Archive for “Transport” category
Showing results 11 - 15 of 41 for the category: Transport.
29 Jul 2009
Transformation Moment: low carbon travel.
How, and how far, will we travel if we make the changes we need to in order to thrive in a carbon constrained society? For a range of interlocking reasons, the conclusion of this paper is that we will be happier, healthier and more resilient if we radically change from our current patterns to ones that fit into a relocalised world. In that world we will travel far less far and fast, overwhelmingly walking, cycling and using public transport.
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17 Jul 2009
After many months of Ed Milliband putting himself out there are a Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change that actually gets climate change, finally his big Plan, the UK Low Carbon Transition Plan was unveiled on Wednesday, in a speech in the House of Commons that namechecked Transition Towns and which is the boldest national vision for a low carbon society yet seen. Many others have since pitched in with their thoughts, I thought it might be useful here to offer an analysis from a Transition perspective. In his speech, Milliband said “we know from the Transition Towns movement the power of community action to motivate people..”, clearly an outcome of his attendance as a ‘Keynote Listener’ at the Transition Network conference in May. So how does the Plan measure up, and does it actually advance what Transition initiatives and the wider relocalisation movement are doing?
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12 Mar 2009
A couple of weeks ago I was in London, and I visited Coin Street Community Builders (CSCB) on the South Bank. CSCB are a fascinating initiative, one that can teach a great deal to Transition Initiatives. For me, a Transition initiative, once it has created its EDAP, needs to morph, and become in effect, a relocalisation agency, a developer, a housing association, a bank. CSCB have done many of these things, and their experience is invaluable.
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7 Jan 2009
I often liken breaking our collective and individual addiction to oil as being like giving up any other addiction. My family has now passed its fifth month without a car, and the process of getting used to life with no car has been very similar to giving up drinking or smoking. I can’t for a moment say that it has been easy and hassle-free, but at the same time, we are still here, no-one has starved to death or died of boredom, life goes on, and we are, in many ways, the better for it. What I want to do here is not to give some rosy ‘it’s been so easy’ account of the process, but rather to give a warts’n'all account of where we have got to, in order to stimulate discussion and debate.
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24 Nov 2008
I was in London over the weekend, seeing a concert at the Alexandra Palace by the utterly wonderful Sigur Ros, which was indeed utterly wonderful. The next day, en route home, we went to Camden Market, and my eye was caught by this great T-shirt on one of the stalls. I had never considered Mr T a hero of the no-fly movement, but of course “I ain’t getting on no plane” was one of his catchphrases. Unfortunately Mr T wasn’t motivated by climate change, nor by the results of the Oil Vulnerability Audit he did for the A-Team’s activities, rather a sheer terror of setting foot on aircraft (something to do with his Vietnam experiences).
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How, and how far, will we travel if we make the changes we need to in order to thrive in a carbon constrained society? For a range of interlocking reasons, the conclusion of this paper is that we will be happier, healthier and more resilient if we radically change from our current patterns to ones that fit into a relocalised world. In that world we will travel far less far and fast, overwhelmingly walking, cycling and using public transport.
