Redesigning our towns and cities to work for people and nature.
Our towns and cities can be places where people and nature thrive, with warm and affordable homes powered by clean energy, accessible and climate-friendly ways of getting around, and healthy green spaces.
Climate Safe Communities is an achievable plan that over the next seven years will reshape the places we live to meet three priorities:
- People first - our communities will be reshaped around the needs of people, not cars, with green streets for our children to play and move around safely
- Space for nature - our streets will be lined with trees and streams, and green spaces will provide a place to relax and protect us from flooding
- Climate-friendly travel - people will find it easier to get around on buses and trains, with services like free dental just a safe walk or bike ride away
Successive governments have made the political decision to design our towns and cities around cars. This has failed for everyone, including drivers.
Evidence shows that when we build more roads, they fill up. People are forced to drive more often and for longer in the same congestion and we end up with more urban sprawl. It is a very expensive plan that we know won't succeed.
When it comes to political decision-making for better towns and cities, the Green Party is focused on the evidence. There is not a town or city in the world that has solved the challenges it faces by building more roads.
Our plan will build our cities around the needs of people, while also leaving space for nature, like new green infrastructure that can soak up water and prevent flooding.
Creating new routes for buses and light rail, walking and cycling, will get people where they need to go more quickly and with less emissions than building more roads, and in a more connected and joyful way.
Tree lined streets will shade us as we walk the kids to school and provide an effective, efficient, and immediate form of urban climate action.
Green spaces will absorb water when the next storm hits so it doesn’t flood our homes.
This is our plan to bring our towns and cities into balance with a healthy climate and thriving nature.