Italy Considers Car Ban To Deal With Smog, No Pizza Either

Chris Tonn
by Chris Tonn

Milan has banned cars in the city limits for six hours each day for the next three days, and Rome has limited car access via odd/even restrictions, all to reduce smog in those cities. This might sound familiar, as Paris did the same thing for a day this past summer as an experiment, and Beijing and Delhi have been banning cars this month too.

Cars aren’t the only scapegoat, however. According to the BBC, a town has banned wood-fired pizza ovens that aren’t equipped with a particulate filter.

(I’m waiting for the bombshell: Papa John’s gets hit by massive fine after emissions defeat device is discovered on a pizza oven.)

The Italian cities have been hit by high smog levels for weeks, as unusually dry weather has plagued much of the country. Discounted all-day public transportation passes are offered in lieu of cars.

As the Milan ban only is in effect between 10 a.m. and 4 p.m., outside normal commuting hours, it is unclear what effect the restrictions will have on smog levels.

On our side of the pond, no major metropolitan area has outright banned cars due to increased pollution. But if the ban seems to be traveling the Silk Road so quickly, it’s possible that ours is in the mail.

Chris Tonn
Chris Tonn

Some enthusiasts say they were born with gasoline in their veins. Chris Tonn, on the other hand, had rust flakes in his eyes nearly since birth. Living in salty Ohio and being hopelessly addicted to vintage British and Japanese steel will do that to you. His work has appeared in eBay Motors, Hagerty, The Truth About Cars, Reader's Digest, AutoGuide, Family Handyman, and Jalopnik. He is a member of the Midwest Automotive Media Association, and he's currently looking for the safety glasses he just set down somewhere.

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  • NickS NickS on Dec 29, 2015

    Paris was fairly hazy in stifling heat in August and Milan smelled of heavy city smog at Christmas when it was overcast cold and alternating between rain and snow. London, and Athens were quite bad too and many smaller European cities I've been to didn't fare much better. Granted it's my personal experience only but I don't usually complain about bad air. The only other time I have breathing difficulty is driving through the central valley (calif). The air quality in that region is just nasty. Yet, in places like Paris and Milan there are lots of distractions to get your mind off the air you are breathing.

  • Art Vandelay Art Vandelay on Dec 29, 2015

    Obviously the US is more polluted as a direct result of the Chicken Tax. If only we had a bunch of global midsize diesel pickups to filter our air it would be clean.

  • Shaker Shaker on Dec 29, 2015

    If 'Vitriol' were considered a pollutant, this thread would probably exceed all known health standards :-) GOD REST YE MERRY GENTLEMEN The pollution problem can be solved, but collective will, solid science, and adjustments to the "business as usual" mindset are required. Which means, it will take crisis after crisis to hammer the point home, and many will suffer in the interim. Ironically, "planning" seems to be an anathema to human existence these days, even to Communists. Money (meaning, I've got MINE, to Hell with everyone else) isn't the root of all evil in the immediate sense, but the pursuit of wealth and material goods seems to have an eventual outcome that resembles evil, no? Ex: My desire for 'artisan' pizza causing respiratory distress for the less-pulmonary endowed among us? Tsk tsk tsk... Hopefully, the New Year will bring clearer thinking for those of us who have it pretty damn good.

    • See 1 previous
    • Shaker Shaker on Dec 30, 2015

      @RideHeight Any "harm" is purely unintentional ;-) HNY to you as well!

  • VolandoBajo VolandoBajo on Jan 06, 2016

    Where did the the poster (I won't call him one of the B&B) who swore that US cities such as LA were much more polluted than those in the EU go? These stories of the current state of smog in the EU end up looking like LA did over a half a century ago, before the Clean Air Act took effect. So once again, no the US is not more polluted than Europe, it is the other way around. As can clearly be seen by the EU's needing to ban cars from its major cities.

    • RobertRyan RobertRyan on Jan 06, 2016

      @VolandroBajo, If Milan or Rome were as polluted as Los Angeles is now , ALL petroleum based vehicles would be banned. At least you can see the Hills of Rome quite clearly any time of the day. Not the case in LA, where the Hills disappear into the smog.

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