are doing the poisoning (whether or not they live in Manchester) and people who live in Greater Manchester who are being poisoned (whether or not they drive cars).

Now of course there is some overlap between the two groups, but they are not the same. And the mayor has has come out in support of the poisoners rather than the population of Manchester. I guess you could say that serves Mancunians right for electing a scouser and hoping that their longevity would figure in his list of priorities.
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Re: Manchester Toxic Air Zone

Post by mumbojumbo »

Wrong?The majority of residents own and drive a car,and are poisoning themselves and others.
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Re: Manchester Toxic Air Zone

Post by mumbojumbo »

Now of course there is some overlap between the two groups, but they are not the same. And the mayor has has come out in support of the poisoners rather than the population of Manchester. I guess you could say that serves Mancunians right for electing a scouser and hoping that their longevity would figure in his list of priorities.
Top
The population of GM is not exclusively Mancunian they make up a minority of the electorate. Although an Everton supporter was born in Lancashire .,now in the borough of Sefton .Not a scouser ,to use your vernacular.
Mike Sales
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Re: Manchester Toxic Air Zone

Post by Mike Sales »

Pete Owens wrote: 24 May 2022, 4:23pm
Wrong, people who drive cars are are doing the poisoning (whether or not they live in Manchester) and people who live in Greater Manchester who are being poisoned (whether or not they drive cars).
People in cars are much better protected against the consequences if a vehicle happens to come into a collision with a pedestrian or cyclist.
I would not be surprised if car manufacturers began to filter the air entering a car so that it was not harmful to the occupants.
It's the same the whole world over
It's the poor what gets the blame
It's the rich what gets the pleasure
Isn't it a blooming shame?
Bmblbzzz
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Re: Manchester Toxic Air Zone

Post by Bmblbzzz »

I thought filtering incoming air had been standard on Japanese cars at least for a few decades. No idea if it's effective though.
Stevek76
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Re: Manchester Toxic Air Zone

Post by Stevek76 »

You can't filter no2 (not practically at ambient temperatures anyway)

Can't easily do much about ultrafines either but that's not what the legislation is about.

Regarding this, the leaders of citys dragging their feet on this are frankly being pathetic. Paying a game of brinkmanship with DEFRA/DfT that they're never going to win whilst the poorest in your city are hit hardest is pointless both practically (you're not going to get better funding from it) and politically (your Tory leaning suburbs will still think you're 'anti car' whilst your inner city votes will look elsewhere, as Rees found out in Bristol).

The comparison here is Birmingham that realised and accepted from the start that it would need a class D zone (i.e. one that includes cars) and just got on with it. It got no less scrappage funding than Manchester or Bristol have been offered and with the zone already in a year it's now got £18m of revenue to spend on sustainable transport to help its poorest residents.

I don't think the charging zones are a particularly good solution, they're a necessary solution that's resulted from over a decade of prevarication since the 40ug no2 limit was actually introduced. A better approach would have been a decade of fairly radical urban transport changes and car restraint (and still should be long term). Even with the zones, DEFRAs classification is dubious. Their own emission rates (the ones used in all the modelling done for these zones) consider euro 6d diesels, ie the post cheatgate ones, to be slightly worse than euro 3 petrols, yet a Yreg fiesta gets charged and a brand new Chelsea tractor doesn't?

I'd have modified them into a 'Class D+' which included all diesel cars and also a general, but lower, congestion charge. Proceeds to wholesale roadspace reallocation away from private cars.
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ratherbeintobago
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Re: Manchester Toxic Air Zone

Post by ratherbeintobago »

This is a complete failure of political leadership.

Essentially, having come up with a bad scheme (revenue-earning vehicles only, no effect on private cars even on Deansgate) he's then backed down in the face of people (who probably weren't going to vote for him anyway) demanding the right to drive smoky old vans wherever and whenever they want. I suppose you could make the case that light commercials are more polluting than private cars because they've never had a scrappage scheme, but still.
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Re: Manchester Toxic Air Zone

Post by Bmblbzzz »

Stevek76 wrote: 25 May 2022, 11:52am I don't think the charging zones are a particularly good solution, they're a necessary solution that's resulted from over a decade of prevarication since the 40ug no2 limit was actually introduced. A better approach would have been a decade of fairly radical urban transport changes and car restraint (and still should be long term).
I strongly agree.
ratherbeintobago
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Re: Manchester Toxic Air Zone

Post by ratherbeintobago »

The comparison here is Birmingham that realised and accepted from the start that it would need a class D zone (i.e. one that includes cars) and just got on with it. It got no less scrappage funding than Manchester or Bristol have been offered and with the zone already in a year it's now got £18m of revenue to spend on sustainable transport to help its poorest residents.
This is a big thing here that seems to be lost on Lab politicians - ¼ of households have no access to a car (⅓ in Rochdale), something which is strongly correlated with deprivation and which iOS only going to get worse as the cost of energy crisis bites. And yet anything that reduces people's car use is taboo.
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Re: Manchester Toxic Air Zone

Post by mjr »

ratherbeintobago wrote: 25 May 2022, 2:11pm
The comparison here is Birmingham that realised and accepted from the start that it would need a class D zone (i.e. one that includes cars) and just got on with it. It got no less scrappage funding than Manchester or Bristol have been offered and with the zone already in a year it's now got £18m of revenue to spend on sustainable transport to help its poorest residents.
This is a big thing here that seems to be lost on Lab politicians - ¼ of households have no access to a car (⅓ in Rochdale), something which is strongly correlated with deprivation and which iOS only going to get worse as the cost of energy crisis bites. And yet anything that reduces people's car use is taboo.
One might speculate that the political party of the mayors might be part of why Birmingham was able to get on with it without national government or newspapers making as much trouble.
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Re: Manchester Toxic Air Zone

Post by Bmblbzzz »

Seems unlikely. In the case of Rees, the only trouble from national government has been of the "you should have done this years ago" sort, and there hasn't been a concerted media opposition.
ratherbeintobago
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Re: Manchester Toxic Air Zone

Post by ratherbeintobago »

Probably hasn’t done any good that local Tories in GM have been willing to stir up trouble for a mayor from an opposing party?
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