ULEZ

Saggi

Nobody needs a car in London. It’s self indulgent. Pay up or do the right thing and get onto public transport.

So carers, district nurses etc going from patient to patient should just rely on buses and the Tube, carrying all their necessary equipment with them?

What about other workers, tradespeople visiting customers with their tools?

People delivering goods, including delivering food?

dumdum

Having had to get hold of a GP at 2am for a wheezing asthmatic child. I have sympathy with ULEZ. However it needs to be managed better, particularly where those on lower incomes and small businesses are concerned

Yes, I agree.

However, my wheezing child suffered more when we moved from London to the countryside.

Would agree that in big cities with decent public transport a car is not essential . Since living abroad where transport is cheap and reliable my dd and dh have not had a car. They don’t miss one and can rent if they ever need to travel somewhere less accessible.
I recently paid £10 one way fir a one mile trip in a taxi to my local railway station. Won’t rush to repeat.

Saggi

Nobody needs a car in London. It’s self indulgent. Pay up or do the right thing and get onto public transport.

I don't know if you live in London, but not all of London is served by good transport links. South of the river generally has it worse than north of the river, there's very little in the way of underground services, especially for the SE. Public transport tends not to run 24 hours a day, and taxis can be impossible to get and/or extremely expensive in the wee small hours.
My policeman son, when still in uniform, had to start his weekend shifts before public transport started. My husband would drive him into central London where he could then take public transport the rest of the way. Was he being self indulgent?
When my midwife niece is on call for home births, should she rely on the occasional night buses to get to a woman in labour's home, or perhaps she could walk the several miles carrying all the equipment for a home birth?
Sometimes it helps to look at the bigger picture.

"Nobody needs a car in London" London is a huge are. In the context of the ULEZ roll out, we are talking about the Greater London area which has now swallowed up parts of the home counties, there would be an enormous discrepancy on accessibility. In any case, over ground rail subject to ongoing strikes and expensive. As Callistemon has pointed out umpteen people work shifts, others have heavy equipment to transport. I actually heard a ULEZ supporter suggest that it would actually be possible for workmen to lug tool boxes etc. on public transport until the interviewer mooted "what about ladders then?" No helpful suggestions forthcoming

When consulting my not very helpful GP with my wheezing child when living in west London I got this lecture "you are not only near M25 but Heathrow so move" we couldn't at the time. Yes Heathrow another major polluting factor for those west of London!

Saggi

Nobody needs a car in London. It’s self indulgent. Pay up or do the right thing and get onto public transport.

It is not self indulgent it is personal choice due to the circumstances of that person!

When consulting my not very helpful GP with my wheezing child when living in west London I got this lecture "you are not only near M25 but Heathrow so move" we couldn't at the time. Yes Heathrow another major polluting factor for those west of London!
I remember it well
The days of Concorde too!

"The days of Concorde too!" Ah yes the rattling of the windows as it flew over, I remember it well Callistemon

From Hetty 58

''Really? Time to think again. This example of 'least able to afford it' is just pathetic. A cab to the shops and doctor is far cheaper than running a car.'' From Hetty 58

A small but telling example.....

My husband recently spent more than 3 months in hospital Whilst under their 'care' he sustained an accident which left him incapacitated after all staff there had been advised that he had started to hallucinate..... but I needed to return home before night-time taxi rates applied after a 6 hour stint looking after him

He was subsequently left unattended in a private room as he also had contracted Norovirus and was
unable even to pour out a drink ( 2 broken arms )
His urine was dark orange and I speak as having no nursing training but observant enough to detect dehydration.

He was extremely depressed and spoke of the possibility of visiting Civitas in Switzerland for euthanasia

The price for a taxi to visit him daily which I thought important for his medical state was £90 return ( c 18 miles from home) + waiting time for the hour's visit. I did not always feel it advisable to drive in particular weather conditions. He is nearly 91 now and has cheered up greatly on leaving the hospital.

How many people can afford about £850 a week to visit someone who looks at suicide as a release from the NHS.......and even those late into retirement who cannot. My car comes nowhere near this in running costs, Hetty.

I am not reassured that should a grandchild think that he/ she feels as if he/ she were another sex ( how does he/ she know?) then more aid might be forthcoming

FACT is that London had Polluted Air back wen the Roman'w were stil here. Their Historians Recorded the fact and it wa due to small scale Metal production when the Population was just 30,000 people.
Why, well you can see London form Sydenham Hill, Gypsy Hill, Parliament Hill, Wimbledon Hill and I could go on naming al the Hill surounding London and YES I was a Londoner. London Lies in a Bowl of Hills and the prevaliing Westerly Wind blows over th e top of London so all the Pollution stays in the trapped atmosphere. The Pollution is not just cars. What wil be the argument when in a years time they find that the polution levels have not changed at all.???

The vast majority of vehicles are ULEZ compliant already, anyway (about 90% I believe) so I find a lot of the examples given a tad silly. Trurider1, yes, the air has been dirty for a very long time but that's hardly relevant. Air conditioning is a looming pollution disaster too.

Next year, pollution levels will drop, as more vehicles will be compliant - pushed by ULEZ charges. It's only by hitting folk in the pocket that change is accelerated.

Saggi, yes, people are self indulgent, craving convenience - and creatures of habit. They're irresponsible, thoughtless and won't change their lives one iota. The older they are, the worse they get. Nothing is ever their fault.

Their attitudes and actions (or complete lack of) show that they don't really care about younger generations with stunted lung capacities, shortened lives and reduced fertility (although that could be a blessing in disguise, the way things are going).

I'm constantly amazed at the lack of concern for grandchildren - on a grandparent forum. Just one 'wheezy' child was mentioned in all this discussion.

Hetty58
You’re clueless on this issue.

Stats apparently from the Daily Telegraph, posted on what was twitter

Outer London Households
62.1% - ULEZ-compliant vehicle
31% - No vehicle
6.9% - Vehicle that's not ULEZ-compliant

Inner London Households
58% - No vehicle
37.8% - ULEZ-compliant vehicle
4.2% - Vehicle that's not ULEZ-compliant

Just curious - do you get a sticker for your car or some other way to show compliance? Who is doing the ticketing?

CanadianGran

Just curious - do you get a sticker for your car or some other way to show compliance? Who is doing the ticketing?

No cameras pick up your registration the system knows if your car is ULEZ compliant.

Oreo (biscuit by name etc.) - of course, I'm clueless, as is Khan - whereas your input has been utterly fascinating so far!

So it's even less than I thought, just 6.9% of vehicles in outer London - hardly a major disaster then. People do adapt when they have to. We've so many services in London, we're very lucky and many people never own a car - and get by just fine.

It’s a tax - nothing else. Will the £12.50 make the air cleaner ? We haven’t got it yet . We have Andy Burnham instead.

£12.50 won’t make the air cleaner but fewer and fewer people will want to pay it. Any money raised will be used for public transport.

The sooner Khan is voted out the better

tictacnana

It’s a tax - nothing else. Will the £12.50 make the air cleaner ? We haven’t got it yet . We have Andy Burnham instead.

No doubt the air quality in the ULEZ areas will be monitored on a regular basis. The results of the monitoring will answer your question.

Hetty58

Oreo (biscuit by name etc.) - of course, I'm clueless, as is Khan - whereas your input has been utterly fascinating so far!

So it's even less than I thought, just 6.9% of vehicles in outer London - hardly a major disaster then. People do adapt when they have to. We've so many services in London, we're very lucky and many people never own a car - and get by just fine.

That is an estimate of people who live on the new ULEZ zone.

How about the 1,000’s who live outside but work within the zone, who need their vehicles, no help for them to purchase compliant vehicles.

I suppose window cleaners could go back to the 30’s and put their ladders on pushbikes, women could carry their loads on their heads etc…

Last year, £151.3m was generated through daily charges, with £73.3m in PCNs.(BBC website) (London)

Certainly a money making scheme. If pollution is so bad why not ban all polluting cars full stop, but no money to be made from that.

Next May's Mayoral election should be interesting, given that the Tory candidate, Susan Hall, has promised to cancel this extended ULEZ the following day.

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12317617/Conservative-candidate-London-mayor-Susan-Hall-vows-scrap-loathed-Ulez-expansion-day-office.html

One in four cameras have been vandalised or destroyed already:

www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/08/31/ulez-cameras-vandalism-expanded-quarter-sadiq-khan/

www.standard.co.uk/news/politics/london-ulez-camera-tory-mp-vandalism-police-iain-duncan-smith-b1103720.html

A maybe weekly cab is certainly cheaper than running a car, Hetty58 - as we tried in vain to tell my mother, after she voluntarily gave her car up at around 80, having become nervous in heavy traffic.

But would she ever take one? No, because although she could well afford it, in her head, after many frugal years in the past, they were still a great extravagance.
It was very frustrating!

Hetty58

Oreo (biscuit by name etc.) - of course, I'm clueless, as is Khan - whereas your input has been utterly fascinating so far!

So it's even less than I thought, just 6.9% of vehicles in outer London - hardly a major disaster then. People do adapt when they have to. We've so many services in London, we're very lucky and many people never own a car - and get by just fine.

No idea what ‘biscuit by name’ means, just weird.
FYI on the figures given above ( if correct) that means 11% are not ULEZ compliant.11% of combined inner and outer London is a lot of cars.It’s not cars tho, it’s people and the poorer people who you happily expect to be ‘hit in the pocket*.
This really affect lives Hetty58 and it’s obvs you have no empathy or even sympathy for those affected.