Fuel prices on the up, so shouldn’t we use less?

Most of the cost is in the tax and the tax is higher in rural areas because the base cost is higher — principally because of lack of competition not simply between retailers, but between the wholesale companies. Compare the cost of petrol in the Outer Hebrides with that in Inverness — both delivered by the same seagoing tankers!

If you want to see a reduction in car travel, it’s not enough to up the price of fuel — that just reduces the choice of the poorer people in the community. Make the use of public transport more feasible and more people will use it. I’ve been trying for ten years to get some sort of board put up at at least one bus stop within our village indicating the times and destinations of buses departing from the village. Zero success. Typical.

I live in Herefordshire and amny villages have no public transport (or what there is is one day a week).
The high cost of fuel is really hitting these areas, especially those on lower incomes. If the petrol increases keep on coming, only the rich will be able to live there.

It’s all well and good to say we should use cars less but what about those of us who require a car to travel to and from work, this is more important for people like me who have our own business and take some stock to work with us etc. It is hardly feasible to hop on a bus and travel with stock for our shop! I think the emphasis should be on new technology like Hydrogen fuel cell rather that electric cars, it’s all very well giving grants for electric cars and the like but has no-one realised that all the electricity to power them still needs generating in a power station? A Hydrogen fuel cell system would be a natural progression as it would still involve driving until you need to fill your car up then pulling into a filling station and filling up with Hydrogen which would take no longer than filling up now. ‘Filling up’ with electricity is more of an overnight/all day job.

Removing the exhaust catalyst would give us 10% more mpg I understand. Since it is only effective when warm, after about 10 miles and the average UK journey is less than 8 miles, why not simply remove this costly addition? This will save the environment by (i) saving energy and rare metals in making it (ii) again when it finally has to be disposed of safely and (iii) fuel as we do not use it!

You simply decide to trvel less by car and arrange things differently by adjusting your lifestile accordingly. Over the past five years my annual distance by car has fallen from 40 000Km to my current 10 000Km. Given that most people live in urban areas with public transport availability superior to my semi rural location, it is really a question of finding out what is available locally and using buses and trains as necessary (to link to these it is essential to get to know routes and times in advance – most of this information is available electronically nowadays). The critical element is the inclination to use taxis as link. You can be very sustainable and also reduce the necessity to fly as increasingly good surface and ferry links enable improved journey times especially on European inter-city routes. Frankly if you live in Truro you cannot do this but from London you will have excellent day travel by rail as far as Milan or Berlin.

Believe me the total spend on transport for work and social/ domestic calls, including getting to connect with continental journey hubs, is down by one third in real terms from what it was.

It’s not Rocket science and consideing that most people use the phone/telecoms their preferred use means you keep your precious car in the the security and peace of your garage – disturbing your banger or luxury limousine only when it is really essential.