Extinction Rebellion

Price apart, what sort of public transport system would you want to make it your preferred mode of travel?

One where I wouldn't need to set aside 3hrs of my day to make a 7 mile each way journey, often crammed like a sardine in a tin into my chosen mode.

Maybe it is my expectations that need to change.

Ideally one that's faster (or at least as fast) and cheaper than the alternatives whenever you want to travel.

That's already the case for London but realistically it isn't feasible to do the same in less densely populated places

Problem with free public transport is that you’d never be able to keep up with the massive demand it would unleash.

Much better to tax polluting forms of transport heavily and encourage cultural change such that people don’t need to move around as much - ie distributed industries, new housing designed with amenities close by, support for small high streets etc etc

Sorry if I misread your comment (hard to get tone of voice on here) but I wasn’t trying to be patronising.

Timely: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/apr/26/labour-reverse-bus-cuts

Your link was good and helpful.

The 'fallacies' comment is better aimed at @jj72 trying to prop up his argument that 'you can't win'. That's ....... a bit ...... unhelpful.

Unhelpful, but true. Like my car analogy, you make something more efficient (re: cheaper) and more people will want to use it. Those providing the service (airlines, car/road manufacturers will do their thing cos capitalism. Making air travel more efficient will mean lower costs and thus more customers. I’m old enough and cynical enough to know that this whole shitshow is driven by desire for profit at any cost. Sorry if I sound unhelpful but sometimes I just feel like we are banging our heads against a wall. The scale of the change we need to make is overwhelmingly huge and I can’t see it happening in my lifetime, mostly because people are selfish and generally don’t give a tin shit.

You're (again) describing unchecked consumption and completely ignoring taxation as a mechanism to prevent the 'bounce-back' in demand.

Reduce the need to travel by creating well designed, low carbon, high-density new housing?

XR released a document of internal expenses. Worth a read if you want a laugh https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1Imi5IyEHKG9DPe_tPOY2cMXHCzRI-6iWCOK3zaxtjqQ/htmlview

A bit tl;dr so I'm not sure what to laugh at?

Funny 'cos people need compensating for their time so they can continue to eat/pay bills?

Proximity to amenities & employment needs considering too.

Reduce the need to travel by creating well designed, low carbon, high-density new housing?

This probably should have happened regardless of the Co2 aims. It’s kinda like like nobody has been running the country for the last 15 years.

#neolibralism

Laughing at the detail of people’s lives? I don’t get it.

No new infrastructure either
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/apr/27/extinction-rebellion-activists-scale-trees-in-anti-hs2-protest

To be fair. That part of hs2 hasn’t had the go ahead yet. This tree felling in a nature reserve is ‘preparation work’. They haven’t even started water safeguarding assessments and there’s a real chance it’ll not pass.

'Buckinghamshire County Council has formally resolved to call for the government to halt its “enabling” works for HS2 in Bucks until such times as the project receives formal Notice to Proceed. This Notice has recently been postponed for a second time, till at least the end of this year, as the three main tests have not been met. The tests relate to the robustness of HS2’s business case, the completion of the design for the whole line and the fitness of HS2 Ltd to deliver the project. As we all know, not one of these is anywhere near being met.'

Copied from a local (Ruislip) anti-HS2 campaigner, who has asked our council, London Borough of Hillingdon to follow Bucks CC's example.
It will come too late for the +/-400 mature trees on Ruislip Municipal Golf Course which recently became large piles of woodchip.

It's also the bird nesting season so working in a nature reserve at this time of year should warrant a protest anyway, let alone for a vanity project that hasn't even got full approval.

https://www.wildlifetrusts.org/hs2

Anyone thoughts on the related-but-not-the-same group standing for European elections? Are they targeting areas where they won't undermine Greens?

£10 Easter egg h8rs, spotted today a full week after Easter

1 Attachment

https://youtu.be/mj2PwGdZYX4

Gove seems to have ... nothing.

they missed E bike off that chart

A low carbon future may ask these folks to be paired up to exchange jobs to remove the impact of the long commutes. This probably won't be well received as it breaks routines & long standing social relationships.