Transport Strategy

Ireland's New Transport Strategy: Ambitious Vision, Cautious Action

The Irish government has published its Moving Together transport strategy, focusing on systems change using a collaborative approach alongside its Sustainable Mobility Policy Action Plan. It sounds promising. Is it?

Key Takeaways

• The strategy does not include a prescriptive set of top-down actions, claiming such an approach will not work.
• Instead, the strategy provides a framework for delivering systemic change by identifying all the policies and programmes that can contribute to that change and enabling actors across the system.
• There is an existing target to cut transport emissions by 50% by 2030. To achieve this target, the government is prioritising a large-scale transition to Electric Vehicles (EVs), greater penetration of biofuels and increased modal shift.
• The vision: to sustainably connect people and places, with a transport system that is efficient, accessible, safe, and healthy for all.
• There are six focus areas:
  • Integrated Land Use and Transport Planning
  • Optimal Use of Space
  • Fiscal Measures
  • Generators of Demand (Movement of People)
  • Generators of Demand (Movement of Goods)
  • Captive Car Users
• Communications and engagement with the public to explain the need for systems change and encouraging behaviour change are a core part of the strategy.
• The communications messaging is switching from "Save the planet, get off the roads" to "Improving my health and lifestyle in my city."
• Recommendations:
  • Strengthened implementation of demand management across the national planning system
  • Embedding the polluter pays principle in taxation policy over the medium to long term
  • Empowering and supporting local authorities
  • Driving efficiency in the freight sector
  • Strengthening supply-side measures to complement demand management
  • Providing enabling legislation to support appropriate measures
  • Embedding demand management principles and practices across the public sector
  • Engaging with the education and sports sectors to embed demand management principles and practices
  • Engaging with the business sector to embed demand management principles and practices
  • Supporting public engagement and consumer awareness
  • Building the evidence base to inform policy choices and demonstrate success
• To monitor and evaluate the strategy's progress, they propose to incorporate a wellbeing approach.
• The action plan outlines measures to improve infrastructure and services for sustainable transport, such as public transport upgrades and new cycling infrastructure.

Comment

The strategy outlines the things that need to be done to undertake transport system transformation, and the action plan supports it by improving alternatives to the car.

But ultimately it can be characterised as a strategy that does not want to make the difficult decisions, so either kicks the can down the road through 'strengthening, embedding, supporting or engaging' or wants someone else to make the difficult choices and hides it under the guise of needing to be 'collaborative'.

Road pricing is a good example. Is there a commitment to implement? No, just a review into the taxation of transport. Local governments can implement road congestion charges if they want to.

What Next?

Does your transport strategy have the necessary actions to deliver results?

Transport Planning

Roads Less Travelled: The Case for Traffic Evaporation

When we build more roads and add more lanes, more people drive, but does the reverse hold true? This 2023 report from the German Institute for Urban Affairs examined what happens when road space for cars is removed. I have only just come across the report.

Key Takeaways

• A frequently cited argument is that the traffic calming measures do not reduce traffic but instead place an additional burden on the adjacent road network.
• Thirty traffic calming measures were evaluated and categorised into widespread traffic calming measures (Redesign of individual neighbourhoods and redesign of entire city centres) and linear traffic calming measures (Redesign of individual shopping streets and redesigns of main access roads or bicycle streets).
• Almost all surveys confirm the phenomenon of "traffic evaporation". Traffic volume does not simply appear elsewhere; rather, it decreases overall.
• The magnitude of evaporation ranges from 15 to 28%in area-wide traffic calming projects, from 25 to 69% in city centres, and from 4 to 52% in the vicinity of individual redesigned streets.
• Figures vary depending on the project and the context.
• Although measurements do show some shift of traffic to adjacent streets, these effects are usually moderate.
• The positive effects of reducing traffic congestion increase over time. For example, in low-traffic neighbourhoods, more people are walking or cycling and sometimes decide to forgo using a car altogether after one or two years.
• The effect can be explained by a change in traffic behaviour: the more attractive pedestrian and cycle paths are, the more frequently people use them.
• Besides a change in mode of transport, other adaptation strategies also contribute to the effect: people choose different destinations, forgo less important trips, or take different routes.
• If the availability of accessible destinations in the local area and the conditions for walking and cycling are improved, more people will walk and cycle, and the flow of car traffic will likely improve because there will be fewer cars on the road overall.

Comment

I remember the first time that I heard about traffic evaporation - I didn't believe it. But then I started looking at the evidence and why it happens.

Historically, we often thought about the amount of car use as a constant we needed to accommodate with road space. We now know that's not true. We should be doing more schemes that lead to traffic evaporation.

What Next?

Do you have a pipeline of traffic-calming schemes that are held back by fear of increased congestion?

Transport Policy

Car Insurance: Reform For Safer Roads?

I have written frequently about how we need to improve demand management in our transport system. This recent article discussed the benefits of pay-per-mile car insurance for the State of New York and referenced this paper by Todd Litman.

Key Takeaways

• Car insurers currently set premiums that don't change, regardless of whether policyholders drive 10 miles a year or 10,000 miles — even though the 10,000-mile motorist clearly poses a much larger risk.
• People are not charged based on how much they drive, so that leads people to drive more, and so insurance costs are more than they would necessarily be if you charged them per mile.
• The policy could cut driving — and therefore the likelihood of crashes — by as much as 30 per cent among high-risk motorists.
• The current insurance system is a huge cost subsidy from lower-risk drivers to higher-risk drivers.
• Pay-as-you-drive insurance saves money because drivers' premiums are based on how much they drive, putting a direct price tag on the risk of driving.
• The policy could reduce insurance company profits.
• Litman estimates that these policies would reduce vehicle travel by more than 10% across the board and by 20-30% among the highest-risk motorists, since their steeper premiums would discourage driving even more.
• The Brookings Institution found that pay-per-mile would save roughly $400 per car in today's money and cut miles driven by 8%.
• Some companies offer plans with a discount for motorists who drive below a set mileage each year; however, those are not as effective at changing driving behaviour as lowering premiums for each mile not driven.

Comment

Whilst I like the idea of pay-per-mile car insurance to manage demand, the reason it is not commonplace is the political challenge - around half the public would lose immediately, not to mention scare campaigns from insurance companies if their profits are hit.

However, I think there is a deal to be done if pay-per-mile is opt-in and is rolled out in a staged process, say 10% of drivers per year. Very quickly, those who benefit will opt in. A staggered approach would allow insurers to adjust premiums, and people who do not opt in will see insurance rates increase more slowly.

What Next?

Is pay-per-mile car insurance worth looking at in your jurisdiction?

Quick Adventures in Transport Wonderland

Here is what else I came across this week:

• ​Unveiling barriers and motivations to cycling across different stages of change.​
• ​Integrating machine learning and global sensitivity analysis for human-centered pedestrian path design​
• ​Policy ambition vs. capability: reviewing the UK’s readiness for safe deployment of connected and automated vehicles​

Tool

Benefits of Closing Gaps in Active Transport Networks

​This guide explains how to estimate the benefits of closing gaps in active transport networks.

Innovation

Could Our Faces Be Used As Tickets?

​This article describes a trial in Santiago using faces as bus tickets.