Low traffic neighbourhood schemes cut air pollution on nearby roads

Schemes that goal to cut back visitors by means of sure streets have been accused of accelerating air air pollution on roads at their borders, however a examine in London has discovered that the other is true

By Madeleine Cuff

Low visitors neighbourhoods (LTNs), which use large planters, boundaries and cameras to limit car entry to residential streets, result in a discount in visitors quantity and nitrogen dioxide air pollution each inside their perimeters and on boundary roads, in keeping with a examine of such schemes in London. The findings run counter to claims by anti-LTN campaigners that the zones merely displace visitors and air pollution to their boundary.

“Not only does traffic and air pollution reduce within the LTNs as you would expect, but we also found some reductions at the boundary areas, especially for air pollution,” says Audrey de Nazelle at Imperial College London. “The concern for air pollution is not a reason not to be in support of LTNs.”

Over the final three years lots of of LTNs have been launched in cities and cities throughout the UK in a bid to chop visitors and air air pollution and make residential streets safer to stroll and cycle round. They often limit by means of visitors from sure streets, whereas permitting pedestrians and cyclists to cross unobstructed.

But the measures have sparked vocal opposition, with some residents and campaigners claiming LTNs displace visitors and air pollution from richer residential streets contained in the zone to poorer communities residing on their periphery. LTN boundaries, akin to planters, have even been vandalised and tipped over in native disputes.

To discover out whether or not the air air pollution claims have been correct, de Nazelle and her colleagues checked out three LTNs put in within the London borough of Islington in 2020, assessing the visitors and air air pollution affect inside the LTN zones and within the surrounding space utilizing information supplied by the council.

They discovered that concentrations of nitrogen dioxide fell by 5.7 per cent inside the LTNs and by slightly below 9 per cent on their boundaries, in comparison with different websites in Islington not topic to any visitors interventions. Meanwhile visitors volumes dropped by greater than half contained in the LTNs and by 13 per cent on boundary roads.

De Nazelle says extra analysis is required to verify the findings at a bigger scale, however the outcomes chime with wider analysis on the advantages of LTNs in reducing visitors accidents and rising strolling and biking charges.

“What we are finding is not a surprise, we expect to find it elsewhere,” de Nazelle says. “We have sufficient evidence that LTNs are beneficial for community members, for members of society. There’s no evidence of harm in boundary areas.”

Journal reference: Transportation Research Part D, DOI: 10.1016/j.trd.2022.103536

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