Zero Carbon Luton - Issue 2, 2023
Bike and walking plans, car-free living and the GoodGym
Welcome to issue 2/23 of the newsletter, which shall include:
Car-free urban living in Luton?
Proposed new walking and cycling routes
Get out and about with GoodGym
Action for and against airport growth
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Car-free urban living in Luton?
A new development in High Town plans to deliver purposefully car-free living for the residents of 179 new flats. The building will be located on Brunswick Street, a five minute walk from Luton Station and the bus interchange. (For those familiar with its orange bulk, it will replace the current Lok’n’Store facility) The new homes will be within easy walking distance of the town centre, and all existing shops, school, park and amenities in High Town.
Instead of parking spaces, the site will include safe storage for 64 bikes in two dedicated cycle stores. It is a development designed to minimise the need for car travel, which has benefits for local traffic congestion, air pollution and carbon emissions.
The car-free plan drew a sceptical response from some locals, who predicted that residents would have cars anyway and simply park them in the street. Some insisted that car-free living was impractical in Luton. However, walking and cycling are at the heart of a sustainable transport system. More people choosing to live car-free means cleaner air and less traffic for everyone. While it may not work for every household, well designed and well situated car-free developments should be welcome in the town.
Active transport will play an important role in a zero carbon Luton, and the current target is for half of all journeys in the town to happen on foot or by bike by 2033. More on that below.
New walking and cycling routes
You don’t have to live in a new car-free development to choose active transport in Luton. In order to encourage more of it, the council has set out a new Local Walking and Cycling Infrastructure Plan for the decade to 2033.
Initial scoping work revealed that transport in Luton was “biased towards motorised transport” – something you probably already know. Although Luton’s streets are compact enough to support walking and cycling, a lot of people choose to drive because it doesn’t feel safe or attractive.
In response, the new plan identifies key routes through the town, with ideas for improving them. Improvements to walking infrastructure include better road crossing points, pavement widening, footbridges and barriers between road and pavement. Among the cycling proposals are improvements to junctions, segregated bike lanes, and the creation of ‘quiet ways’ which direct cyclists down less busy streets.
Whether you are an avid walker or cyclist already, or perhaps aspire to be, it’s worth spending a few minutes reviewing the current plans and feeding back to the council. You have until April 1st to fill in the survey. What do you think? Is there anything they’ve missed? What else can we do to get more walking and cycling in Luton – and the cleaner air, safer streets and lower carbon emissions that come with it?
Get out and about with GoodGym
GoodGym is a national network of people who want to ‘get fit by doing good’. They meet up to run or cycle to community projects or individuals who need a bit of help, and then muck in with practical tasks.
This year activities have included running to Stony Hill nature reserve for a litter pick, joining conservation volunteers to clear ivy with the parks department, and digging over a potato patch at the Penrose Roots Recovery Garden. Every session is different, with a wide variety of opportunities for exercise, socialising and helping out at the same time.
"Whether you can walk, run or cycle, there's something in GoodGym for everyone,” says David Mansfield, who runs Luton’s GoodGym branch. “We tackle all sorts of tasks that have a good local impact, but more than anything we just enjoy getting together with like-minded people, in the process we build physical fitness and mental health.”
"Check out the local listings to see what's coming up, and join our welcoming group of positive people at a session that suits you.”
If you could do with a hand, you can also get in touch with the team to request a task: "If you're a local community group, we'd love to hear how we can help you out!"
Action for and against airport growth
The formal application process for Luton’s airport expansion has begun, with documents filed with the Planning Inspectorate at the end of February. This confirms the plan to grow the airport from the current cap of 18 million passengers a year to 32 million - more on the Zero Carbon Luton website.
On the other hand, protestors blockaded the airport’s private aviation terminal in February. Activists from Extinction Rebellion towed a sailing boat across the entrance to Harrods Aviation and Signature, demanding a ban to private jets and a tax on frequent flyers - more on the website.
In other news…
Grants of up to £10,000 are available for local environmental projects through the new Greener Future Fund, run on behalf of the airport. The deadline is 31st of March.
Participative climate project The Strategy Room visited Luton as part of a pilot tour around the country. Three groups of volunteers helped to test their interactive decision-making process. If successful, it may provide a model for consulting residents on decisions that affect them in future.
After the passenger testing that we reported in the last newsletter, the airport’s new DART service has carried its first paying passengers.
Luton is among the towns awarded millions of pounds of funding for bus improvements, as part of the government’s National Bus Strategy. We look forward to more detail on what improvements to expect, and will share them in future newsletters.
And finally
Please do forward this to anyone who might be interested in climate action in Luton - which is everybody, right?