Leo Murray
@crisortunity.bsky.social
4.5K followers 1.6K following 11K posts
Trouble making. Problem solving. Doing my best to help. Climate action, Badvertising, bike lanes, frequent flyer levy, solar rail, Trump babysitting currently laser focused on www.ridingsunbeams.org
Posts Media Videos Starter Packs
Pinned
crisortunity.bsky.social
For everyone new to Blue Sky (like me!), by way of introduction: the first 40m of this video is my recent presentation to the Transport Planning Society of insights on what works - and what doesn’t - when it comes to implementing traffic reduction schemes www.youtube.com/watch?v=62dn...
Reducing Traffic – what is Possible?
YouTube video by Transport Planning Society
www.youtube.com
Reposted by Leo Murray
alasdaircameron.bsky.social
This also applies I think to environmental campaigning. People are always talking about the need to stop using 'challenged' words or phrases like rewilding, net zero, climate change - but ultimately it is the content of these things which threatens powerful interests, not the words.. ⬇️
raynewman.bsky.social
“The changing of names in order to destigmatise these conditions has been done for a very long time... And in my opinion, it doesn't work... because history suggests that sanitising a name only works for as long as people don't know what that new name means.”
crisortunity.bsky.social
See also Low Traffic Neighborhoods and all the many angsty alternative names dreamed up for these interventions in a doomed effort to ‘detoxify’ them
Reposted by Leo Murray
ianwalker.bsky.social
"The single most important behaviour, design or regulation for creating streets conducive to walking and cycling, was physical separation between the modes"

We've got a new study out, learning from a broad mixture of street users, planners and designers

www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Highlights
    For marginalised street users mode separation is the key to human-scale movement.
    Streets conducive to walking and cycling have functional, safe and accessible design.
    Professionals must approach street design, regulation and user behaviour holistically.
    Combinations of influencing factors persuade people to either use or avoid a street.
    There are no easy fixes to the public realm that will work for all non-drivers.
Reposted by Leo Murray
nicolasfulghum.bsky.social
NEW | Electricity generation from fossil fuels fell in China and India in the first half of 2025 🔥📉

This marks a reversal from previous trends.

Simultaneously, there was a small uptick in the US and in the EU.

A thread 🧵
Reposted by Leo Murray
mikeachim.bsky.social
Damn. This is amazing. £325 per week, paid monthly, for 3 years - and the result was a profit for the Irish economy:
www.citizensinformation.ie/en/employmen...
Post from Threads user rodneyowl: "Ireland has declared the Basic Income for Artists scheme permanent. This will be officially announced in tomorrow’s budget. Details to follow. Congratulations to all who fought for it and the present and future artists of all sorts in Ireland. That includes me 👌We’re just comin to the end of a 3 year pilot scheme. It’s been a roaring success. For every €1 paid out to the 2000 participants, the government got €1.46 back. Can’t argue with that. Other countries are already taking note."
Reposted by Leo Murray
mikegalsworthy.bsky.social
She was arrested for holding a sign reading:

“I do not support the proscription of Palestine Action”

How that would warrant arrest is very unclear. I wonder if the police here even understand the boundaries of the bizarre law they’ve been forced to enforce.
crisortunity.bsky.social
Not anyone on NextDoor, as far as I can tell
Reposted by Leo Murray
drbenwhitham.bsky.social
Men in balaclavas set fire to a mosque in East Sussex last night. It's only appearing on the BBC's local coverage, rather than its main national headlines, despite coming just a week after the (also under-reported) firebombing of an asylum hotel in London last week
www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
Peacehaven: Fire at East Sussex mosque probed as 'hate crime'
Video appears to show two people in balaclavas at the mosque before a large blaze spreads.
www.bbc.co.uk
Reposted by Leo Murray
Reposted by Leo Murray
harikunzru.bsky.social
While I’m on a posting roll, I just realized that the way to save the Humanities is by rebranding Higher Ed as where you go to learn how to Do Your Own Research
Reposted by Leo Murray
rantyhighwayman.bsky.social
If only the government pushed rail as enthusiastically as pretty much anything to do with driving or flying.
oxfordclarion.bsky.social
Separately, the Clarion understands East-West Rail trains are unlikely to start running until 2026, raising the possibility that electric taxis will be flying between Oxford and Cambridge before the first passenger train has reached Milton Keynes.
Reposted by Leo Murray
sundance.bikesky.social
Playgrounds are car infrastructure
Reposted by Leo Murray
drsimevans.carbonbrief.org
A question for Times columnist Sebastian Payne:

What is this cheaper source of "energy" that you speak of?

The world's energy experts would like to know…
crisortunity.bsky.social
Inconsiderately went through the windscreen or something I expect
Reposted by Leo Murray
richard.hebditch.org
"We have had major reviews by the CMA and the government itself which suggest that the problem is less the blockages imposed by planning rules, and more the model of private housebuilding itself. Volume house builders...have no interest in reducing the value of their only product."
‘Build baby build’ is not a housing strategy
There are too many middling politicians in this country who look at Donald Trump with envy. I might not like his politics, they think, but isn’t he such a great communicator? Don’t you see how good he...
www.spectator.co.uk
Reposted by Leo Murray
workingclasshistory.com
#OtD 3 Oct 1937 almost a year after their defeat at Cable St, Mosley's Blackshirts attempted to march through Bermondsey, South London. Met with strong local opposition and barricades in the streets, the march never arrived at its intended destination workingclasshistory.com/podcast/e35-...
crisortunity.bsky.social
Yes good point I stand corrected! The chart shows vehicles which threw me
crisortunity.bsky.social
Just one pedestrian killed by a pedal cyclist in the UK in 2024. 265 killed by cars www.gov.uk/government/s...
Who kills who chart showing most road fatalities are killed by cars. Most car casualty  fatalities don’t involve another vehicle
Reposted by Leo Murray
biggerthanfrogs.bsky.social
"Investing in Gatwick expansion is a choice. It is a choice to prioritise frequent flyers over repairing the UK’s broken transport system, strengthening the NHS, or investing in climate resilience. More flights mean more emissions, worsening climate change for everyone."
kevinclimate.bsky.social
Sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) plays the same role in aviation as CCS/BECCS/DACCS play for other fossil-fuelled sectors: more a stalling tactic than solution. Good engineers work on SAF, but CEOs/politicians/etc deliberately mis-sell their role in mitigation.
climateuncensored.com/gatwick-expa...
Gatwick Expansion: A Direct Assault on Climate Commitments - Climate Uncensored
Comment on UK Government announcement of Gatwick Airport expansion by Professor Kevin Anderson and Dr. Lois Pennington, of Tyndall Centre, University of
climateuncensored.com
Reposted by Leo Murray
billmckibben.bsky.social
Pope Leo--weirdly normal Midwesterner--gave a key climate speech yesterday that couldn't have been more different from Trump's disturbing and dangerous harangue of the generals
billmckibben.substack.com/p/a-differen...
A different kind of leader gives a different kind of speech
An afternoon with the Pope
billmckibben.substack.com