I am standing in the middle of a busy street in the polluted centre of London – about as far away from the countryside than you can imagine.
But here the parking spaces of this upmarket residential area are packed full of gas-guzzling 4x4s designed to drive through rivers, muddy fields and tackle mountains.
Labelled Chelsea tractors by critics, it turns out the name rings true.
The highest concentration of sport utility vehicles (SUVs) can be found here in Chelsea and neighbouring areas of London, a new study has found.
And after spending just five minutes here, it appears the only workload these two-ton trucks are getting is the weekly shop at Waitrose, while clogging up the streets with their big engines pumping out pollution.
Three quarters of all SUVs sold in the UK are registered to people living in urban areas with the London boroughs of Kensington and Chelsea, Hammersmith and Fulham, and Westminster topping the list.
These unnecessarily large, energy-hungry vehicles produce around 25% more carbon dioxide emissions, a potent greenhouse gas, than a medium-sized car.
Globally, rising sales of SUVs are the second biggest cause of increasing carbon emissions after power generation, but ahead of aviation and heavy industry, analysis commissioned by think tank The New Weather Institute and climate charity Possible found.
Study co-author Andrew Simms, said: “One of advertising’s biggest manipulations has persuaded urban families that it’s perfectly normal to go shopping in a two-ton truck.
“They’ve spun the Chelsea tractor factor into behaviour change, but the human health and climate damage done by SUVs is huge and needs to be undone.
“Just as tobacco advertising has successfully ended, it’s time to stop promoting polluting SUVs.”
Britain’s streets are being ruined by heavy, dirty, dangerous SUVs.
Air pollution, largely from motor traffic, kills between 28,000 and 36,000 people a year in the UK.
No one needs a two-ton truck to do the weekly shop or pick up the kids from school.
