Matt Edwards 🟒 Profile picture
πŸ’š Leader of Green Party on Bradford Council and Councillor for Tong Ward | πŸš‰ @TheGreenParty National Transport & Healthy Streets Spokesperson | πŸ³οΈβ€πŸŒˆ
Jul 28 β€’ 6 tweets β€’ 3 min read
πŸš— The average weight of cars sold in Europe increased 21% from 2001 to 2022.

⏲️ This is a trend that has been happening for decades - but is getting worse.

βš–οΈ A great example of this is the #Fiat Panda which first came out in 1980 and weighed just 715kg.

#autobesity /1 A red 1980s Fiat Panda on a cobbled street with some pleasant buildings in the background. πŸ—“οΈ The second version of The #Fiat Panda came out in 2003

βš–οΈ This version was still quite light, especially by the standards of the early 2000s. It weighed 840–975 kg.

πŸ“ It was also not that much bigger than the original Mark 1 (although quite a bit taller).

/2 A light blue second generation Fiat Panda. There is a large glass building in the background.
Oct 19, 2023 β€’ 8 tweets β€’ 3 min read
Many people loose hundreds of hours a year to #congestion.

πŸš™πŸš—πŸš›πŸ›»πŸš—πŸš™πŸššπŸš•πŸš™πŸš›πŸš—

For generations, government and council have tried to solve this problem by building more roads.

It hasn't worked.

It's time to rethink our approach to getting around our urban areas.

A 🧡 /1 A photo of a street in London showing both sides of the road full with cars and other motor vehicles. 🚘 #London's roads are the most congested in the world.

😷 It causes dangerous #AirPollution across the city which is damaging the health of millions of Londoners.

🀦 Successive Labour and Conservative Mayor's have failed to tackle this problem.



/2bbc.com/news/uk-englan…
Aug 27, 2023 β€’ 14 tweets β€’ 5 min read
πŸ’Έ Millions of people in the UK can't afford to own cars, or can't drive for whatever reason.

πŸ›‘ The lack of non-car options means they are trapped around where they live.

🚍 Getting around needs to more affordable, which means less focus on cars.

πŸ§΅πŸ‘‡

theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/j… I've seen people today say anti-car policies are "anti-working class".

Not only is that not true, it's actually the opposite. Car ownership is expensive.

Car-centric #transport policies are forcing drivers to spend up to a fifth of pre-tax income on running a car.

/2 A graphic showing the cost of car ownership: Β£166 Vehicle Excise Do it ty Β£1206 Fuel Β£936 Car Insurance Β£613 MOT, Services and Repairs Β£2922 Total (not including parking, leasing)
Aug 12, 2023 β€’ 12 tweets β€’ 4 min read
The figure Β£1.6billion is being used to refer to the fiasco linked to the #BibbyStockholm.

But surely this isn't how much the government is paying to hire a single barge?!

Well. It's not.

The reality is worse.

A short 🧡 #asylum

independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-n… The government has awarded a two year contract worth Β£1.6billion to an Australian firm called Corporate Travel Management (CTM).

The contract covers a few (no evidence of what precise number is) asylum accommodation ships - the Stockholm Bibby is just the first.

/2
Nov 3, 2022 β€’ 9 tweets β€’ 7 min read
πŸš— FUN FACT - SUVs are the world's 6th largest polluter (if they were ranked as a country)

😷 Total emissions of all the SUVs globally is more than Germany, Saudi Arabia and South Korea

🌍 But despite the fact we are facing a #ClimateEmergency, car makers are still pushing SUVs A bar graph that shows the total annual carbon emissions for In fact, Growing demand for SUVs was the second largest contributor to the increase in global CO2 emissions from 2010 to 2018. #pollution

The increase in global #emissions from SUVs was more than heavy industry, shipping and #aviation

theguardian.com/environment/ng…
Nov 1, 2022 β€’ 13 tweets β€’ 11 min read
πŸ“‰ The Tories have tanked our economy and we are facing more massive cuts.

πŸ’‘Scrapping 5 biggest road schemes would β€˜nearly halve budget deficit'

🧡 A thread on why we need to scrap road building plans for the sake of our economy AND our environment πŸ‘‡

transportxtra.com/publications/l… 🌍 Building new roads is absolutely the wrong thing to do in a #ClimateEmergency

πŸš› Roads increase traffic, noise, air pollution and carbon emissions

πŸ’° The 5 largest road schemes in the pipeline as part of #RIS2 all have weak economic cases and will cost Β£16BILLION! @StopRIS2 An aerial photo of multiple...