Council asks for views on how to improve active travel and reduce emissions
Lancaster City Council is asking for people’s views on what improvements could be made within the district to help improve networks for walking and cycling, public transport and reduce emissions from vehicles while ensuring people can continue to lead good lives.
In January 2019, the city council declared a climate emergency and committed itself to reducing its own carbon emissions to net zero while supporting the district in reaching the same.
Since then, Salt Ayre Leisure Centre has been decarbonised, electric vehicles purchased and the energy efficiency buildings improved, all with the aim of being net carbon zero by 2030.
But with one of the major contributing factors of climate change being how we travel around, the city council is now interested in people’s views on how we access the things that are necessary to lead a good life at the same time as reducing harmful greenhouse gas emissions.
Over the next few weeks, the council is asking people to help it answer the question: “How can we as residents of Lancaster district access the resources we need to lead a good life by moving around freely and at the same time reducing emissions?”
To help to do this it has launched a new survey using Polis, an online tool to gather, analyse and understand what large groups of people think about an issue. There is also the opportunity to vote on the statements and proposals that are put forward to understand which are the most popular.
To take part visit lancaster.gov.uk/travel
Councillor Phillip Black, leader of Lancaster City Council, said: “Tackling the devastating impact of climate change is at the heart of all the council’s policies and significant progress is being made in meeting our ambitious target of making the council’s activities net zero by 2030.
“However, the council’s own emissions are only a small part of the picture. We need to involve every member of our community to get involved and help to reduce emissions across the district. To do that we need to gather their views, understand their thoughts, and use this information to lobby for change and influence organisations like Lancashire County Council, who are responsible for transport.”
In addition to the Polis survey, the council has recruited Community Explorers, who will be out and about asking people their views on the issue and encouraging them to share ideas and opinions. Recruitment and training for the Explorers is being organised by Shared Future.
The results from both sets of engagement work will be presented to elected councillors and Lancashire County Council to help make informed decisions in the future.
You can find out more on what the council is doing to address climate emergency at www.lancaster.gov.uk/climate-emergency.
If you have any questions, please contact us at climate-emergency@lancaster.gov.uk.
The survey will close on 12th June, 2023.
Last updated: 26 May 2023