New analysis shows supporting LTNs does not lead to London councilors losing seats
New analysis commissioned by us and conducted by the Active Travel Academy at Westminster University has found that London councillors representing areas with Low Traffic Neighbourhoods (LTNs) who tweeted about LTNs were no more or less likely to hold their seat in the 2022 local elections than those who did not tweet about LTNs.
Research conducted on LTNs in London suggests the schemes are associated with positive outcomes such as lower car ownership, reduced traffic volume, increased walking and cycling levels, lower levels of air pollution, reduced street crime, and reduced road traffic injuries. However, the online and wider debate about LTNs is highly polarised and opponents to LTNs are often very vocal about their opposition.
Perhaps because of this, this analysis found that most incumbent councillors chose not to tweet at all about LTNs prior to the 2022 local elections, likely owing to fear that taking any public position on LTNs could reduce their chances of being re-elected.
This report confirms that councillors who tweeted about LTNs were no more or less likely to hold their seat than councillors who did not tweet about LTNs at all in the 2022 local elections. It suggests that LTNs are not the election-defining issue they are sometimes assumed or portrayed to be. Though there is increasingly polarised Twitter dialogue, it may not always reflect what the wider public thinks. In fact, the Department of Transport found 61 per cent of respondents would support LTNs in their local area with only 29 per cent opposed to LTNs.
In reality, low-traffic neighbourhoods aren’t the election-defining culture war their detractors wish that they were.
In the run-up to the 2022 local elections, there was much media discussion around possible effects of councillors’ support for LTNs, with varying expectations that it could be electorally negative, positive, or neutral. This report finds no statistically-significant evidence of a negative effect for councillors who supported LTNs ahead of the 2022 elections. In fact, evidence suggests that compared to current Conservative councillors, positive sentiment towards LTNs was linked to increased support for Labour councillors at the ballot box between 2018 and 2022.
The report also finds a divide between the main parties on attitudes towards LTNs:
Conservative councillors were generally negative in their public stance on LTNs, with not a single Conservative councillor in the study tweeting positively about LTNs in the run-up to the 2022 elections, despite LTNs being funded by the national Conservative government.
Labour councillors were much more positive about LTNs.
There was a statistically significant difference in the relationship between sentiment of any tweets about LTNs and the change in relative vote shares amongst Labour and Conservative councillors.
In comparison to Conservative councillors, the more positive a Labour councillor was about LTNs, the more positive the effect on the change in their relative number of votes between 2018 and 2022.
Labour councillors saw a positive change in the relative number of votes they received when tweeting moderately more positively about LTNs, the analysis found.
Conservative councillors appeared to see a small gain in vote share for being more hostile, or less neutral, towards LTNs on Twitter - although in both cases the effect was too small to impact on winning or losing seats in the election.
This groundbreaking new analysis should give politicians everywhere the courage to speak up for low-traffic neighbourhoods, safe in the knowledge that they won’t be punished at the ballot box for championing calmer streets.