SmartGrowthUK
@SmartGrowthUK
An informal coalition of organisations and individuals interested in promoting the Smart Growth approach in the UK.
24 July is #EarthOvershootDay. That means humanity has used up Earth’s yearly natural resources budget in just 7 months. In 2024, the date was 1 August. The date keeps creeping earlier—but the trend can be reversed: genevaenvironmentnetwork.org/resources/upda…
So we need to reduce our dependence on road transport. 😀
I promise you that once everything is taken into account... the environmental cost of these electric cars will be equal to or greater than internal combustion engines. Cheers to virtue signaling.
A perfect explanation of why low-density #CarDependentSprawl being catastrophically pursued by the Government and the #YimbyLobby is the wrong approach. We need #SmartGrowth. theguardian.com/politics/2025/…
Here we go again... An enormous housing development that would have eliminated the green space at the heart of #Normandy, proposed in 2016 but eventually removed from the @GuildfordBC Local Plan, is back in prospect. For full details visit our website: normandyag.org.uk/red-alert
With the West Midlands Metro extension to Dudley well under way, what other metro/tram network in the UK would you like to see extended?
Today's reminder for #ClimateBoneheads
Record heat in 2024 caused ecosystems on land to emit nearly as much carbon dioxide as they took out of the atmosphere newscientist.com/article/248966…
Very much so. This is ridiculous gaslighting, the idea that our most irreplaceable habitats like ancient woodland can be replaced, compensated for.
Ummm, so you can replace irreplaceable habitats - how? Isn't that a contradiction in terms!
Meanwhile, here in the UK, the well-funded #YimbyLobby PR operation, listened to by central government, is advocating a big acceleration of #SoilSealing by #CarDependentSprawl, which reduces groundwater recharge. tinyurl.com/2r62btt2
The way yimbys treat affordable housing is all the proof you need that they don’t really care about making housing affordable. It’s never been about house prices.
Affordable housing requirements are like a gateway drug for left-NIMBYISM. You think you're just having a quick puff on the "we need more units at X% below market rate" pipe, but soon after you're injecting "supply can't solve the housing crisis" directly into your eyeballs.
Instead of campaigns to reduce urban cycling, do we need to develop serious cycle-calming techniques to slow testosterone-powered cycling where conflicts with pedestrians are a problem? Possibly even measures to enforce dismounting at, for example, floating bus stops?
Please watch this 2 minute clip and tell me this is seriously ok .. The the cyclists hit a child, cyclists cycling agressivly into vulnerable people…. Let’s stop floating bus stops now….
Your 'moment of doom' for July 25, 2025 ~ Choking on hope. "We are not facing a distant environmental threat. We are living through the sixth mass extinction. It’s not a prediction anymore—it is a present reality..." vocal.media/earth/climate-…
“What happens if you build more housing, and institutional investors are buying up 20% of the new stock?” Ocampo said. “It’s like a never-ending cycle.” theguardian.com/us-news/2025/j…
🚩Govt. admits concessions to Pt 3 of the Planning Bill are tokenistic and a 'tactical retreat' to speed the Bill up through the Lords. The amends don't help nature. Killing snails won't make mortgages any more affordable for homebuyers. Reeves presents a false dichotomy here
Ummm, so you can replace irreplaceable habitats - how? Isn't that a contradiction in terms!
🚩Government's proposed concessions to the Planning Bill don't protect irreplaceable habitats. The Bill *assumes* that replacement habitats are successfully delivered. Here, Barry Gardiner MP interrogates Matthew Pennycook on this:
Must read by the very sharp @horton_official giving yet more evidence of this being most hostile government to nature in my 50+ years experience.
Interviewed @CHinchliffMP about how he was treated by Starmer’s team after he campaigned for nature, what he’s doing next; and if he is a “knobhead” 🕷 🦇 🦎 theguardian.com/environment/20…
Sick and tired of this performative gratuitous attack on nature. With 1.4 million plots already approved for new homes, many empty homes, there's no need to set up this false choice, straw man argument.
I mean honestly Speechless that Ministers talk like this (Also, with pylons, it isn’t just views) independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-n…
Interesting. At a time the #YimbyLobby is whining about Greater London not having enough house building and saying only massive construction would bring down prices, er, prices are falling.
Why Dubai is Crashing London House Prices The UAE is driving down London house prices: ↳Prime Central London is in freefall, Mayfair has crashed 40% ↳Kensington & Chelsea prices dropped 15.1% in 12 months. Back to 2013 prices ↳30 months of continuous decline ↳In Q1 2025,…
Don't tell him about sea-level rise.
This is $500,000 per hectare (but the upfront cost is actually zero: they are paying contractors in land). Could the UK government give anyone who raises Doggerland 10% of the land if they give the country 90%? Would be a good site for a detention centre.
Now watch the oil industry lobbying campaign slot into gear to find ways to decry this. Click: $$$$$$$$$$$$
🚨BREAKING🚨 ICJ ruling that a healthy environment is a human right could be a real turning point in setting out governments’ legal responsibility to tackle #climate crisis 👇 theguardian.com/environment/20…
And the world needs this because...????
We are excited to share this raw flight footage including take-off and landing, all with real sound. No special effects, no CGI, no AI, pure engineering. Enjoy the future! A fully functional real-world "speeder bike" that so far only existed in sci-fi movies is finally here.