By 10:15am on Wednesday last week, Enrique Pelagio had parked his truck in the chic Madrid neighborhood of Chueca and was stacking the trolley that would bring the local cafes, bars and restaurants their daily bread and pastries.
Across the road was the van from the fruit and vegetables shop, while near the craft beer place sat a red delivery truck from the ubiquitous Mahou brewery.
This mini-murmuration of goods vehicles takes place throughout the capital several times a day, every day.
Illustration: Mountain People
However, change is afoot. On Friday last week, Madrid’s latest anti-pollution measure came into force: A ban on polluting vehicles in the city center.
The plan, known as Madrid Central, establishes a low-emissions zone that covers 472 hectares. All gasoline vehicles registered before 2000 and diesel ones registered before 2006 are banned from the area, unless they are used by residents of the area or meet other exemptions. The goal is to cut nitrogen dioxide levels by 23 percent in 2020 and put people — rather than the internal combustion engine — at the heart of transport policy.
There have been similar moves in other major cities: At the end of 2016, the mayors of Paris, Athens and Mexico City joined Madrid in announcing plans to take diesel cars and vans off their roads by 2025, and in May Hamburg became the first German city to ban some older diesel vehicles from two of its main roads.
Meanwhile, Oslo, which had planned on making its city center car-free, is now embarked on a drive to ensure it has the “fewest possible vehicles.”
In January last year, Paris launched a color-coded sticker scheme to ban all diesel cars registered between 1997 and 2000 between 8am and 8pm.
However, Madrid’s proposal is bolder still: The only vehicles allowed to drive freely around the downtown area will be those that produce zero emissions.
As he stacked his trolley, Pelagio was more sanguine about the new rules than many of his colleagues, who said they cannot afford to upgrade to cleaner vehicles.
“It’s the only way forward,” he said. Besides, with fewer older cars and trucks, “there’ll be more space.”
There is some access under strict rules. Hybrids and liquefied petroleum gas vehicles are allowed into the area to park for a maximum of two hours, and more modern diesel and gasoline vehicles are allowed in to park in public carparks or private garages.
Truck drivers such as Pelagio, meanwhile, are subject to a timetable: The oldest, most polluting trucks are only admitted from 7am to 1pm, while more modern ones would see that window extended until 9pm.
The left-wing city council of Madrid Mayor Manuela Carmena has argued that the initiative is as much about public health as public transport.
“Air quality has been breaching acceptable levels for 10 years and people in the city are being exposed to air that has clear effects on their health, especially those who are most vulnerable, such as children and older people,” said Ines Sabanes, councilor for the environment and mobility.
“There’s research that shows clear links between pollution peaks and hospital admissions. It has a very clear effect on health — on the number of deaths and premature births,” Sabanes said.
The mayor’s conservative opponents have tried to thwart the plan, arguing that it has not been executed correctly or been properly thought out.
Others have their own reasons. Antonio Villaverde, president of the Association of Self-employed Truck Drivers, said that while his members are in favor of addressing Madrid’s pollution problem, they simply do not have the money to buy new vehicles.
“We’ll need to replace 90 percent of our vehicles in Madrid over the course of just five years,” he said. “Even if we wanted to, it’s practically impossible. The problem with all this is that the sector is still using very old vehicles because of the economic crisis.”
Villaverde said the reduced delivery hours could have serious consequences.
“If this goes ahead, I think two things will happen: there will be forced supply shortages in the city, because we won’t be able to deliver,” he said. “And a lot of us will have to close our small businesses, because we won’t be able to buy new trucks.”
Sabanes disagreed with the gloomier predictions. Of the 2 million or so daily journeys made to the city center, 1.2 million are already made on public transport, 550,000 on foot and only 230,000 by car.
“There’s a narrative around that the center of Madrid is being shut down,” she said. “But that’s not true. Truck drivers, residents and their guests can enter the center.”
Gasoline and diesel taxis, as well as private hire vehicles, are allowed into the zone until the end of 2022. The authorities will not start imposing fines on people who break the rules until March.
Sabanes also rejected suggestions that Madrid Central is drastic. “I don’t think it’s among the strictest measures,” she said. “There are different models, such as charging a lot to enter the center of a city, or legal bans on driving in certain areas, like in Berlin. Madrid has gone for a mixed model, which will allow for a gradual implementation as we set about achieving our goals.”
She likened it to the smoking ban that came in seven years ago: Despite the initial dark mutterings, people quickly adjusted to the new norms.
There was also grumbling in some quarters 35 years ago when Madrid banned cars from its most famous park, El Retiro.
If there is opposition, it is not coming from neighborhood groups, environmental campaigners or health professionals, she said. “They’re all saying that’s it’s already overdue and needs to happen now.”
Paco Segura, coordinator of environmental group Ecologists in Action, could not agree more.
For years, successive Madrid councils have been in denial over the scale of the city’s pollution problem, he said.
“We’ve filed dozens of complaints and put out a ton of reports with official figures that show that, year after year, we’re going above the legal limits,” he said. “Our main criticism of this plan is that it’s come so late. Studies show that this is responsible for the premature deaths of about 3,000 people a year. Not acting as quickly as possible would be totally immoral.”
As far as the city council is concerned, Madrid Central is not a war on cars, but rather a challenge to their dominance and a push toward better co-existence between vehicles and pedestrians.
It is also about geography and social equality.
Jose Manuel Calvo, the city council’s representative for sustainable urban development, said the plan would help to decentralize Madrid and ensure a fairer distribution of wealth and resources.
“We needs to redress the balance so that there isn’t such a high concentration of activity in the center compared with peripheral areas,” he said.
Calvo said that ways can be found to cut pollution while still preserving life in the center of Madrid so that it remains a place where people can live, work, eat, drink and shop, and which tourists want to visit.
He pointed to the “last mile” distribution models being developed in other cities, whereby goods are delivered to warehouses close to the center of town and ferried to customers in sustainable vehicles including bicycles.
One day, the Spanish capital would more closely resemble the northwestern city of Pontevedra, which banned all but essential traffic in its center almost 20 years ago, Calvo said.
“It would be on another scale, but it’s possible. With Madrid Central, the whole of the center will become a shared space, with reduced speed limits and more pavement. Gradually, vehicles will come to realize that they’re not the ones in charge,” he said.
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