Cars For Low Income Families
Workers who charge less than 8,000 euros a year may travel through Barcelona with polluting vehicles for another year. The ordinance that prepares the City Council to regulate the low emission areas , which will enter into force on January 1, provides exemptions for people who prove income below the Public Indicator of Multiple Effects Income (IPREM) and who need their vehicle to Work and move around the ZBE.
This exception has been an ERC proposal that is included in the text of the ordinance that today approves the Commission of Ecology and Urbanism and will be voted on December 20. The Councilor for Climate Emergency, Eloi Badia, estimates that this distinction will affect some 2,000 cars.The session provides penalties of 100, 200 and 500 euros depending on whether the offense is mild, serious or very serious. After 90 minutes, the offending driver can be sanctioned again if he is caught by the cameras.
The ordinance has received 1,815 allegations from 130 natural or legal persons . The session has accepted 45% of the allegations and has been included in the text. With these changes, a series of vehicles have been agreed that will be exempt from carrying the environmental label and that may sporadically enter the city such as transport trucks, concrete mixers and public transport.Vehicles driven by people with reduced mobility and people who must undergo medical treatment will also have special treatment. These drivers must register with the City Council.With this ordinance, Barcelona plans to limit the entry of 50,000 polluting cars into the city. The rule will affect Badia, Councilor for Climate Emergency, which has a highly polluting van and promised that it would be sold shortly.
The low emission zone enters into force on January 1, 2020 and will be applied from cars for people in need 7 to 20 hours on business days. The area affects Barcelona and part of the Hospitalet de Llogregat, Cornellà, Esplugues and Sant Adrià del Besòs. Vehicles that do not have the environmental mark of the DGT cannot circulate.
The ZBE affects petrol cars registered before January 2000 and diesel before 2006. It also restricts the passage to vans registered before October 1, 1994. Carriers have a year of moratorium to adapt to the regulations. Finally, motorcycles, mopeds and quadricycles registered before 2003 cannot enter Barcelona either.
Comcast is expanding its services to help more low-income people access the internet without paying regular prices. In a new measure to close the so-called “digital divide,” the company announced that it will significantly expand its low-cost Internet access program, known as to include all households that meet certain requirements in its service area. , making almost any low-income client eligible.
According to data from the United States Census, households living in cities with the highest poverty rates are up to ten times more likely to not have access to compared to households in the most affluent cities. That seems to be the mission behind this Comcast program. The expansion, part of the company's Internet Essentials program, will allow thousands of new homes to get Internet connectivity with download speeds of 15Mbps, for only $ 9.95 per month, priced at $ 40 lower than what that usually costs service.
Before August 6, there were only five ways to qualify. Parents of children in the National School Lunch Program were eligible, as were students of community colleges in Colorado or Illinois. Low-income veterans, seniors and HUD housing beneficiaries may also submit an application.
Now, this new expansion is the most important change in the history of the program, and the company estimates that more than three million additional low-income households may qualify to apply, including homes with people with disabilities. Comcast notes that almost seven million homes now have low-cost Internet access, which literally doubles the total number of previously eligible households.