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This town is the first in America to ban new gas stations – is the tide turning?
theguardian.com ^ | August 7, 2021 | Dominic Rushe

Posted on 08/18/2021 6:00:37 AM PDT by lowbridge

Emily Bit remembers a time when she didn’t feel the constant threat of climate change. Her family lives in American Canyon, in southern Napa county, California, a state now being hit by record high temperatures and devastating wildfires. “It didn’t used to be this bad,” she said.

These days her family has to evacuate their home every summer. Two of her friends lost their homes in Paradise, the town consumed by the 2018 Camp fire disaster, the deadliest in California history. Last year, a wildfire burned the nature reserve behind her local school until it was “entirely black. It was like something from a dystopian novel”.

She worries about her younger siblings, a 12-year-old sister and an eight-year-old brother. “What’s it going to be like in the future?” she asks. She wonders how responsible it would be for her to have children. Bit is 17.

Now, she and fellow student activists are working to break one big link in the fossil fuel chain that is driving climate change: gas stations. There are two proposed new gas stations in her town she wants scrapped. “We don’t need them,” she said.

It’s early days but here in California the initiative is taking off and, if it spreads, it could signal one of the biggest changes in transportation since the car displaced the horse and carriage.

In March, Petaluma in Sonoma county became the first city in the US to ban future gas station construction or any new pumps on existing sites. In July Sonoma county’s Regional Climate Protection Authority voted to explore ways to support the nine cities in the county considering bans of their own. A final vote on the resolution is scheduled for September.

(Excerpt) Read more at theguardian.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; News/Current Events; US: California
KEYWORDS: california; climate; gas; napavalley; waronoil
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1 posted on 08/18/2021 6:00:37 AM PDT by lowbridge
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To: lowbridge

Isn’t it awesome to be 17 and have all the answers? What’s even more awesome is to be a “journalist” and be able to share that expertise.


2 posted on 08/18/2021 6:03:22 AM PDT by lp boonie (Good judgment comes from experience, and a lot of that comes from bad judgment)
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To: lowbridge

Does Emily also insist that the buggy drivers have proper pooper scooper shovels?


3 posted on 08/18/2021 6:05:05 AM PDT by hardspunned (former GOP globalist stooge)
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To: lowbridge

It didn’t used to be this bad. Of course it was. Where do you think the present forests came from....previous burns. Like duh...


4 posted on 08/18/2021 6:05:14 AM PDT by Sacajaweau
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To: lowbridge
She wonders how responsible it would be for her to have children.

Very irresponsible. Go get a hysterectomy now, before it's too late...................

5 posted on 08/18/2021 6:05:15 AM PDT by Red Badger (Homeless veterans camp in the streets while illegal aliens are put up in hotels.....................)
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To: lowbridge

Such a standard leftist narrative style. Take manufactured emotion, build in fear and hope, sprinkle with a couple manipulated “facts,” and call it reportage.


6 posted on 08/18/2021 6:06:32 AM PDT by PGR88
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To: lowbridge

It is not ‘man made climate change” causing the problems described, it is mismanagement by Democrats that is creating the problems.


7 posted on 08/18/2021 6:06:42 AM PDT by CIB-173RDABN (I am not an expert in anything, and my opinion is just that, an opinion. I may be wrong.)
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To: lowbridge

Has anyone told her about how her state government is the number one reason those fires get out of control so quickly?


8 posted on 08/18/2021 6:07:48 AM PDT by cableguymn (We need a redneck in the white house.... But the fact checkers said the story was false!)
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To: lowbridge
“It didn't used to be this bad,”

Since when? The 1960’s, 70’s, 80’s.

California has been burning almost every year for thousands of years. First of all stop building communities in the middle of the forest with trees 5’ from your house.
Clear the brush around your home.
Clear the dead and dying timber from the forests.
Move to a place that is not susceptible to drought conditions on an annual basis. The natives that lived in California hundreds of years ago knew that fires sometimes burned everything all the way down to the ocean.

9 posted on 08/18/2021 6:08:26 AM PDT by woodbutcher1963
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To: lowbridge

Since they don’t want gas stations, then ban all motorized vehicles. Stop delivering food there.


10 posted on 08/18/2021 6:08:59 AM PDT by CodeToad
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To: lowbridge

Great idea. Now I can either wait in line with my engine idling at the remaining gas stations or drive to the next town. Yeah, gas savings!</s>


11 posted on 08/18/2021 6:09:15 AM PDT by KarlInOhio ("Anti-fascist" is from the official name of the Berlin Wall: Anti-fascist Protection Barrier.)
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To: lowbridge

Morons. And cut them off from anything that uses oil/fossil fuels.


12 posted on 08/18/2021 6:09:16 AM PDT by Vision (Elections are one day. Reject "Chicago" vote harvesting. Election Reform Now. Obama is an evildoer.)
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To: lowbridge

This insanity can be fixed with 1 new law. Give parents/family members an educational tax credit for education.

This simple rule change would change the complexion of public schools overnight. Gone would be the NEA, State and local teachers unions. Everyone wins. Except the parasites in the dues dependent Marxist labor and professional unions.


13 posted on 08/18/2021 6:10:26 AM PDT by bigfootbob
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To: lowbridge
Are you walking to school, Emily?

Oh, and don't ask to borrow the family car on Saturday night either.

And, finally, I don't want any of your boyfriends or girlfriends driving one of those evil gas-burning vehicles to pick you up for your dates ...

14 posted on 08/18/2021 6:13:04 AM PDT by BlueLancer (Orchides Forum Trahite - Cordes Et Mentes Veniant)
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To: lowbridge

It is probably legal for the town to ban new gas stations. It is unquestionably illegal for the town to ban new gas pumps on existing stations. That’s tortious interference. Plain and simple.


15 posted on 08/18/2021 6:14:40 AM PDT by Attention Surplus Disorder (Apoplectic is where we want them)
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To: lowbridge
These towns in California need grass and wood-fired steam-powered vehicles. Hybrid steam engines as well.

Start harvesting brush and putting it to good use instead of the forest mismanagement they've had for decades that has led to giant tinderboxes across the entire state.

One example of a new steam engine design:
http://cyclonepower.com/how-it-works-2/

16 posted on 08/18/2021 6:16:36 AM PDT by T.B. Yoits
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To: lowbridge

Is the tide turning? No - as these towns depopulate of useful idiot leftists they’ll be replaced by Afghan refugees and the Afghanis will want proper gas-powered cars.


17 posted on 08/18/2021 6:17:17 AM PDT by No_Mas_Obama
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To: lowbridge

California. Doomed anyway.


18 posted on 08/18/2021 6:18:43 AM PDT by Salman (It's not a "slippery slope" if it was part of the program all along. )
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To: Attention Surplus Disorder

“It is unquestionably illegal for the town to ban new gas pumps on existing stations. “

Are referring to new replacement pumps or new additional pumps when you cite then illegality?


19 posted on 08/18/2021 6:21:31 AM PDT by billyboy15
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To: lowbridge
“It didn’t used to be this bad,” she said.

Yes, if you go by her age (born 2004?). Historically the entire west coast has experienced periodic droughts & fires predating 1950. I remember reading about early 1800s Spanish California with bad fires. Since this is the LEFTist Guardian, you know it comes with the bias. My sympathies for Ms Bit but her attitude is why I avoid California!

20 posted on 08/18/2021 6:23:59 AM PDT by SES1066 (Ask not what the LEFT can do for you, rather ask what the LEFT is doing to YOU!)
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