Sunak’s Anti-LTN Report Finds LTNs Popular

A report commissioned by Mr Sunak to show that Low-Traffic Neighbourhoods (LTNs) are unpopular and ineffective has reached the opposite conclusion.

The report was ordered in July 2023 and was due to be published in January 2024, but because of its inconvenient conclusions it has been suppressed.

The Guardian has seen a copy of the unpublished report. According to Peter Walker’s article, it says that LTNs are popular and effective. As a result, government advisors asked for it to be permanently shelved.

Sunak the Unprincipled Opportunist

Transport is the single largest source of UK greenhouse gas emissions, mostly from private cars.

Active travel can replace short car trips, and thereby reduce emissions. It is also a solution to air pollution, inactivity and obesity, congestion and road danger.

A government pursuing long-term goals with integrity would have continued with Andrew Gilligan’s Gear Change policies to enable active travel.

In July 2023, the Conservatives managed to hang on to a Parliamentary seat at the Uxbridge by-election. This was thought to be partly due to some voters’ opposition to expansion of London’s ULEZ.

Following Uxbridge, Mr Sunak showed himself to be an unprincipled opportunist with attempts to capitalise on opposition to good long-term policies designed to deal with pollution and greenhouse gas emissions from private cars.

He announced a review of LTNs installed from 2020 onwards, with a view to removing them or blocking new ones.

In October 2023, he expanded his war on safe streets to include opposition to 20mph and traffic-calming. Later that month, there was a laughable Tory plan for drivers.

Polling

The DfT report includes polling in four sample LTNs in London, Birmingham, Wigan and York. It shows:

• 45% support among residents of LTNs and
• 21% opposition

In a sign that LTNs are not as controversial as Mr Sunak and the right-wing press would like to believe, 58% of respondents did not know that they lived in an LTN.

Evidence

The report also contains evidence about the effects of LTNs. It says that LTNs generally do not displace traffic onto boundary roads.

‘The available evidence from the UK indicates that LTNs are effective in achieving outcomes of reducing traffic volumes within their zones, while adverse impacts on boundary roads appear to be limited’.

dft report on ltns

Although there is a perception that there was more traffic on boundary roads due to LTNs, the evidence does not support that.

‘There are tensions between evidence and perceptions. There appears to be limited evidence of adverse impacts on boundary roads, but residents are more likely than not to think that schemes have added traffic congestion and queues to these nearby roads’.

dft report on ltns

Where schemes were rushed through, there had been some initial problems for emergency services, but issues eased over time. Overall, LTNs do not cause problems for emergency vehicles.

‘LTNs do not adversely affect response times for emergency vehicles’.

dft report on ltns

On the positive side, the report finds that LTNs enable more walking and cycling, and tend to reduce road danger and street crime.

Penalty Charge Notices

A wider survey of 42 LTNs showed that a total of 31,000 penalty charge notices had been issued.

These are sent to drivers who are not exempt from the rules but drive through an LTN anyway.

Government Comment

The DfT put up a spokesperson who said, ‘We are clear that many local authorities have not put local residents first when implementing LTNs. We are backing motorists and will produce new guidance focused on the importance of securing strong local support’.

Not if we vote you out first, you won’t.

Apparently the DfT plans to launch a consultation on denying councils access to Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR) data if they “are enforcing the road rules too vigorously”.

Of all Britain’s problems, too much enforcement of the rules of the road isn’t one of them.

Rachel Aldred Study in the Journal of Health & Transport

Meanwhile a Rachel Aldred study in the Journal of Health & Transport shows the effectiveness of active travel interventions.

The study looked at 6 years of data from the People and Places survey to examine the impacts of active travel interventions in Outer London (the mini-Hollands programme). It found a consistent dose-response relationship between infrastructure and uptake.

It says that the active travel programme generates £1 billion of health economic benefits for a cost of £100 million – a BCR of 10.

LTNs have a very high value for money, as much as 50:1 to 200:1.

Specifically, LTNs were the most effective interventions, with a 20-year per-person physical activity related benefit of £4,800, for a cost of between £28 and £112.

The study’s conclusion was:

‘The study supports building active travel infrastructure to help meet policy goals of increasing active travel and reducing car use. The strongest support is for a policy combining LTNs with providing proximity to main road cycle tracks, as was done most consistently during this time in south of Waltham Forest.

The findings suggest that this leads to substantially increased walking, increased participation in cycling, and reductions in car ownership and/or use, and that the benefits of increased walking and cycling substantially outweighs scheme costs’.

conclusion of rachel aldred study in health & transport