The only way forward on parking

Most of the correspondence about the proposed residents' parking schemes (RPSs) centres around myopic self-interest to maintain the status quo, rather than how to move forward to tackle the threat of the motor car to the environment and health. Most seem to view the environment as merely planning problems in Mistra or Baħrija, and nothing to do with the quality of life within the towns and villages of densely urbanised Malta.

In organised countries, including nearby Italy, RPSs and pedestrianisation of town and village cores has been ongoing for decades. Cities like London, with especially big traffic problems, have expensive parking meters for non-residents and annual street parking fees for residents. Here in Malta motorists expect to park anywhere for free, and garage owners also own the street in front of them rent-free (how's that for discriminiation?)

People get hot under the collar because the Transport Authority has done little to curb vehicle exhaust emissions but want to keep driving around and parking wherever it suits them. London's administration is being chased by EU health authorities to cut its high air nitrous oxide level, because this is now reckoned to be the main cause of the sharp increase in asthma of recent decades, and is of vehicle exhaust origin. Malta may soon be under similar pressure to improve its urban air quality.

We have now reached a stage where the threat posed by the car to the urban environment needs to be tackled as a matter of urgency - not moving forward, as others have done, means we're sliding backwards. The only solution is RPSs and pedestrianisation of town and village cores, and the establishment of car parks for visitors. This works in Mdina, and for hundreds of motorists who leave their car at the Floriana car park and walk into Valletta every day. It would have to work for Sliema and other towns and villages.