Tag Archives: No Idle Matter

A hole in SERA’s holistic approach

Announcing a proposal to limit speeds on the M1 near Sheffield to 60mph, the Today Programme interviewed Samantha Heath of SERA, an environmental pressure group linked to Labour. Her holistic approach seemed to boil down to lower speeds and fewer cars. … Continue reading

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Corporate manslaughter

There is increasing evidence that traffic fumes cause heart disease, respiratory disease, strokes, neurodegenerative conditions, early death, and now dementia. Ten years ago, in No Idle Matter, I wrote that traffic control multiplies harmful emissions by a factor of four. Engineering lecturer at … Continue reading

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Traffic lights and air quality

In No Idle Matter (2007), I wrote that the stop-start motion caused by traffic lights multiplies emissions and fuel use by a factor of four. In this piece, Prashant Kumar (University of Surrey) says air quality at signal-controlled junctions is no … Continue reading

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Corporate manslaughter

My Radio 4 piece is over and done, but I should have denounced the purveyors of traffic control in stronger terms. By making roads dangerous in the first place (with the unequal priority system), and for presiding over tens of … Continue reading

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Exhaust deaths

The Commons Environment Committee has confirmed something we already knew: that annually there are 4,000 premature deaths in London attributable to poor air quality caused largely by traffic. Nationwide, the figure is 30,000. Also quoted on The Today Programme was the … Continue reading

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