[mathieuh]

It's become a culture war issue. In the UK London introduced a so-called Ultra-Low Emissions Zone recently, and Wales has dropped 30 mph speed limits down to 20, which prompted the right-wing populist government to come out as being "on the side of drivers" and to call decarbonisation schemes "tyrannical". They've now gone full swivel-eyed loon and are rowing back many climate change commitments.

It seems to me that, in the UK at least, as the two main parties align more and more on economic and social issues that they are needing to find new wedge issues to differentiate themselves.

Not sure if this is also the case in countries with PR governments.

[robertlagrant]

ULEZ isn't decarbonisation. It mostly targets diesel cars due to NO. And it doesn't ban them; it just costs £12/day to drive there. So suddenly millions of drivers, who bought diesel cars because that was the thing they were supposed to buy according to the government, now own cars that are worth -£2000/year.

It might seem that everything is along political lines because you view it that way. There are non-political reasons to get annoyed at things.

[tpm]

Millions? The number of daily non-compliant cars entering the ULEZ zone went from 36k in March 2019 to 12k in December 2020 according to Wikipedia. I seriously doubt the expansion did hit millions.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultra_Low_Emission_Zone

[robertlagrant]

> The number of daily non-compliant cars entering the ULEZ zone went from 36k in March 2019 to 12k in December 2020 according to Wikipedia. I seriously doubt the expansion did hit millions.

ULEZ was a tiny central part of London. New ULEZ is...all of London[0].

[0] https://tfl.gov.uk/modes/driving/ultra-low-emission-zone/ule... - the map shows the red outlined congestion charge zone (old ULEZ) vs the new blue area (new ULEZ)

[tpm]

Yes I know, and the point is? Still no trace of millions of drivers.

[robertlagrant]

The point is the study you cite is on that tiny inner bit, compared to the giant outer bit.

[tpm]

I expressly mentioned the expansion in my original post, so it should be clear I understand the difference, and the millions are still nowhere to be found.

[extraduder_ire]

I think the implication is that wherever you have your car, it's worth less because it costs money to drive it in london, which directly affects its resale value. Pretty indirect though.

[tpm]

Sure, but that also applies only to pre-Euro 6 diesel cars, so pretty old anyway.

[robertlagrant]

7 years old. Basically it's a tax on people who don't have a new diesel. And on businesses who require vehicles to get goods in.

[extraduder_ire]

Can one not just add an after-market adblue filter onto the car to hit the emission requirements? Like, do a reverse VW on it.

[rob74]

It's the same here too... before the recent state-level elections here in Bavaria is was basically "everyone against the Green party", the right-wing government (CSU and Freie Wähler) trying to out-populist the far-right populists from the AfD while trying to not sound too much like them - with the result that the AfD gained 4.4 % points compared to the last elections, FW gained 4,2%, CSU lost 0,2% (looks like they weren't populist enough) and the Greens lost 3,2%, losing the status of largest opposition party to the AfD.

[hef19898]

And basically all because of how we shoupd be heating our homes in the future. Quite pathetic actually, but every time I am in the more rural areas of Bavaria (a state I love, I am one of those with a healthy amount of regional partiotism of the absolute not serious kind), I remember the days of my youth: Without FW and AfD, all those opinions (from anti-semitic borderline hate speech to blatant racism and sexism, the pursuitbof short term profits regardless of costs, the disregard for nature if a dime could be made...) all existed to the same extent, they were only covered, and welcome, by the CSU as it was. Lately, there is split happeneing, were those more radical elements are drifting a bit further right. The same happened to the SPD when Lafontaine split of Die Linke after his fall-out with Schröder.

The next federal elections will be "fun", I just hope us Germans, as a whole, do the same thing that happened across Europe lately: prevent the more extremenright from getting the power of government (I know the post-fasiscts won in Italy).

That being said, I do think that most of the pro-AfD votes come from people deeply affraid of the change they see happening, affraid that someone will take away things from them. Not that this is the case, but it sure seems like it sometimes (I can see it myself). Unless a true pro-democratic coalition forms (explicitly incl. media), we will be stuck in this situation for the time being.