Healthier, happier, fairer: New research shows that decarbonising transport has big benefits for life

With funding for walking and cycling halved in the government's recently published National Land Transport Plan and a weaker plan to reduce transport emissions, the potential health benefits of a low-carbon transport system have hit real speed.

This is a shame, because one of the great promises of low-carbon transport is the health improvements that can accompany certain policy decisions. Health is tangible, while decarbonisation policy is often complex and highly technical. People care a lot about their health, both physical and mental.

But we now face climate and transport policy options that will have radically different health consequences.

To investigate this, we looked at two different future transport pathways described by the Commission on Climate Change. We found that the decisions New Zealand makes now will be crucial to improving people's lives in the near future. (Caroline Shaw, The Conversation, more at phys.org)