Counting On … – Page 72

Counting on …. Day 1.062

4th March 2023

Streets can be places of plants, trees and biodiversity when they include planters and green verges, trees and parklets. Such streets are cooler in the summer and help absorb heavy rainfall. Meristem Design who design street features such as parklets and rain gardens, comments ‘In urban areas, we use many non-permeable materials (such as our roads). This means that water cannot drain naturally through the ground. In order to manage this, we have developed drainage systems that use pipes and sewers to redirect water. Sustainable drainage systems (SuDS) modify surface water flow at more natural rates, reducing the impact of urbanisation flooding by allowing vegetation and plants to absorb the majority of the rainwater. Too much surface rainwater in our cities often leads to a rising water table, causing our riverbanks to overflow and leads to devastating floods and damage to nearby properties. With climate change creating wetter winters and more frequent rainfalls, the level of surface water available will only increase, making the traditional drainage methods less and less effective. Creating rain gardens across our cities and towns is one part of the solution to this problem~~:https://www.meristemdesign.co.uk/suds-planters-rain-gardens~~

Counting on …. day 1.061

3rd March 2023

The Guardian today reports ‘UK droughts already threaten disastrous breeding year for frogs….Fortunately, wildlife groups and suburban gardeners are increasingly aware of the declining populations of frogs, newts and toads and are providing new habitats – the most important being our garden ponds.’

We can make a difference!

Counting on …day 1.060

2nd March 2023

Pedal power for delivery vehicles is already happening. Cycle courier services have been around for many years now as bikes are often far quicker than any other vehicle for short urban journeys – and of course have been used by Royal Mail for centuries. Likewise Co-op’s use of bikes for grocery deliveries is not new. Freddie’s flowers – a weekly flower delivery service is also fulfilled by bike. Cycle delivery services such as Peddle Me, carryout same day deliveries for a variety of clients including coffee roasters, breweries, flower suppliers, film companies, local authorities, community kitchens, charities, restaurant chains and numerous food suppliers – “You name it, we deliver it”! They also offer a taxi service for people too!

Hammersmith and Fulham Council have set up ‘Parcels not Pollution’ – a delivery service that uses an e-cargo bike for business deliveries in Hammersmith and Shepherds Bush town centres.

Tradespeople people carrying out repairs, redecorations, window cleaning, laundry services etc are also making use of cycle power.

Counting on …. Day 1.059

1st March 2023

Shop local. When we walk and cycle more and drive less, it is local shops and businesses that benefit!

The Living Streets report, The Pedestrian Pound (updated 2018), noted that If more space is given for walking and cycling and less to cars, the absence of customers arriving by car is more than compensated by people arriving on foot or by bike. For example, in San Francisco, the first trial ‘parklet’ increased pedestrian traffic in the area by 37% on weeknights and increased people walking with bikes at the weekend by 350%. A similar scheme in Shoreditch, London, increased takings in an adjacent shop by 20%.

A different world is possible!

Counting on … day 1.058

28th February 2023

Swopping to a cycle based city.

In Copenhagen the bicycle has become the most important means of transport. The goal is for 50 percent of all trips to work and education in Copenhagen to be made by bike by 2025. In 2018, they reached 49 percent. Out of all trips made to, from and in the City of Copenhagen, 28 percent were in 2018 made by bicycle (32 percent by car, 21 percent walking and 19 percent public transport). In the inner city, bicycles outnumbered cars in 2016.

The backbone of the city’s design for cycling is a network of protected bike lanes. In Denmark, unidirectional bike lanes are separated from both the pavements and the road by a kerb. Protected bike lanes are a must when the volume and speed of vehicle traffic is high.

https://eu.boell.org/en/cycling-copenhagen-the-making-of-a-bike-friendly-city

Counting on day … 1.057

27th February 2023

Low traffic neighbour hoods – “mini Holland”

‘When Waltham Forest Council received funding from Transport for London to create a low-traffic neighbourhood, local residents and campaigners worked hard to explain the benefits of low traffic neighbourhoods to the community.

At first some residents weren’t too keen on introducing low-traffic neighbourhoods and were worried that it would be difficult to access homes and businesses.

They also thought that it would lead to an increase in traffic on the main roads and might force traffic outside of schools.

However, they soon saw the improvement in the area, and counts on main roads in Waltham Forest have shown that traffic is now more spread out across the day and maximum peak hour flows are lower on the main roads.

Walthamstow Village is now one of London’s most advanced liveable-neighbourhood schemes and traffic levels have fallen by over 90% on some streets and by 56% on average. The scheme has made people think twice about using their car for shorter journeys and within a year, there was an increase in the number of people walking in the area, with residents walking 32 minutes and cycling on average nine minutes more per week. It’s now easier to cross the road and safer for cyclists and there’s a lot less air pollution.

Walthamstow Village has also become a great deal greener with new trees and ‘pocket parks’ that offer attractive planters, seating and community gardens’. https://www.livingstreets.org.uk/about-us/our-work-in-action/creating-low-traffic-neighbourhoods

A different world is possible!

Counting on day … 1.056

25th February 2023

School streets – a different world is possible!

“Bristol City Council is committed to making Bristol’s streets safer for everyone living, working and visiting the city. An area of priority are the streets outside our schools – we want to make the journey to school safer and healthier for children and their families, and help to make it a nice environment for everyone living and working there.

One of the ways we are doing this is through the introduction of School Streets, whereby the street or streets immediately outside the school entrance are closed to non-essential vehicles at school opening and closing times.

Only people walking, wheeling, cycling and scooting are permitted access to the School Street zone while the restriction is in place, with exemptions given to emergency vehicles and Blue Badge holders. In some cases, permits will be given to residents and businesses living or working within the zone – this varies from scheme to scheme and is decided on an individual basis.

Aims of the School Street scheme:

The aim of a School Street is to make it easier and safer for children and their parents to walk, wheel, cycle and scoot to school.

Reducing the use of private car journeys to and from school should lead to:

Less road danger from traffic
Less anti-social behaviour from inconsiderate parking and dangerous driving
More children walking, wheeling, cycling and scooting to school
Reduced congestion and local pollution from idling vehicles”

Bristol School Streets

Counting on day … 1.054

23rd February 2023

Yesterday I joined a poignant observance of Ash Wednesday with others from Christian Climate Action. We held a service of ashing in Parliament Square, using coal dust as we confessed our – and those of society – in allowing our flagrant use of fossil fuels that has and is still causing so much damage to the world we live in – and its future. We called on the government to take action and in particular to overturn its approval for the new Cumbrian Coal Mine. Carrying coal, and to a slow drum beat, we took our lament and our prayers to the Home Office which had granted the Mine permission in December of last year,

Finally we processed to the office of Javelin Global Commodities where we symbolically laid down the coal we had been carrying in our hands. We renewed our resolve to seek a different, better future.

Javelin is a significant partner of West Cumbria Mining, being 34 percent owned by U.S. coal miner Murray Energy, 28 percent owned by German utility E.ON and 38 percent owned by its principal traders, some of whom were previously at Goldman Sachs.Javelin is undertaking to purchase all of WCM’s production output and to sell the coal to steelmaking customers in the UK and Europe, as it “aims to ramp up its coal trading”

Counting on day 1.053

22nd February 2023

The Independent reports ‘St Michael with St Mary parish church in Melbourne, Derbyshire, is a fine example of 12th-century Norman ecclesiastical architecture, but one part of the building is distinctly modern. The sunshine that illuminates the church’s stained-glass windows is also shrinking its carbon footprint thanks to a 42-panel, 10kw array of solar panels on the roof.’

One of the first churches to install solar panels was St James Piccadilly, whilst more recently St John’s Waterloo has installed panels that will produce 30 kilowatts per hour in bright sunshine and over the course of a year could generate 28,597 kWh.

A different world is possible!

NB I have put together a series of 40 mini reflections on water (a rerun of a series from a couple of years ago). These can be found in the menu under Lent Reflections, or here https://greentau.org/2023/02/11/lent-reflections-water/

Counting on …. day 1.049

18th February 2023

The Grimsby Telegraph reports ‘As part of its Towns Fund Deal, North Lincolnshire Council got £1.4m in government cash for the rollout of solar panels on at least 30 Scunthorpe schools and to create an affordable, zero-carbon energy system in North Lincolnshire. Four schools – Holme Valley Primary, Bottesford Junior, Fred Gough Secondary and Berkeley Primary – had panels already installed by the end of January, while two more, St Hugh’s School and Priory Lane Primary were poised to have them installed by February. Once set up, the six schools will save £97,880 a year in energy bills.’

A different world is possible.