Sustainable Transport Alliance uses COP26 to warn that solely focusing on electric vehicles would ignore their social and environmental drawbacks

 
Transport secretary Grant Shapps posed with an electric car at COP26

 
The UK’s leading sustainable transport NGOs this week appealed to world leaders to recognise that technology alone cannot reduce transport emissions. Instead, reducing traffic and shifting towards public transport, walking, cycling and shared mobility must be “a major climate goal, which can unleash widespread health, wellbeing and social justice benefits”.

As the focus of the UN’s COP26 climate change conference turned to transport – the biggest source of greenhouse emissions in the UK and the fastest rising globally – the Sustainable Transport Alliance highlighted that solely focussing on electric vehicles would ignore their social and environmental drawbacks – including a potential 51% increase in road traffic in the UK – and the immediate benefits of greener forms of transport.

The group outlined how the UK as president of COP26 can lead the way globally by drawing on community actions and voices to place walking and cycling, public, community and shared transport at the heart of climate ambitions.

We cannot put all our faith in electric cars

Jools Townsend, chair of the Sustainable Transport Alliance, and chief executive of Community Rail Network, said: “The evidence is clear that we cannot put all our faith in electric cars – we need a more fundamental shift in how we get around, and we have much to gain from this.”

Paul Tuohy, chief executive of Campaign for Better Transport, said: “Rather than saying it’s business as usual and technology will save the day, our leaders need to be upfront with people on what each of us needs to do and provide the right investment.”

 
This article appears in the latest issue of Passenger Transport.

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