Alliance vs The Welsh Assembly Government

Friends of the Earth may be happy with the recent update to Welsh Assembly Government transport policy, and business leaders angry at the recent announcement - worried about the economic impact of a decision to scrap the proposed M4 relief road. Meanwhile Ieuan Wyn Jones will enjoy the break of recess as he tries to juggle the two balls of his brief.

In another part of town, an alliance of Welsh organisations had already called on the Assembly Government to perform a U-turn on transport policy.

1. BayTrans
2. Bevan Foundation
3. British Heart Foundation Cymru
4. BMA Cymru
5. Bus Users UK Cymru
6. Campaign for National Parks
7. Confederation of Passenger Transport Cymru (CPT)
8. CTC Cymru
9. Energy Saving Trust
10. Passenger Focus
11. Physical Activity Network for Wales
12. Railfuture Wales
13. Severn Tunnel Action Group
14. Snowdonia Society
15. Sustrans Cymru
16. Traveline Cymru
17. Wales Council for Voluntary Action (WCVA)
18. WWF Cymru
19. YHA Cymru

The long-awaited National Transport Plan is put out to consultation and an unprecedented coalition has come together to call for a shift away from road building to fund a bold package of measures to help tackle climate change.

For the first time public transport operators have joined passenger watchdogs, health groups and NGOs to press for greater priority to be given to a range of initiatives that promote green transport.

Lee Waters, Chair of Sustainable Transport Cymru:

We’re fed up of strategies promising greener transport when half the transport budget is tied up in road schemes. From past experience we know this will result in more people driving further and faster.

If we are serious about tackling climate change and creating a healthier Wales, we urgently need a bold shift in transport policy. Projects which cut car use should be given priority.

The Sustainable Transport Cymru coalition has agreed a list of measures which command widespread support to cut car use and reduce carbon emissions:

• Measures to promote integrated transport, for example, multi-modal ticketing, bus / rail interchanges, Smart Cards and secure cycle parking.


• A range of ‘Smarter Choices’ measures. For example, Travel planning, Car Clubs, Car sharing, Bus Real Time information systems, Park & Ride, showers and lockers in workplaces.


• Traffic calming and speed restraint in residential areas to encourage walking and cycling


• An extensive network of shared paths for walking and cycling (segregated from traffic)


• Congestion charging allied with extra investment in public transport


• Parking control (including low parking standards for new developments, charging, use of workplace parking levies, re-development of parking space for more productive uses);


• An extension of safe routes to schools (for example, by using traffic-calming measures near schools and by creating or improving walking and cycle routes to schools).


• Reallocation of road space towards sustainable modes of transport


• An integrated marketing strategy to target information on those who are susceptible to change the way they travel;


• Demand responsive services, including community transport, to tackle social exclusion in rural areas and other areas of transport poverty.


• A wide reaching awareness raising campaign educating the public in the techniques involved in more efficient driving, for journeys where sustainable modes of transport are not an option.

These measures to reduce car dependency should be funded by a shift away from road building.

Sustainable Transport Cymru is an alliance of Welsh organisations from the private, public and voluntary sectors. They support efforts to reduce the environmental impacts of travelling and to create an environment where people have access to essential local services without the need to use a car.

Total Politics Results: Green Blogs

No Welsh Green blogs have made it into Iain Dale's Top 20 Green Blogs list for his Guide to Political Blogging in the UK 2008-9.

It seems that we only eat greens in Wales.

The full list and entire series can be followed by clicking on the following link to Iain Dale's Diary.

'Clean, lean and green'...and away with the fairies?

The One Wales agreement called climate change ‘the greatest threat facing humanity’. To tackle this threat it promised (surprise, surprise) some strategies: an energy strategy to deal with renewable energy and an energy route map. Today the environment minister Jane Davidson announced a mix of the two, a renewable energy route map that will show how we can develop a Wales that is ‘lean, clean and green’.

The press release accompanying the route map consultation followed Assembly Government house style by once again proclaiming Wales to be the first to do something (a subject Miss Wagstaff has mentioned before). With sparing and environmentally-friendly use of modesty the press release said: ‘Just as we led the world in energy development during the 19th century when our coal powered the industrial revolution, we again have a great opportunity to lead in the battle against climate change.’

Towards the end of the release, just before we all burst into a spontaneous rendition of Hen Wlad Fy Nhadau, the press release says: “With the images of the end of one era – the closure of the last deep mine in Wales at Tower Colliery – still fresh in our memories we must now look to the future.” This passage will sound a little strange to residents living uncomfortably close to the Ffos-y-Fran open cast mine near Merthyr Tydfil. The last era is still alive and well at Ffos-y-Fran and elsewhere across Wales in coal, gas and woodchip burning plants.

The press release calls the route map ‘an ambitious programme’. Unfortunately for the Assembly Government a lot of the programme is hostage to decisions in Whitehall. It is deemed too important an issue for Westminster to leave to the Senedd. This is not to say that the renewable energy route map does not set out some good aims. But renewable energy, according to the Welsh Assembly Government’s own calculations in 2005, accounted for just 2.6% of electricity generation in Wales. Unless there is a serious commitment to realising the programme it will remain a (non-carbon neutral) pipe-dream.