So who is going to live in these towns?

[Vladd67]

Eco-towns will ban cars from outside homes | Vladd’s view of the World
Now this may be exaggerated but to quote department of transport guidelines

“car-free areas within a development” to be “combined with a safe and secure parking provision separate from the residential area, perhaps on the development’s periphery”. The document encourages “restricting car parking to residents with disabilities, visitors and car clubs, limiting car spaces and/or charge for residential car parking” and “restricting car access to *certain times of day within the entire development or part of it”.

So does this mean these new towns will have large car parks on the edges of the community? How would you like to have to catch a bus to get to your car everyday? Or maybe you would prefer a curfew on when you can drive up to your own house? In an ideal world we would have a reliable public transport system that integrates buses and trains, but we don't, in some places you are lucky if the buses turn up. When I lived in a village which is next to a main road (the A5) the few buses we had sometimes just drove straight past the village without stopping. In rural areas people rely on their personal transport, and sometimes a bicycle just isn't practical. The problem seems to be that some politicians living in metropolitan areas with their chauffeur driven cars are completely out of touch with the realities of life for a lot of people in this country today.

[Ursa major]

As it suggests in your link, ecotowns are simply (and only) dormitory towns. The prefix, eco-, is used only to make them sound more palatable, to make them somehow different from the frenzied attempts to concrete over the south east of England (predominantly) - you know, that place where the traffic is worst and the rainfall least. (I'm so glad I don't live there.) It's all spin, as are the proposed restrictions, which will either stop people from going to live in these towns or be quietly dropped (or, in time, the one followed by the other).

It should be possible to build a more environmentally-friendly house anywhere - it doesn't have to be in a field at the back of beyond. In fact it shouldn't be at the back of beyond - in a rational world it should be built near places of work, shops and schools (amongst other things).

But increasingly, we in the UK don't live in a rational world. The sad fact is that we have spent the last few decades persuading people that they do not have to live near their place of work:

• They have to be near a "good" school - when the effort should be put into making all schools as good as possible.
• They all have to work "flexibly". The government (in spite of its blind spot shown up by the 10p tax issue) wold like every adult to be in work; but it also wants people to be "flexible". But that can mean that both parents have jobs; and if they are "flexible", there's a good chance that neither parent will be working near their childrens' schools.
• They have to shop in large out-of-town hypermarkets (with huge car parks) rather than at local shops (with, say, Post Offices), and all because competition is a god that brooks no, well, competition (at least not from anything as vague as community).
• I could go on, but I'd get all depressed about it.

But now, in an attempt as futile as blowing a kiss into a hurricane, the government thinks that turning a field into a town and slapping the prefic eco- onto the planning application is the answer.

[Briareus Delta]

If, as Ursa suggests (and I suspect she is right), the eco prefix is nothing more than window dressing, then the whole concept falls down anyway.

But there is no reason why a true eco-town couldn't be built, if the planners, politicians and big business could get their act together and some true political will and leadership existed (stay with me, this is a Utopian vision I'm creating here!). It's not just about building eco-friendly, energy-saving houses. It's about how that energy is generated and where it is generated from. It is about creating the necessary public transport links so that people are not so dependent on the internal combustion engine. It is, as Ursa suggested , about planning where we live and work and how we work. Planning where our children are educated and where we shop.

It could be done. It won't be. As for the current ill-thought out plans to put some kind of huge car park on the edge of housing developments - well, I only hope that the people that move to these new towns know exactly what they are letting themselves in for!

[andrew.v.spencer]

We should build dams across the Wash, the Severn, Thames and Forth estuaries. WE NEED MORE LAND. This is just a precurser to the big project... yes throwing dams across the North Sea.

Then we invade Norway.

Currently the Government committee: Situations That Under Present Idiosyncracies Democratise, is considering my brilliant plans.

[Ursa major]

Originally Posted by Briareus Delta

If, as Ursa suggests (and I suspect she is right), the eco prefix is nothing more than window dressing, then the whole concept falls down anyway.

Of course Ursa is right; he is always right. (But in this case, I hope that I'm not. Right, that is.)

[Overread]

I think Ursa is right on the ball here - we can do eco friendly - we can make greener fuels we can do much more than we are doing now.
Why do we not?
Because it involves more cost to the producer, which is a no=no in modern concepts of maufacture (where now the concept of the product lasting is bad - that means they only buy 1).
Also government only thinks in 4 year blocks (well 3 years - the last is campaining to get back in again) which means any long term planning (which going eco would need ) is likley not only to get overturned/changed/downgraded by the next party, but also that the average layman only cares about eco so long as the proposed changes don't affect him. As soon as they do he looks ot vote for another

[pyan]

Originally Posted by Vladd67

So does this mean these new towns will have large car parks on the edges of the community?

Not always even that, Vladd...they're about to build 1500 new homes on a brownfield site near me, but have allowed only 1200 car parking spaces.
The official reason is to "discourage the residents from owning cars, and to promote the use of public transport"

Yeah, right: that's really going to happen....

[Drachir]

Originally Posted by andrew.v.spencer

We should build dams across the Wash, the Severn, Thames and Forth estuaries. WE NEED MORE LAND. This is just a precurser to the big project... yes throwing dams across the North Sea.

Then we invade Norway.

Currently the Government committee: Situations That Under Present Idiosyncracies Democratise, is considering my brilliant plans.

Seems only fair concerning the Norway bit. The Norwegians certainly spent a lot of time 1000 years ago invading Britain.

[Kissmequick]

Originally Posted by pyan

Not always even that, Vladd...they're about to build 1500 new homes on a brownfield site near me, but have allowed only 1200 car parking spaces.
The official reason is to "discourage the residents from owning cars, and to promote the use of public transport"

Yeah, right: that's really going to happen....

Hah sounds like my street. It's a victorian road, so no drives or garages. You have to park on the street. There would be enough parking for one car each house, but of course several houses have two or more cars ( one regularly has four) so.....we can't park down our own road half the time.

Luckily we only use the car ( except for hubby's work) about once a week.


But I can see the same thing happening at that car park -- some people will have two cars, others will have no choice but to park any old where, because you can almost gurantee the public transport won't be good enough.


Just outside of town ( about five miles away) they are planning to build a four thousand house development in what is currently a couple of fields. Are they going to increase the twice a day buses that go past? Nope. Include any shop other than a corner newsagent? Nope. Put in a pub? Nope. Have a school / employment in walking distance? Nope. People will have to drive.
The nearest infant school will be four miles or more away, same for primary. Can a five year old walk/ cycle that far to school? Not without being knackered, no. Where is the nearest place to be employed? Five miles away ( some nice steep hills in the way to put off the cyclists too) The bus won't come early enough to get you to work on time, and the one on the way back is at 3pm, so you'll still be at work. If you do cycle, well how the hell are you going to bring your shopping home from the nearest grocer ( five miles away) unles you take a day off work, otr play scrum with everyone else from the new village who are doing teh same thing but won't all fit on teh one bus? But they want to encourage people not to use cars.

*facepalm*
Sometimes I really wonder if anyone actually thinks about these things.

[Vladd67]

I used to live in Milton Keynes, when that was originally built back in the 70s every house and flat had two parking spaces, the roads were built in a grid system so the roads ran smoothly and buses ran every 10 min or so. Now the anti car lib dem council has screwed with the roads the buses are a joke and new housing has one car space per residence if you are lucky. Of course I now live in Northampton in a Victorian street so I can sympathise with Kissmequick. I don't no what the town planners (now thats a joke) were thinking of with all the road works but according to the local paper before christmas there were 70 road works going on at one time in Northampton.

[BookStop]

What is the point of parking cars elsewhere? The cars still exist, they still have mass...I'm guessing they will still be used, only now eco community would also get to experience a negative enviromental impact fromt he added buses need to transport folks to their cars. Makes no sense to me.

[Ursa major]

It strikes me that even more people will end up buying huge 4x4s so they will at least be able to park in some enterprising farmer's field.


(As for the Norwegians: I thought they paid for the land on the sunset side of the Pennines, thus providing that film title: "Norse Buy North West". Sorry. )

[pyan]

Originally Posted by Kissmequick

Have a school / employment in walking distance?

Heh, sounds familiar...in our case, the development will be ready in about seven years...but the council, who are working to a five-year schedule, are closing the local secondary school because of projected falling population in the area!

Words fail me....

[Vladd67]

Ursa you get worse Don't change.

[Kissmequick]

Originally Posted by pyan

Heh, sounds familiar...in our case, the development will be ready in about seven years...but the council, who are working to a five-year schedule, are closing the local secondary school because of projected falling population in the area!

Words fail me....

Hah, I live in one of the most highly populated parts of the country, they're building god knows how many more homes. So what are they doing? Shutting all the hospitals.

They promised they'd build us a nice new one, shut the A&E and maternity in the old ones, and then said 'sorry we lied, you aren't getting a new one'

This is one reason no more kiddies -- literally I'd have to go 25 + miles to get to a maternity ward ( and I'd never get there before the baby popped out. I only just made it last time, and the maternity was less than ten miles away) As from next year there will be one maternity unit in West Sussex. Same for A&E. I don't dare have an accident -- it'd take an age to get the ambulance to me.