Perhaps this is the wrong place to talk about climate change, so if this thread was more related to congestion, apologies, however, I've become much more conscious of the climate change and pollution issue in the last few years. I spent some time away from cities recently, and on coming back, was shocked that, having got used to breathing cleaner air, I could actually taste the fumes in the air. Something that is quite routine nowadays, but I was watching the telly and an advert came on for Water Aid, it showed a little girl walking miles to collect polluted, parasite infested, dirty water to drink. We're so de-sensitised to this stuff that we can almost ignore it, but when you actually sit and focus on the message, this, it goes without saying, really isn't ok, and is only going to get worse, the longer we continue to pretend climate change isn't happening. It's a global problem, but things have to change at all levels, starting with the individual, and at a local level. So looking at our city, how do we get to the point where we can look at ourselves in the mirror and be happy with what's looking back? I don't personally think a congestion charge is the answer. I don't think penalising people without giving them viable alternatives, in a region that's significantly poorer than other parts of the country anyway, is going to get people on board, which for me, is the primary goal. All it does is penalise the less well off, while those with lots of money will just pay the charge. It needs to form part of a bigger strategy.
A similar idea, but rather than targeting specific areas, I'd sooner implement a national commuter tax, where if you commute more than 10 (or insert mileage here) miles to your place of work, you pay a 'green' tax out of your PAYE. Would be easy to implement through companies having to have proof of address upon employing you, so this could just be registered with the government. The money generated could be ring fenced to fund green initiatives and public transport, with spending proportionate with the revenue raised in certain areas of the country (so the money couldn't just be invested into one area), so in theory, over time, people are given more cost affective green transport alternatives, further driving down congestion. It could even be used to subsidise electric vehicles for those who wouldn't have the funds to access them. The tax would in the main only hit people who can 'afford' to commute long distance, and it would encourage people to work locally, thus easing a bit of the congestion on motorways, in cities etc. I think that's more justifiable than charging everyone to drive into town, which would result in someone driving 30 miles to get to town, and paying the same charge as the bloke who drives a couple of miles to work each day. While air quality and congestion in cities seems to be something of an emergency, if you look at it from a climate emergency perspective, pollution is pollution, whether you drive down a country lane to work, or down the waterfront in town. It would need tweaking for the occasional person that might cycle long distance, use an electric car etc, but yeh. A proportion of tax on fossil fuels could also be treated in the same manner.
I'd also put a tiered green tax on flights. People who consider themselves conscientious with regard to ecological issues often seem to forget that jet engines are a big part of the problem; climate change is an issue, and we either all look at what we contribute as individuals across all areas of our lives, or we fail. Cherry picking certain areas to target, while ignoring other areas out of convenience (which we are all guilty of), isn't the answer, and will leave people further divided into categories, feeling alienated, and ultimately won't change peoples hearts and minds re: thinking green, which for me, is what this is all about. It's an entire cultural and lifestyle shift. The questions shouldn't be isolated ones, questions that make people feel marginalised or adversarial, like do you drive to work, do you fly long haul, are you part of a 'problem' group, they should be, what's your carbon footprint, what do you do to offset it, what could you do to improve it, what can we as a collective do to improve all of the above, with tiered approaches down from here, but keeping people aware of the entire tree, not just the branches they use/belong to. Encourage both personal and collective responsibility in this regard, be transparent in plans and where money goes from initiatives like the above, give people rewards for being carbon neutral, whether that's subsidised/free use of transport networks, tax breaks; as long as it's viable and sustainable, why not?
Some other thoughts re: Liverpool; electric mopeds can be driven on a CBT, and cost about 2.5 - 3k - in a scenario like the above wouldn't be that hard to set up some sort of quick rental system akin to the whole 'Boris' bike thing with charging points around the city? It'd pay for itself pretty quickly I think. In terms of a larger scale, long term plan, the Seattle monorail is a tourist attraction, other cities have cable cars, in the long term there's nothing to stop Liverpool implementing this stuff on the waterfront, down Lord Street, there's pockets of space, the city could be a world leader in green transport, show other places how to do things. People would visit to see this stuff, more money into the local economy. A green transport plan for the next 20 years, push carbon emissions down, drive down pollution, with re-investment of profit back into the system. A solution not motivated by profit, but because it's the right thing to do.
It's a pity we're about to do the whole Brexit thing re: funding.. that said, crowd funding, and companies/individuals taking time out to provide content for this type of thing, CAD designers and the like, it'd drive costs down and show what could be done. The question isn't can we afford to, it's as a nation, a city, an individual, can we afford not to?
