Sheffield council will tackle the “silent killer” of pollution by investing into electric buses.
A council meeting on Wednesday passed the report to increase decarbonised, quality buses around the city to combat the issue of unclean air and poor transport.
The decision has been made to reduce Sheffield’s carbon footprint and improve bus services.
Councillor Ben Miskell, Chair of the Transport, Regeneration and Climate Policy Committee said: “It’s really important that we have the clean air investment plan to protect some of the most vulnerable in society.
“We know that dirty air is a silent killer in our city, and we have to deal with it.”
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Councillor Andrew Sangar, Sheffield Liberal Democrat spokesperson on the issue said: “When you knock on doors anywhere in the city people will grumble about two things, they will grumble about the state of the buses – that they’re not reliable enough and that they don’t go where they want them to go, and the city centre.”
Amanda Cosgrove who has done work on the Clean Air Zone proposed an investment of £1m into the fund.
This was passed at the meeting and no councillors objected to the passing of the report.
Group Spokesperson Denise Fox expressed concern for Sheffield’s hilly terrain as opposed to Leicester, where electric buses have already been a success.
However, charging equipment for the Sheffield City Connect service is already in place with e-charging funding for 65 buses.
As well as converting to an electric fleet, the aim of the report is to make all vehicles compliant with regulations for decarbonisation.
Tom Finnegan-Smith, Head of Strategy, Transport, Sustainability and Infrastructure said: “Of November 2022, we’re in a position where the majority of our private hire vehicles in the city are compliant, with only 6% of the fleet being non-compliant.”
Now that the report has been passed, action will be underway to fund electrical buses though Mr Miskell could not comment on the time scale he expects for this conversion.
At the same meeting Sheffield City Council decided to implement two 20mph speed zones in residential areas to improve air quality and safety around schools.
ShefNews spoke to people around the city centre to see what they thought of bus services in Sheffield.
Conor and Samantha Reid, both 31, owners of a cleaning business felt negatively. Conor said: “We live in Stocksbridge and the bus service is awful.”
Samantha added: “I’m actually learning how to drive so I don’t have to take the bus anymore.”
Lee Randle, 42, a financial tech worker, said: “They’re fairly reliable if they’re in the city business district, it’s when you start getting out toward the suburbs that’s when there’s a lot of delays.
“Some of the buses are very old, so they need some investment in those.”