On October 11 of this year, on the Lazio Region website, the
center-right president Rocca declared: "We have listened to the cry ofalarm of the Roman citizens and given them a concrete response with
respect to a plan inherited from those who preceded us. Today's Regional
Council, in fact, has confirmed the extension for entry into the ZTL
green zone of Rome for cars and commercial diesel vehicles Euro 4 and
postponed the ban for diesel Euro 5, approving the proposal for the
remodulation by Rome Capital of the interventions regarding limitations
to vehicular traffic, effective from November 1, 2024" (1).
To understand Rocca's victory cry, we need to rewind the tape and go
back two years: in November 2022, in fact, the center-left municipal
government led by Gualtieri, on the basis of the indications contained
in the Air Quality Recovery Plan approved by the then PD-led regional
government, introduced a new ZTL, the so-called "green band", which
includes a large part of the municipal territory, in some areas also
touching the Grande Raccordo Anulare. The measure, in addition to
confirming the limitations already in place for some years, introduces
further progressive limitations within this area for diesel vehicles, in
particular starting from November 2023 for Euro 4 and from November 2024
for Euro 5.
This does not go unnoticed: the protests immediately begin, ridden by
the right that thunders against the radical-chic left of the ZTL. At the
end of 2023, the Capitoline council backtracks and postpones the
restrictions on Euro 4 and Euro 5 diesels by another year.
And so we arrive at the present day, with the Gualtieri council
proposing to the Lazio Region a further extension of the highly
contested restrictions on Euro 4 and 5 diesels and with President Rocca
who, by approving the extension, can boast of having introduced "a
measure to mitigate a plan that would have put hundreds of thousands of
Romans in great difficulty, unable to change cars in such a short time",
as can always be read on the aforementioned page of the Region's
website. Yet another own goal by the liberal "left", which knows nothing
but to give ground and arguments to the right.
The story of the ZTL in Rome is an example of a phenomenon that we are
unfortunately witnessing more and more frequently in recent times, and
which is becoming the norm in almost all advanced capitalist countries,
namely the polarization and trivialization of public debate. This in
fact now boils down to the comparison between a reformist left, or
so-called, incapable and uninterested in structurally addressing the
ecological crisis towards which capitalism is pushing us, which
struggles to find partial solutions, often focused on the activation of
virtuous behaviors on an individual and voluntary basis, without any
structural perspective and even less in a class perspective capable of
protecting the weakest groups; and an increasingly less liberal right,
which rides the popular discontent towards restrictive measures in
environmental matters, accusing the left of being now relegated to the
good living rooms.
This is a false opposition, which is repeated not only in the specific
case of policies to limit vehicular traffic, but every time we talk
about the environment and ecological transition; and it is false because
both positions have no intention of addressing the causes of the
problem, much less of identifying effective solutions.
That air pollution in urban areas is a real problem is now well
established by the entire scientific community: exposure to high levels
of air pollutants can cause problems to the cardiovascular and
respiratory systems, as well as increase the risk of miscarriage and
neurological problems such as dementia and cognitive disorders. The IARC
(the UN agency for research on cancer) classifies outdoor air pollution
as a type 1 human carcinogen.
The WHO estimated, for 2019, 4.2 million premature deaths in the world
due to outdoor air pollution (including indoor air pollution, i.e.
related to closed environments, the figure reaches 6.7 million deaths).
Of these 4.2 million deaths, approximately 89% are concentrated in low-
and middle-income countries, particularly in Southeast Asia and the
Western Pacific regions. In 2021, estimates for Europe speak of 253,000
premature deaths due to exposure to high levels of fine particulate
matter in the air and 52,000 related to nitrogen dioxide.
Of course, not all the impact on the quality of the air we breathe is
caused by our cars: the role played by industry and agriculture is also
enormous, as is home heating.
The EEA (European Environment Agency) estimates that in the countries of
the European Union, with regard to airborne particulate matter,
approximately 44% of PM10 and 53% of PM2.5 are due to the heating of
homes, offices and shops, while road traffic accounts for only 9%. The
agricultural sector is responsible for 94% of total ammonia emissions,
road traffic for only 1%. Only in relation to nitrogen oxide emissions
is road transport the main source, with approximately 37% of the total (2).
On the other hand, there are now numerous scientific studies that
highlight the health benefits obtained through traffic limitation
policies, be they ZTLs or urban congestion taxes (such as for example
the area C of Milan); this was supported by a study published last
summer in the scientific journal The Lancet Public Health, which after
reviewing studies and research on the health effects of traffic
limitation policies in various cities around the world, came to the
conclusion that such policies "can reduce health outcomes related to air
pollution, with the most significant effect on cardiovascular disease",
while keeping in mind that an evaluation of the long-term effects
requires further monitoring and observation (3).
The fight for a healthy environment, for the right to breathe clean air,
must therefore also involve overcoming the transport model centered on
the private car; however, this cannot be done to the detriment of
workers who are forced to give up the car they use to go to work,
accompany children or elderly people to nurseries and medical facilities
that are increasingly distant because they are increasingly numerically
reduced.
The bourgeoisie's "green" propaganda - of which the PD and local
center-left administrators are happy to advocate and repeat - prescribes
the use of electric and hybrid cars, which many workers can hardly
afford. And those who cannot afford them, due to the new restrictions on
circulation, are most of the time forced to depend on an absolutely
inadequate public transport system. In a city, moreover, that in a few
weeks will be taken by storm by the mass tourism of the Jubilee, and has
been clogged up for months by construction sites opened for this occasion.
These are classist measures that increasingly risk making workers
perceive public health and environmental protection as a luxury.
As if that were not enough, Mayor Gualtieri recently presented the plan
for the installation of new bus shelters, which obviously only concerns
the city center. They will obviously be "green" and "smart" (English is
a must, also to give color to a dull mayor): it's a shame that on the
only bench provided there will barely fit three people (again to avoid
making the "homeless" lie down?) and that bus waiting times, even if
consulted interactively on a shiny digital screen, will not be reduced
at all. And there are already those who joke about the possibility of
charging their cell phone in the shelter while waiting: considering the
frequency of the trips, there will be plenty of time...
Mobility, health and quality of life in large cities are class issues,
which must be addressed with a class approach. The implementation of new
and more sustainable urban mobility systems is certainly a difficult
challenge, which must be accompanied by a profound revision of urban
planning models - which currently increasingly relegate the working
class to suburbs with few services and poorly connected to the center -
and which can only be part of the project to overcome the capitalist
model. On the other hand, this can only happen if, here and now, we
begin to consolidate a grassroots movement capable of both analyzing the
complex reality we live in and of advancing simple primary objectives,
such as the strengthening of public transport and free season tickets or
the drastic reduction of their cost. Notes:
(1) Ztl Roma, from the Lazio Region extension to circulation for diesel
Euro 4, www.regione.lazio.it, 11 November 2024,
https://www.regione.lazio.it/notizie/Ztl-Roma-Regione-Lazio-proroga-circolazione-diesel-euro4
(2) Air pollution,
https://www.eea.europa.eu/en/topics/in-depth/air-pollution?activeAccordion=4268d9b2-6e3b-409b-8b2a-b624c120090d&activeTab=07e50b68-8bf2-4641-ba6b-eda1afd544be,
15 October 2024.
(3) Health effects of low emission and congestion charging zones: a
systematic review, Chamberlain, Rosemary C et al., The Lancet Public
Health, Volume 8, Issue 7, e559-e574,
https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanpub/article/PIIS2468-2667(23)00120-2/fulltext.
http://alternativalibertaria.fdca.it/
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