Letter: County Council Needs To Do More To Reduce Pollution Levels

Published on: 6 Jul, 2019
Updated on: 6 Jul, 2019

From Simon Schulz

In response to: Compton Right-turn Ban Is Councils’ Solution to Cut Idling and Fight Air Pollution

As one of the residents affected, the right-turn ban in Compton is completely pointless, and (on the basis of GBC’s own figures in their report) will have an absolutely negligible effect on the pollution level.

After a positive initial approach, residents did respond collectively to the GBC consultation, universally condemning the poor response the council made to the pollution problem.

In fact, again on the basis of the figures in the report, which I have examined in great detail, there is only one possible action which would be guaranteed to reduce NO2 pollution to below the legal limit. That is to eliminate one lane of traffic (the number of vehicles per hour being the variable which has by far more influence on pollution levels than any other).

Surrey County Council has refused to countenance this or any of the measures listed above and in the report, some of which, at least, come close to achieving legal pollution levels. By refusing to consider action which could bring pollution levels down below the legal limit, they are, in legal terminology, “improperly fettering their own discretion”, which to my understanding means they are acting illegally.