Transaid: Emergency Transport in Northern Nigeria

Transaid is an international development organisation that seeks to reduce poverty and improve lives in Africa through creating better transport. Here is a partnership transport project they are working on in Northern Nigeria.
-- Sustainable development and social justice? Think Africa! --

Transaid has been working as part of the PRRINN project in Northern Nigeria to help improve immunisation coverage for women and children in the states of Yobe, Jigawa, Katsina and Zamfara.

Transaid’s role has been to advise on appropriate management of the Ministry of Health’s transport to ensure adequate healthcare reaches those most in need. This project has now been expanded in three of the four states to cover all primary healthcare for mother’s, newborn babies and children (MNCH) extending the reach and impact of Transaid’s vital work.

The Problem
In this part of Northern Nigeria, less than 6% of children are fully immunised against life-threatening diseases and rates of newborn, maternal and child mortality are some of the highest in the world. Over 500,000 women die in pregnancy every year. A woman in sub-saharan Africa has a 1 in 13 chance of dying in pregnancy or childbirth, compared to a 1 in 4,000 risk in the industrialised world*.

The millennium development goals which have been put in place to reduce extreme poverty aim to reduce child mortality by two thirds, maternal mortality by three quarters and to achieve universal access to reproductive health by 2015. Efficient and effective transport has a key role to play in the delivery of health services and is a vital link to enabling these goals to be realised.
*Statistic taken from 'Maternal Mortality: Africa's Burden. A Toolkit on Gender, Transport and Maternal Mortality', vs4-04-2005

The Process
Transaid is providing technical assistance in relation to the transport elements of the project. Through the initial PRRINN project we have already begun to implement a transport management system to help improve health service delivery. We are also working with project partners and the government at state level to establish solutions to the problem of accessing health facilities in emergency pregnancy cases.

Plans are being developed for an emergency transport system to be put in place using members of the National Union of Road Transport Workers NURTW) to take patients for a small fee. This has already proven to be successful following a pilot in Jigawa state. We are also looking at the viability of other low-cost modes of transport such as the motorcycle and bicycle ambulance to improve access to emergency healthcare in hard to reach areas.

Partners
The PRRINN-MNCH consortium led by Health Partners International, Save the Children and Grid Consulting, the State Ministry of Health in Katsina, Yobe and Zamfara. (Jigawa state is not included in the MNCH project)

The Results
The overall aims of the whole project are to improve antenatal care for women and the number of births attended by skilled medical personnel. The project also aims to increase immunisation levels so that 60% of children under one year old are fully immunised by 2012, decreasing the number of cases of life-threatening illnesses such as measles. It is hoped that health centres will serve 50% more women and children through better functioning and rehabilitated systems (including transport). The increase in trained staff at health centres and hospitals will also ensure greater accountability and responsiveness to patients and a more joined up approach to management at all levels.

Impact
The new PRRINN-MNCH project will improve the quality and availability of all maternal and child health services including antenatal and postnatal care, safer deliveries, care for newborn and young children, better nutrition and increased routine immunisation. Using Transaid’s transport management system vehicles will also be better managed and scheduled, increasing vehicle availability for emergency pregnancy transfers.




More:
(If you want to know more about Transaid’s work in Nigeria please follow this link: http://www.transaid.org/projects/nigeria,-increasing-access-to-healthcare-for-mothers-and-children,-prrinn---mnch-update-%E2%80%93-april-2009

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Bringing World Streets to China: A collaborative effort

World Streets is strongly committed to working with all those concerned in China to advancing the sustainable transportation agenda in their cities and surrounding regions. What a wonderful challenge for international collaboration and exchange on our topic, and it strikes us that this is an excellent occasion to initiate and deepen this collaboration. An important event can lead the way. Let's look at this together.

First steps:

The 60th anniversary of the founding of the People's Republic of China falls on Oct. 1, barely two weeks away. World Streets wants to be there to celebrate this important event and to become a useful partner for sustainable transportation and sustainable cities in China for the many years ahead.

For various technical reasons, World Streets is not able at present to share our information and leads with our Chinese colleagues. So, to find our way into this new partnership out first step was to start by asking a few of our mainland Chinese friends by email, phone and Skype what they think. This we did and this is what they have told us:

For various internal reasons they told us some internet connections on the mainland are currently being filtered. Which means that it can happen that people in universities, home, internet cafes, and even government agencies are unable at present to access http://WorldStreets.org/.

This situation is not going to last forever; however, if we wish to be a good source of information and inspiration for our Chinese colleagues, we need to work our way around this.

Now there are work-arounds for this, namely sites ARE accessible via proxy sites or for those with access to VPNs (virtual private networks), but essentially this means either a few extra steps are needed to access the information. While this is useful for some for now, it is (a) only available to 'net-savvy surfers. More than that however it is (b) a "back-door approach" which is hardly appropriate to the real, broad and deep collaboration and exchange that is appropriate in the face of the challenges ahead..



Intermediate adaptation:

Now that we have a feel for what is going on, our next step has been to take a template from our New Mobility Agenda series (www.newmobility.org) and to see how we might quickly refit it to make at least a portion of our content available by other means. If you go to http://china.WorldStreets.org/ you will see how this looks so far.

The advantage as it stands is that it gives the reader a clue and short summaries of all the articles that are housed in our archives and current editions: but unfortunately for now, not the full text. Still, we have a start.

Longer Term:

The permanent fix, we are advised, will be to approach the responsible regulatory agency, the Ministry of Information (see http://opennet.net/bulletins/011/#1), and register with them so that access to Streets will not longer be blocked. We are hopeful that some of our Chinese colleagues will work with us on this.

An option, we are advised, is to create a new .cn domain name and blog -- but we hope this is to be avoided if possible since the job of uploading the hundreds of articles and tools housed in the present site to yet a new website is a formidable and time consuming task.

World Streets in China:

In closing, we might add that the steady progress that is being made of late in the quality of machine translations to and from Chinese and English has been very impressive. Our Chinese friends tell us that this is a handy way to find out at least the gist of any given article or piece, but there is of course nothing like a fine human translation. Still . . .



Our hope will be to do much better than this and to find Chinese partners in order to do with World Streets in China what we are presently accomplishing with our first non-English sustainable transport daily, Nuova Mobilità -- http://nuovamobilita.org -- for and with our Italian colleagues and in Italian. N/M is our working model or template for what we are hoping to do in other countries and languages. Because the simple reality is that if something is to get read every day by busy planners, agencies, local government, transport operators, researchers, activists and others concerned, the odds are that if it is not in their first working language it just will not get read.

Beyond this the Italian editors not only translate, but also adapt and provide context and commentary for the Italian reader on the articles they select for publication. And that is not all. The journal also functions as a turntable for swapping ideas articles and dialogues between planners and others concerned within Italy itself.

In short, the traffic is not at all one way. These are living streets.

And there you have our hopes for World Streets in China.



[Comments, corrections and refinements as always warmly welcome, You can leave them simply by clicking the Comment tag below.]

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Curious to get an idea of the quality of the Chinese language translations? You may care to try the hardest translation test of all. Click to translate, say, this article into Chinese in Google Translate -- http://translate.google.com/translate_t# -- and then simply reverse the process and translate the Chinese text back into English. Again, this is a terrible text, but have a look and see if the machine works to the extent that you have some reasonable idea of the original. (And bear in mind please that this two-round process significantly magnifies what may be small glitches. But if you really want to know, if you are genuinely curious it can be a genuine help. At least it is to us and to a number of our bilingual Chinese colleagues.)

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Home Location , Smart Growth and Sustainable Transport: Changing Patterns

A significant key to sustainable transport resides in our land use. And what more important land use decision than where we chose to live, the place in which we start or end the lion's share of our personal travel each day? In this article our guest Todd Litman of the Victoria Transport Policy Institute sheds judicious light on claims and counter-claims of Smart Growth, as true in Delhi, Moscow or Cape Town as in North America.

Where We Want To Be:
Home Location Preferences And Their Implications For Smart Growth

Smart growth consists of more compact, accessible, multi-modal community development. This can provide numerous benefits to residents who live in such areas and society overall. Critics claim that most consumers dislike this type of community and so are harmed by public policies that encourage it. This analysis suggests otherwise.

Although market surveys indicate that most North American households preferred single-family homes, they also indicate strong and growing consumer preference for smart growth features such as accessibility and modal options (reflected as short commutes and convenient walkability to local services). Twenty years ago less than a third of households preferred smart growth, but this is projected to increase to two thirds of households within two decades.

This reflects various demographic and economic trends, including aging population, rising fuel prices, and increased health and environmental concerns. In addition, suburban lifestyles and automobile travel have become less glamorous. An increasing portion of consumers now aspire to urban lifestyles for at least part of their lifecycle, and the housing market correction in 2008 spoiled confidence in suburban real estate investments. Households are likely to be more rational and cautious in the future.

Described differently, for a few decades consumer housing and transportation decisions seemed to defy basic rules of economics. Housing location decisions seemed insensitive to transportation cost factors such as commute distance and fuel prices, resulting in dispersed housing and automobile-dependent lifestyles. Walking, cycling and public transit were dismissed as inferior and undesirable modes, even where they are efficient and cost effective. Increasing congestion, fuel prices, health and environmental concerns causes consumers to be more rational. Some embrace this opportunity while others react with fear.



This is not to suggest that automobile travel and suburban living will end. Under even aggressive smart growth policies most North Americans will continue to live in single-family houses, although a greater portion will be small-lot, attached housing such as townhouses.

However, the demand for new housing is likely to shift dramatically. The current stock of large-lot, single-family houses in exurban locations currently exceeds demand, causing prices to plummet and foreclosures to rise. At best, it will take years for such homes to regain their 2005 market value (in real, inflation-adjusted terms). More likely, consumer demand for such housing will never fully recover.

On the other hand, the market for small-lot, attached housing in accessible, multi-modal communities is strong. Such housing has maintained its value and demand is projected to increase significantly in the future due to structural demographic and economic trends. Communities and developers that respond to these market shifts can succeed. Those that continue past policies are likely to fare poorly.

This is good news overall since more compact, accessible, multi-modal housing can provide many benefits to consumers and society. It gives consumers better options and greater efficiency.

Smart growth residents benefit directly from time savings, financial savings, and increased safety and health. Society benefits from infrastructure cost savings, improved opportunity for disadvantaged populations, and improved environmental quality.

Claims that smart growth deprives consumers of preferred housing options are clearly inaccurate. Sprawl housing is now abundantly available at discounted prices, while smart growth housing is scarce in many regions, which drives up prices, making it unaffordable to the lower income households that need it most. Sprawl results, in part, from planning and market distortions that favor dispersed development and automobile travel.

There are many reasons to correct these distortions and support smart growth. Such reforms will result in land use development patterns that better reflect consumer preferences.

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* A complete report on this report is available from the VTPI at http://www.vtpi.org/sgcp.pdf (36 pp.)

Further reading:

Laurence Aurbach (2006), The Market for Mixed Use & Walkability, PedShed
(http://pedshed.net/?p=25).

Belden, Russonello and Stewart (2004) American Community Survey, National Association of Realtors (www.realtor.org) and Smart Growth America (www.smartgrowthamerica.org); at www.brspoll.com/Reports/Smart%20Growth.pdf.

David Berson, David Lereah, Paul Merski, Frank Nothaft, and David Seiders (2006), America’s Home Forecast: The Next Decade for Housing and Mortgage Finance, Homeownership Alliance (www.freddiemac.com); at www.freddiemac.com/news/pdf/americas_home_forecast.pdf.

Robert Burchell, et al (2002), The Costs of Sprawl – 2000, TCRP Report 74, TRB (www.trb.org); at http://onlinepubs.trb.org/Onlinepubs/tcrp/tcrp_rpt_74-a.pdf.

Robert Burchell, Anthony Downs, Barbara McCann and Sahan Mukherji (2005), Sprawl Costs: Economic Impacts of Unchecked Development, Island Press (www.islandpress.org).

Cambridge Systematics (2009), Moving Cooler: Transportation Strategies to Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions (www.movingcooler.info); summary at http://commerce.uli.org/misc/movingcoolerexecsum.pdf.

Gerald Carlino, Satyajit Chatterjee, and Robert Hunt (2006), Urban Density and the Rate of Invention, WP 06-14, Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia (www.philadelphiafed.org); at www.philadelphiafed.org/research-and-data/regional-economy/regionalresearch/ index.cfm?tab=3.

CDC (2005), Designing and Building Healthy Places, U.S. Center for Disease Control
(www.cdc.gov/healthyplaces).

Patrick M. Condon (2004), Canadian Cities American Cities: Our Differences Are the Same, Funders Network for Smart Growth and Livable Communities (www.fundersnetwork.org/usr_doc/Patrick_Condon_Primer.pdf).

Joe Cortright (2008), Driven to the Brink: How the Gas Price Spike Popped the Housing Bubble and Devalued the Suburbs, CEOs for Cities (www.ceosforcities.org); at
www.ceosforcities.org/files/Driven%20to%20the%20Brink%20FINAL.pdf.

Wendell Cox (2001), Smart Growth: Retarding the Quality of Life, Demographia
(www.demographia.com); at www.demographia.com/dib-smg.htm.

CTOD and CNT (2006), The Affordability Index: A New Tool for Measuring the True
Affordability of a Housing Choice, Center for Transit-Oriented Development and the Center for Neighborhood Technology (http://htaindex.cnt.org); at www.brookings.edu/metro/umi/20060127_affindex.pdf.

Decisions Data (1994), Puget Sound Housing Preference Study, Puget Sound Regional Council (www.psrc.org).

DOC (1996), Population Projections of the United States by Age, Sex, Race, and Hispanic Origin: 1995 to 2050, Department of Commerce; at www.census.gov/prod/1/pop/p25-1130.pdf.

Conor Dougherty (2009), “In the Exurbs, the American Dream Is Up for Rent,” Wall Street Journal, 31 March 2009; at http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123845433832571407.html.

Mark Eppli and Charles C. Tu (2000), Valuing the New Urbanism; The Impact of New Urbanism on Prices of Single-Family Homes, Urban Land Institute (www.uli.org).

Pierre Filion, Trudi Bunting and Keith Warriner (1999), “Entrenchment of Urban Dispersion: Residential Preferences and Location Patterns in the Dispersed City” Urban Studies, Vol. 36, pp. 1317-4

William H. Frey (2009), Big City Populations Survive the Housing Crunch, Brookings Institution (www.brookings.edu); at www.brookings.edu/opinions/2009/0701_housing_frey.aspx.

Reid Ewing, Keith Bartholomew, Steve Winkelman, Jerry Walters and Don Chen (2007),
Growing Cooler: The Evidence on Urban Development and Climate Change, Urban Land
Institute and Smart Growth America (www.smartgrowthamerica.org/gcindex.html).

Reid Ewing (2007), “The Demand For Smart Growth: What Survey Research Tell Us,” Planning, American Planning Association; at www.smartgrowth.umd.edu/pdf/Research_Dec07.pdf.

David Goldberg, Jim Chapman, Lawrence Frank, Sarah Kavage and Barbara McCann (2006), New Data for a New Era: A Summary of the SMARTRAQ Findings; Linking Land Use,
Transportation, Air Quality and Health in the Atlanta Region, SmartTraq (www.act-trans.ubc.ca) and Smart Growth America (www.smartgrowthamerica.org); at www.smartgrowthamerica.org/documents/SMARTRAQSummary_000.pdf.

Peter M. Haas, Carrie Makarewicz, Albert Benedict, Thomas W. Sanchez and Casey J. Dawkins (2006), Housing & Transportation Cost Trade-offs and Burdens of Working Households in 28 Metros, Center for Neighborhood Technology (www.cnt.org); at www.cnt.org/repository/H-TTradeoffs-for-Working-Families-n-28-Metros-FULL.pdf.

Susan Handy (2008), “Is Support For Traditionally Designed Communities Growing?,” Journal of the American Planning Association, Vol. 74, No. 2, pp. 209-221.

Bennet Heart and Jennifer Biringer (2000), The Smart Growth - Climate Change Connection, Conservation Law Foundation (www.tlcnetwork.org).

John D. Hunt (2001), A Stated Preference Analysis of Sensitivities to Elements of Transportation and Urban Form, Transportation Research Board Annual Meeting (www.trb.org); at www.ucalgary.ca/~jabraham/Papers/ecv4trbhunt/ECV4TRBHunt.PDF.

IEDC (2006), Economic Development and Smart Growth: Case Studies on the Connections
Between Smart Growth Development and Jobs, Wealth, and Quality of Life, International
Economic Development Council (www.iedconline.org); at L. Jiang and B. C. O’Neill (2007), “Impacts Of Demographic Trends On US Household Size And Structure,” Population and Development Review, 33, No. 3, pp. 567-591; at
www.iiasa.ac.at/Research/PCC/pubs/Jiang_O%27Neill_PDR07.pdf?cookieSet=1.

Robert E. Lang (2005), “Valuing the Suburbs: Why Some ‘Improvements’ Lower Home Prices,” Opolis, Vol.1, No.1 (www.mi.vt.edu/uploads/Opolis/Lang.pdf), pp. 5-12.
Christopher B. Leinberger (2008), “The Next Slum,” Atlantic Monthly, March 2008; at
www.theatlantic.com/doc/200803/subprime.

Jonathan Levine (2006), Zoned Out: Regulation, Markets and Choices in Transportation and Metropolitan Land Use, Resources for the Future (www.rff.org).

Jonathan Levine, Aseem Inam, Richard Werbel and Gwo-Wei Torng (2002), Land Use and
Transportation Alternatives: Constraint or Expansion of Household Choice?, Mineta
Transportation Institute, Report 01-19 (www.transweb.sjsu.edu/publications/01-19.pdf).

Jonathan Levine and Lawrence D. Frank (2006), “Transportation And Land-Use Preferences And Residents’ Neighborhood Choices: The Sufficiency Of Compact Development In The Atlanta Region,” Transportation, Vol. 33, No. 6 (www.springerlink.com), November 2006.

Michael Lewyn (2005), “How Overregulation Creates Sprawl (Even in a City without Zoning),” Wayne Law Review, Vol. 50, p. 1171; at http://ssrn.com/abstract=837244.

Michael Lewyn (2006), “Five Myths About Sprawl,” Harvard BlackLetter Law Journal,
(http://ssrn.com/abstract=931251), 2006.

Michael Lewyn (2009), A Fable About Sprawl, Planetizen Blog (www.planetizen.com/node/39789). Todd Litman (1995), “Land Use Impact Costs of Transportation,” originally published in World
Transport Policy & Practice, Vol. 1, No. 4, pp. 9-16; at www.vtpi.org/landuse.pdf.

Todd Litman (2002), Parking Requirement Impacts on Housing Affordability, VTPI
(www.vtpi.org); at www.vtpi.org/park-hou.pdf.

Todd Litman (2003), “Integrating Public Health Objectives in Transportation Decision-Making,” American Journal of Health Promotion, Vol. 18, No. 1 (www.healthpromotionjournal.com), Sept./Oct. 2003, pp. 103-108; at www.vtpi.org/AJHP-litman.pdf.

Todd Litman (2004), Evaluating Criticism of Smart Growth, VTPI (www.vtpi.org); at
www.vtpi.org/sgcritics.pdf.

Todd Litman (2005), The Future Isn’t What It Used To Be, VTPI (www.vtpi.org); at
www.vtpi.org/future.pdf; published as “Changing Travel Demand: Implications for Transport Planning,” ITE Journal, Vol. 76, No. 9, (www.ite.org), September, pp. 27-33.

Todd Litman (2006), Understanding Smart Growth Savings, VTPI (www.vtpi.org); at
www.vtpi.org/sg_save.pdf.

Todd Litman (2007), Smart Growth Reforms: Changing Planning, Regulatory and Fiscal
Practices to Support More Efficient Land Use, VTPI (www.vtpi.org); at www.vtpi.org/smart_growth_reforms.pdf.

Gregg Logan, Stephanie Siejka and Shyam Kannan (2007), The Market For Smart Growth,
Robert Charles Lesser and Company (www.rclco.com).

William Lucy (2002), Danger in Exurbia: Outer Suburbs More Dangerous Than Cities,
University of Virginia (www.virginia.edu); summarized in
www.virginia.edu/topnews/releases2002/lucy-april-30-2002.html.

William H. Lucy and Jeff Herlitz (2009), Foreclosures in States and Metropolitan Areas: Patterns, Forecasts, and Pricing Toxic Assets, University of Virginia (www.virginia.edu); at www.virginia.edu/uvatoday/pdf/foreclosures_2009.doc.

Eric Miller (2004), Travel and Housing Costs in the Greater Toronto Area: 1986-1996, Neptis Foundation (www.neptis.org).

Joseph Molinaro (2003), Higher Density, Mixed-Use, Walkable Neighborhoods - Do Interested Customers Exist?, National Association Of Realtors (www.realtor.org).

Anne Vernez Moudon and Paul Mitchell Hess (2000), “Suburban Clusters: The Nucleation of Multifamily Housing in Suburban Areas of the Central Puget Sound,” Journal of American Planning Association, Vol. 66, No. 3 (www.planning.org), Summer 2000, pp. 243-264.

Mark Muro and Robert Puentes (2004), Investing In A Better Future: A Review Of The Fiscal And Competitive Advantages Of Smarter Growth Development Patterns, Brookings Institute (www.brookings.edu).

Dowell Myers and Elizabeth Gearin (2001), “Current Preferences and Future Demand for Denser Residential Environments,” Housing Policy Debate, Vol. 12, Issue 4, Fannie Mae Foundation (www.mi.vt.edu/web/page/580/sectionid/580/pagelevel/1/interior.asp).

NAR and NAHB (2002), Joint Survey: Survey Suggests Market-Based Vision of Smart Growth, National Association of Realtors and National Association of Home Builders (www.realtor.org).

NAHB (1999), Consumer Survey on Growth Issues, National Association of Home Builders
(www.nahb.com).

Arthur C. Nelson (2006), “Leadership in a New Era,” Journal of the American Planning Association, Vol. 72, No. 4 (www.planning.org); at
http://law.du.edu/images/uploads/rmlui/conferencematerials/2007/Thursday/DrNelsonLunchPresentation/NelsonJAPA2006.pdf.

Arthur C. Nelson (2009), The New Urbanity: The Rise of a New America, University of Utah Metropolitan Research Center; summary at www.froogalizer.com/news/research-onhomeownership-rate-through-2030.html. Also see The Next $40 Trillion: Texas Trends
(www.texasarchitect.org/texastrends.ppt).

Arthur C. Nelson, Rolf Pendall, Casy Dawkins and Gerrit Knaap (2002), The Link Between Growth Management and Housing Affordability: The Academic Evidence, Brookings Institution Center on Urban and Metropolitan Policy (www.brook.edu); at
www.brook.edu/dybdocroot/es/urban/publications/growthmang.pdf.

Randal O’Toole (2001), “The Folly of ‘Smart Growth’,” Regulation, Cato Institute
(www.cato.org); at www.cato.org/pubs/regulation/regv24n3/otoole.pdf.

Nick Paumgarten (2007), “There and Back Again: The Soul Of The Commuter,” The New Yorker (www.newyorker.com), 16 April 2007, pp. 58-70.

PEW (2009), For Nearly Half of America, Grass Is Greener Somewhere Else, Pew Research
Center’s Social & Demographic Trends Project, (www.pewsocialtrends.org); at
http://pewsocialtrends.org/assets/pdf/Community-Satisfaction.pdf.

PFBE (2007), Valuing Sustainable Urbanism: Measuring & Valuing New Approaches to
Residentially Led Mixed Use Growth, The Prince's Foundation for the Built Environment
(www.princes-foundation.org).

Alan Pisarski (2009), ULI Moving Cooler Report: Greenhouse Gases, Exaggerations and
Misdirections, New Geography (www.newgeography.com); at www.newgeography.com/content/00932-
uli-moving-cooler-report-greenhouse-gases-exaggerations-and-misdirections.

John Pitkin and Dowell Meyers (2008), U.S. Housing Trends: Generational Changes and the Outlook to 2050, for Special Report 298, Driving And The Built Environment: The Effects Of Compact Development On Motorized Travel, Energy Use, And CO2 Emissions, TRB (www.trb.org); at http://onlinepubs.trb.org/Onlinepubs/sr/sr298pitkin-myers.pdf.

Pnina O. Plaut (2006), “Intra-Household Choices Regarding Commuting and Housing,”
Transportation Research A, Vol. 40, Issue 7 (www.elsevier.com/locate/tra), August, pp. 561-571.

PPIC (2002), Special Survey on Land Use: Part of the Growth, Land Use and Environment
Series, Public Policy Institute of California (www.ppic.org).

RCLCO (2008), Measuring the Market for Green Residential Development, Robert Charles
Lesser and Company (www.rclco.com); at www.rclco.com/pdf/Measuring_the_Market.pdf.

Reconnecting America (2004), Hidden In Plain Sight: Capturing The Demand For Housing Near Transit, Center for Transit-Oriented Development; Reconnecting America
(www.reconnectingamerica.org) for the Federal Transit Administration (www.fta.dot.gov); at www.reconnectingamerica.org/pdfs/Ctod_report.pdf.

Reconnecting America (2008), Capturing the Value of Transit, Reconnecting America
(www.reconnectingamerica.org); at www.reconnectingamerica.org/public/projects/318.

Tim Schwanen and Patricia L. Mokhtarian (2005), “What Affects Commute Mode Choice:
Neighborhood Physical Structure Or Preferences Toward Neighborhoods?” Journal of Transport Geography, Vol. 13, pp. 83–99; at www.uctc.net/papers/732.pdf.

SGN (2002 and 2004), Getting To Smart Growth: 100 Policies for Implementation, and Getting to Smart Growth II: 100 More Policies for Implementation, Smart Growth Network (www.smartgrowth.org) and International City/County Management Association
(www.icma.org); at www.epa.gov/dced/getting_to_sg2.htm.

Sierra Club (2005), Healthy Growth Calculator: Where Do You Want to Live?, Sierra Club (www.sierraclub.org/sprawl/density/choose_density.asp).

SMARTRAQ (2007), Metro Atlanta Community Preference Survey, Georgia Institute of
Technology (www.act-trans.ubc.ca/smartraq/pages).

John Stillich and Sandeep Kumar Agrawal (2008), Housing Alternatives Acceptability Study (HAAS), Sustainable Urban Development Association (www.trialsudasite.citymax.com); at
www.trialsudasite.citymax.com/f/Final_FINAL_HAAS_Report1.pdf.

Thomas J. Sugrue (2009), “The New American Dream: Renting,” Wall Street Journal, 14 August 2009 (http://online.wsj.com/article /SB10001424052970204409904574350432677038184.html )

John V. Thomas (2009), Residential Construction Trends in America's Metropolitan Regions, Development, Community, and Environment Division, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (www.epa.gov); at www.epa.gov/smartgrowth/pdf/metro_res_const_trends_09.pdf.

TRB (2009), Driving and the Built Environment: The Effects of Compact Development on
Motorized Travel, Energy Use, and CO2 Emissions, Special Report 298, Transportation Research Board (www.trb.org); at http://onlinepubs.trb.org/Onlinepubs/sr/sr298prepub.pdf.

ULI (Annual Reports), Emerging Trends in Real Estate, Urban Land Institute (www.uli.org); at www.uli.org/ResearchAndPublications/EmergingTrends/Americas.aspx.
US Census (2001), Historical Census of Housing Tables: Units in Structure, U.S. Census (www.census.gov/hhes/www/housing/census/historic/units.html).

US Census (2008), American Housing Survey for the United States: 2007, USHUD and Census Bureau (www.census.gov); at www.census.gov/prod/2008pubs/h150-07.pdf.
US Census (2008), Families, by Presence of Own Children Under 18: 1950 to Present, U.S. Census (www.census.gov/population/www/socdemo/hh-fam/cps2008.html).

David Villano (2009), “The Slumming Of Suburbia: The Poor Are Fleeing Our Cities, But Life Is Not Always Greener, Even When Affordable Housing Comes With A Two-Car Garage,” Miller-M cCune (www.miller-mccune.com); at www.miller-mccune.com/business_economics/theslumming-of-suburbia-994.

VTPI (2006), Online TDM Encyclopedia, Victoria Transport Policy Institute (www.vtpi.org).

Alex Wilson (2007), “Driving to Green Buildings: The Transportation Energy Intensity of Building,” Environmental Building News (www.buildinggreen.com), Vol. 16, No. 9, Sept. 2007; at www.buildinggreen.com/auth/article.cfm?fileName=160901a.xml.

Eric Weiss (2008), “Gas Prices Apply Brakes To Suburban Migration,” Washington Post, 5 August 2008; www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/08/04/AR2008080402415.html.

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Todd Litman is founder and executive director of the Victoria Transport Policy Institute, an independent research organization dedicated to developing innovative solutions to transport problems. His work helps to expand the range of impacts and options considered in transportation decision-making, improve evaluation techniques, and make specialized technical concepts accessible to a larger audience. He can be reached at: 1250 Rudlin Street, Victoria, BC, V8V 3R7, Canada. Email: litman@vtpi.org. Phone & Fax: +1 250-360-1560

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Honk! Park(ing) Day is September 18th, 2009 . (And World Streets invites you to park yourself next Friday)

What’s a simple, cheap, highly visual, and eminently practical way to demonstrate some of the advantages of finding alternatives to our existing car-heavy culture? If you’re Rebar, a San Francisco art and design collective, the answer is PARK(ing) Day. Go for it!

- by Robert Moskowitz, Santa Monica, California

PARK(ing) PARK(ing) Day is an annual, full day, global event that encourages artists, activists, and ordinary citizens to “take back” part of their local car-oriented infrastructure by temporarily transforming conventional metered parking spaces into public parks.

The idea is so simple, it’s brilliant. For the price of a parking spot, concerned citizens can grab possession of some prominent public square footage, and create a 3-D “diorama” about urban life as it could be lived, once we all become less dependent on individualized transportation systems.

Intended strictly as a non-commercial project and promoted as a way to tap into individual and collective creativity, Park(ing) Day has become an engine of civic engagement, critical thinking, unscripted social interactions, human generosity and interpersonal play.



Providing temporary public open space . . .one parking spot at a time.

The practice of seizing control of metered parking space and turning it to other uses dates back at least to the 1930's, when citizens of Oklahoma City played cards in parking spaces to protest the installation of those new-fangled instruments of Fascism: parking meters!

The idea was re-conceived in 2005, and quickly implemented when several members of Rebar seized control of a single metered parking space and ingeniously began using it as a public park. For maximum impact, they choose to do this in an area of San Francisco notably short of publicly accessible open space. The goal was simply to demonstrate that paying the metered price for a public parking space enables one to control that precious urban real estate for recreational purposes, at least for a short while.

According to Rebar, as much as 70% of San Francisco's downtown outdoor space is dedicated to cars, trucks, busses, trolleys, and other forms of transportation. In comparison, much less space has been set aside for people. The Park(ing) Day movement started out as an effort to creatively explore how urban public space is currently allocated, and how it could be used differently. Rebar was curious to learn what people might do with that space, once given the opportunity.

Since then, PARK(ing) Day has become a worldwide phenomenon, supported, controlled, and advanced by independent groups of artists, activists and citizens.

PARK(ing) Day 2008 included more than 500 “PARK” installations in more than 100 cities on four continents. This year, the project continues to expand to urban centers across the globe, including first-time PARK installations in South Africa, Poland, Norway, New Zealand and South Korea.

PARK(ing) Day participants have also broadened the scope to fulfill a range of unmet social needs. “From public parks to free health clinics, from art galleries to demonstration gardens, PARK(ing) Day participants have claimed the metered parking space as a rich new territory for creative experimentation, activism, socializing and play,” says Blaine Merker of Rebar.

In San Francisco, Rebar will deploy its “PARKcycle” – a pedal-powered mobile park, capable of delivering public green space where and when it is needed. “This year we’re going to outfit the PARKcycle with a new type of park. We are keeping the details secret, but we’ll be out pedaling around and visiting other PARK(ing) Day installations around the city,” says Rebar’s Teresa Aguilera. “If you live or work in San Francisco, keep your eyes open for a twenty-two foot long park pedaling through the streets. It will be hard to miss.”

To help make the dream a reality, Rebar has found support from several non-profits, including The Trust for Public Land, the Black Rock Arts Foundation, and Public Architecture, that share the collective’s values and concerns about urban space. The growth and dissemination of PARK(ing) Day ideas and literature, such as the posters accompanying this article, would not have been possible without their support.



Basic Rules for a PARK(ing) Day Installation

Rebar encourages adaptation and “remixing” of the basic "park in a parking space" concept that characterizes Park(ing) Day, and especially encourages participants to consider going beyond the standard combination of grass, bench, and shade. Park(ing) Day parks have been used to examine and address a wide range of other needs in local urban contexts.

However, Rebar encourages adherence to a few simple rules, if only to preserve the original spirit and intent of the celebration. They include:

1) Non-Commercial Sensibility. Everyone who participates in PARK(ing) Day and uses its name must agree not to include any advertising and not to sell or in any way promote any commercial goods or services in or around their temporary park. The only exception is the free "Mark your PARK" poster from Rebar’s website (http://parkingday.org/), which includes a space for commercial organizations and merchants to insert their business names or logo. No other form of advertising is permitted in or near a Park(ing) Day park.

2) Give Credit To PARK(ing) Day, by including the following on all websites, press releases, flyers and other promotional materials: "PARK(ing) Day was originally created in 2005 by Rebar, a San Francisco-based art and design studio, as an experimental exploration in repurposing public space." Although not the original inventor of the concept, Rebar does have rights to the "PARK(ing) Day" name and logo.

The term "PARK(ing) Day" is a registered service mark of Rebar Group, Inc., which grants free rights to the name for use in any non-commercial capacity related to PARK(ing) Day events, provided proper credit is given.

3) Waiver of Liability. Participation in PARK(ing) Day is open and undertaken at your own risk! Participants are acting independently of Rebar Group, Inc. and its owners, employees, officers, directors, members, volunteers, agents, assignees and partners, none of whom are liable for their actions. Rebar asks participants to please download and read their disclaimer/waiver of liability

Participants in PARK(ing) Day can, and probably should, connect with others around the world, and "register" their PARK by adding their PARK to the 2009 Map (http://my.parkingday.org/page/community-map-2009). Rebar says this will help increase the number of visitors at your park, because on PARK(ing) Day people like to tour local installations in their neighborhoods.

# # #

About the author:

Robert Moskowitz is a business consultant, author, and time management "guru" who has founded two non-profits, worked as a Senior Consultant for Hill and Knowlton, helped develop several Internet startups, and won an Emmy for his work on a Public TV series about personal finances. He has written extensively on topics ranging from aging to investment, the Internet, marketing, business management, and more. He writes: "I am here cause I feel in my bones we're living profligately on the planet and we need to find a formula for establishing quality of life without destroying the environment. Obviously, sustainable development and new modes of transport are key ingredients in such a formula."

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Reminder: Sustainable development is a personal combat. Peter Newman is back at the wheel.

There is something deeply personal, non-institutional, non- administrative that lies at the core of our uphill combat for sustainable development in all its necessary varieties and forms. In the heat of the day to day action one can lose sight of this, and that is a fundamental error. And then, even if we lose pace a bit, something happens and we gain sight of this again. For example, only yesterday . . .

We had a very personal reminder about this yesterday morning, when we received a note from our long time friend and respected colleague Peter Newman, announcing his return to action after a brush quite literally with death. I have asked for and received his permission to share portions of his note with you here.
__________________________________________________________

Let me make a brief and hopefully final report on my health...

I am pleased to say I started back at work today officially (I managed to sneak in a bit last week). I started the day as the keynote at the national Clean Air Society conference on ‘Clean, Green Cities Beckon...’, then went to the ABC studio to do an interview with the BBC on Australian cities (against my self-imposed ban on media work but this was not entering a highly charged debate, it was explaining our research). Then after a time at CUSP with my research team I went home for a short nap before going to hear Sam play in the WA Youth Jazz Orchestra which was extremely enjoyable. I think it was the kind of day that represents what I hope I can still do well, at home and work, but without too much stress.

I actually feel so much better than I did before and probably should as I had 2 cm deep accumulated bleeding on my brain. The medical evidence is that I am over the hematoma but the brain on the left side was rather distorted and will take 6 months or so to move back into the space. This means I need to be careful and not over-stress myself - which is just learning to live sensibly really. Its easy to forget sometimes what it was like on July 10th when I was a whisker away from a major seizure.

I want to thank everyone for their emails and letters of support. I feel very privileged to know you all.

Peter Newman

Professor of Sustainability
Curtin University Sustainability Policy (CUSP) Institute
Curtin University
Perth, Australia 6160

__________________________________________________________

We have long said that sustainability is an uphill struggle, that it is an intensely personal enterprise, and that we need every pair of able and willing hands on our side if we are to create a new majority for sustainable development and social justice, and all that goes with it.

So welcome back Peter. Go slow, go wise and go very far. We need you.

Eric Britton
Editor

* For more on Peter's contributions a good place to start is his Wikipedia entry which you can find at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Newman_%28environmental_scientist%29.

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More on North American Carsharing 2009

Roy Russell, founding Chief Technology Officer of Zipcar, read yesterday's feature article on carsharing in North America and immediately wrote to add his experience, thoughts and views on this to further round out the big picture on carsharing in the US . (Additional comments are as always warmly solicited.)

Eric,

I haven't been with Zipcar for a while now so my only source of information is whatever they choose to say to the press -- I don't have any better numbers that Susan does.

However, I do wonder what the limits to growth of car-sharing are and what would encourage it to be more widely adopted. I do think that it is potentially a multi-billion dollar business, both in North America and worldwide. However, in order to achieve this I think there are lots of regulatory practices that need to change that will make the full costs of personal car ownership more apparent and place car sharing vehicles on an equal footing with these private vehicles.

For example, the cost of parking for residents of most cities is heavily subsidized by the municipality. It costs me $8 per year to be able to park my car anywhere on the city streets with a "resident" permit. However, a car sharing vehicle which is shared amongst 50 "residents" must pay the full commercial cost of parking, perhaps $1200 per year or more. If the cost of a resident permit were increased then many more residents would dispose of their under-utilized personal vehicles, opting for the use of a car-sharing vehicle instead.

If the cost to operate a personal vehicle included a per-mile charge for driving on public roads then we'd be more inclined to use our personal vehicles less, and more of us would dispose of them as the under-utilized assets-turned-burdens they become.

As Susan mentions, insurance is also an important factor. If government regulators encouraged insurance-by-the-mile, where you pay depending on how much you drive then people would respond by driving less. And again, the less you drive, the less you require your personal vehicle for regular daily use, the more appealing car sharing gets.

So I think it will take some enlightened municipalities to lead the way and stop subsidizing personal car ownership as much as they have been. This will result in structural changes that will naturally encourage large-scale changes in behavior. Once the benefits are realized by a few, there will likely be broad adoption of improved practices in most cities.

I have encouraged my local city officials to increase the resident parking permit fee. Their reaction, while predictable, is disappointing. They agree that it makes sense and yet they think that it isn't politically possible. Changing the status quo is hard, made even harder by the fact that this change is an increase in fees or taxes. I think the way around this is to somehow tie the increased revenue to explicitly pay for something, rather than simply fill the general coffers. Locally, I'm pushing for the added permit revenue to pay for increased alternative transit improvements such as bike lanes and bicycle parking. I'm hoping this will generate enough political support to offset the negative reaction from car owners unhappy with the increased fee.

Author:
Roy Russell is a software developer, entrepreneur, founding CTO of Zipcar, and Meadow Networks CTO. Prior to that he managed software development for several startups and large high tech companies. (Mr. Russel's picture at the top of this page is a copy of a painting executed by his youngest daughter.)

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2009 North American Carsharing Update

This article is part of our series of updates on carsharing status, problems, projects and plans from members of the New Mobility Agenda's World Carshare program. Why so much attention to a mobility form that will never account for more than a percent or two of all trips in our cities? Simple. Carsharing is one of the vital keys to sustainable transport.

2009 North American Carsharing Update

Higher fuel costs, increased environmental awareness, and a slowing economy are supporting carsharing growth in North America. The principle of carsharing is simple: individuals and businesses/government fleets gain the benefit of vehicle access without the cost and responsibility of private vehicle ownership. Members access a fleet of vehicles for use on an as-needed basis, typically paying by hour and mileage.

The authors estimated that there were 650,000 carsharing members sharing approximately 20,000 vehicles worldwide as of October 2008. In recent years, carsharing in North America has expanded to be the largest market in the world. As of Fall 2008, the North American market accounted for approximately half of the worldwide carsharing membership and nearly 40% of the worldwide carsharing fleets deployed.

As of July 1, 2009, a total of 60 carsharing operations have been deployed in North America since 1994. Of these 60 carsharing operations, 42 are operational and 18 defunct. Reasons for closures include experimental programs, high insurance costs following 9/11, and cost and staffing considerations.

As of July 2009, there were 26 carsharing organizations in the U.S., with approximately 324,000 members sharing more than 7,700 vehicles. As of July 2009, there were 16 carsharing operators in Canada, with more than 53,000 members sharing approximately 2,000 vehicles.

In Canada, member-vehicle ratios have steadily risen over the past ten years, from 14:1 in 1998 to 26:1 in 2009. In contrast, the U.S. is one of three nations worldwide with substantially higher member-vehicle ratios. In July 2009, U.S. member-vehicle ratios were 42:1. Higher U.S. member-vehicle ratios have been a business strategy undertaken by many operators to increase vehicle usage and profitability, particularly among the largest for-profit and non-profit operators.

In North America, five major business models have emerged:

1) for-profit,
2) non-profit,
3) cooperative (owned by its members),
4) public transit (carsharing operated by a public transit agency), and
5) university research programs (operated by universities for research purposes).

In both the U.S. and Canada, for-profit operators continue to account for the majority of carsharing members and fleets deployed.

As of July 2009, 30.8% of the operators are for-profit (eight of 26), in the U.S.; accounting for an estimated 86% and 88% of members and vehicles, respectively. In Canada, 37.5% of the operators are for-profit (six of 16) and account for approximately 87% and 86% of the members and vehicles, respectively.

Commercial Mainstreaming of North American Carsharing

The October 2007 merger of Flexcar and Zipcar, which created the world’s largest multi-national operator, marked the beginning of carsharing’s commercial mainstreaming phase in North America. Since late-2007, North American carsharing has been marked by the following trends:

1) increasing availability and affordability of insurance,
2) market growth and diversification,
3) market entry and competition by traditional car rental services, and
4) continued public policy development.

In North America, the cost and availability of insurance has had a substantial impact on carsharing. Initially, insurance was either unavailable or cost prohibitive, particularly in the U.S.

As carsharing has mainstreamed, insurance has become increasingly available and affordable. This has coincided with market diversification and expansion into new markets, including government and corporate fleets, small business, and colleges/universities.

Three North American carsharing operators have entered municipal fleet contracts with the cities of Berkeley, CA; Philadelphia, PA; and Vancouver, BC. Market diversification has been more common in the U.S. with the expansion of carsharing services to over 150 North American college and university campuses, the majority in the U.S.

Another major trend has been the recent launch of carsharing services by traditional car rental companies, including Enterprise Rent-A-Car’s WeCar, Connect By Hertz, and U-Haul’s U Car Share.

As carsharing becomes increasingly more mainstream in North America, a number of policies are being considered. The majority of these policies are in the U.S. in locations with existing carsharing services that support large memberships; however, a few policies have been developed to encourage carsharing startups. Some of the carsharing policies include developer and zoning regulations, fleet reduction, participant subsidies, on-street and off-street parking, and taxation.

As carsharing continues to expand, both supportive and unsupportive policy approaches will continue to influence carsharing’s growth and locations in the U.S. and Canada.


Bibliography

Berkeley and City CarShare to Make History: First Shared Municipal Fleet in the U.S. Press Release, City of Berkeley, California, July 15, 2004. www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/mayor/PR/pressrelease2004-0715.htm. Accessed July 28, 2008.

City to Join PhillyCarShare, Cut 400 Vehicles. City of Philadelphia, Press Release, April 12, 2004. http://www.phila.gov/pdfs/City_to_Join_PhillyCarShare.pdf. Accessed November 12, 2008.

Cohen, A., S. Shaheen, and R. McKenzie. Carsharing: A Guide For Local Planners. PAS
Memo, May/June 2008.

Millard-Ball, A., G. Murray, J. ter Schure, C. Fox, and J. Burkhardt. TCRP Report 108: Car-Sharing: Where and How It Succeeds. Transportation Research Board of the National Academies, Washington, D.C., 2005.

Shaheen, S.A., A.P. Cohen. Growth in Worldwide Carsharing: An International Comparison. In Transportation Research Record: Journal of the Transportation Research Board, No. 1992, Transportation Research Board of the National Academies, Washington, D.C., 2007, pp 81-89.

Shaheen, S., A. Cohen, and M. Chung. American Carsharing: A Ten-Year Retrospective. In Transportation Research Record: Journal of the Transportation Research Board, Transportation Research Board of the National Academies, Washington, D.C., 2009, forthcoming.

Shaheen, S. A., A. P. Cohen, and J. D. Roberts. Carsharing in North America: Market Growth, Current Developments, and Future Potential. In Transportation Research Record: Journal of the Transportation Research Board, No. 1986, Transportation Research Board of the National Academies, Washington, D.C., 2006, pp. 116–124.

Shaheen, S. and M. Meyn. Shared-Use Vehicle Services: A Survey of North American Market Developments. Proc., 9th World Congress on Intelligent Transportation Systems Conference (CD-ROM). Chicago, Ill., Oct. 2002.

Shaheen, S. A., A. Schwartz, and K. Wipyewski. Policy Considerations for Carsharing and Station Cars: Monitoring Growth, Trends, and Overall Impacts. In Transportation Research Record: Journal of the Transportation Research Board, No. 1887, Transportation Research Board of the National Academies, Washington, D.C., 2004, pp. 128–136.

The authors:
Susan A. Shaheen is a Research Associate, Mineta Institute , &Co-Director, Transportation Sustainability Research Center (TSRC) University of California, Berkeley. She can be reached at sashaheen@tsrc.berkeley.edu


Adam P. Cohen is a Research Associate, Transportation Sustainability Research Center (TSRC)
University of California, Berkeley. He can be reached at apcohen@cal.berkeley.edu.



New Mobility Agenda references:

* New Mobility Agenda at www.newmobility.org
* World Carshare Consortium at www.worldcarshare.com
* World Carshare Cafe (forum) at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/WorldCarShare/

World Carshare Consortium: This free, cooperative, independent, international communications program supports carsharing projects and programs, world wide. Since 1997 it offers a convenient place on the web to gather and share information and independent views on projects and approaches, past, present and planned future, freely and easily available to all comers.

To put this report into its broader international context, the following map taken this morning from the World Carshare Consortium discussion forum pinpoints the last eighty message origins, and in the process provides some visual clues as to where the action is in the sector worldwide. Basically what we are seeing is that the number of contact points is steadily expanding as new countries and cities start to get involved in the forum discussions. A first step in a process which we have seen in many places lead to carsharing itself.

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Heads-up: "Bus schools in Delhi slums

"School buses are being converted to mobile classrooms for children in Delhi slums "
From: Sudhir Gota, CAI-Asia Center
Metro Manila, Philippines
Dear all,

I found this very interesting - "In pictures: Bus schools in Delhi slums" - http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_pictures/8236636.stm

Do you know of any other city which uses "Public Transport facilities" as schools?

Co-benefits :-)

Sudhir Gota

Transport Specialist, CAI-Asia Center
Unit 3510, 35th Floor, Robinsons-Equitable Tower,
ADB Avenue, Ortigas Center, Pasig City
Metro Manila, Philippines 1605
Tel: +63-2-395-2843 Fax: +63-2-395-2846
http://www.cleanairnet.org/caiasia
Skype : sudhirgota

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Honk! We are not here to make you feel comfortable

You have to push hard for sustainable transportation, sustainable cities, and sustainable lives.


Read World Streets. You will see why.

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Spending taxpayer money for transport and quality of life

On Wednesday of this week Gabrielle Herman, a researcher with ITDP-Europe posted a call for help to the Global South/Sustran working group asking for statistical information on "what current road infrastructure budget allocations look like in terms of road safety". World Streets Sentinel Morten Lange responded from Reykjavik, challenging the project team to rethinking their approach. (And your comments on this are warmly welcome here.)

Some additional quick background to set the stage for Morten's comments. Gabriel Hermann has been asked to prepare a section for the forthcoming UNEP (United Nations Environment Programme ) paper, "Share the Road: Minimum 10% for Safety, Sustainability, and Accessibility", funded by the FIA Foundation for the Automobile and Society. The FIA site is at http://www.fiafoundation.org/. The UNEP site at www.unep.org . That of the ITDP Europe - http://www.itdp-europe.org/

__________________________________________________________

Reykjavik Iceland, 3 September 2009

Hi Gabrielle Hermann,

I am sorry that I cannot answer your question on specific examples of 10% spending on infrastructure for NMT. (Hmm, wait ,I have heard that Copenhagen spends a large portion of the road budget on cycling, and the same must hold true in many Dutch settings. No concrete figures or references though )

But your request did spark the following suggestion for a wholly different approach on the matter.

I think the first item on the agenda should be to do some investigation and critical thinking into different approaches to achieving improved road safety for Healthy Transport (HT), or Human Powered Transport (HPT).

It is paramount that the Global South does not copy the mistakes of the North, although some of statistics suggest that segregation and expensive infrastructure is working. At what price have they been working? Materials, huge costs, enormous land-use, and land degradation, pollution, at times long detours for cyclists and pedestrians, improved access for cars, bad health problems because of lack of exercise as part of the daily routine, blame the (HT) victims if they are run over, overdependence on very expensive and very unsustainable cars etc, etc.

Furthermore the situation in the Global South is completely different from the countries with the lowest figures for the number of deaths yearly per 100.000 inhabitants. The modal split is an ocean apart from what Sweden or the UK has, and thinking that modals splits should change in the Global South to mimic the North would be a big mistake.

Healthy Transport (HT) and Human Powered Transport (HPT) are not generally used as concepts, I think, but I suggest these concepts or something of the sort be taken up as alternatives to the term non-motorized transport NMT, or vulnerable road users, mainly because they define cycling, walking et al positively, not as something "other" than cars etc.

In evaluating the different approaches I suggest that the potential for win-win situations figure very prominently. Does the approach

- improve accessibility and efficiency for HT/HPT
- improve the competitiveness of HT/HPT
- reduce greenhouse gas emissions
- reduce other pollution to air, water, soil + noise pollution
- improve the psychological / aesthetic environment
- increase the livability and / or attractiveness
- entail flexibility and cooperation or rigid rules, with sharp edges
- use resources in a close to optimal way
- help the car, oil and tire lobby

Road safety "activists" (Is it fitting to call FIA an activist?) often overfocus on just that, and "forget" to see the whole picture. The road safety problem is one in a big set of problems that have to do with the overuse of the car, and in part the overuse or wrong use of roadgoing motorized transport.

The largest public health problem connected with transport is probably sedentary lifestyles and the resulting obesity, and a long range of life-threatening diseases. Some are associated with obesity, others not. It is estimated that in the US 40.000 die in road accidents, and 400.000 from obesity. It has been suggested that half of the 400.000 stems from sedentary lifestyles, not getting the daily gentle exercise that cyclists and walkers get. WHO has publishes a large study showing that in many major Europeans cities fumes and suspended particulate matter ( mainly from cars exhaust pipes ) kill substantially more people than road accidents.

I and many others are looking to solutions that slow down cars, and change the aesthetics of places so that they are more similar to cozy streets than the tracks for racing in computer games.

Bring down the speeds of cars. Plant trees and bushes along roads. Bring life to the streets. Some experiments in urban settings with taking the infrastructure, including signs and traffic lights away, have been successful. Motorists and HT / HPT start to interact. Accidents have been reduced.

Another approach in roughly the same vein, and then regarding cyclists specifically, is to paint bike-and-chevron markings in the streets. The markings remind both cyclists and motorists that cyclists are welcome on the streets. Very cheap, and effective in improving interactions between drivers and cyclists as well as safety. And a small piece of bicycle advocacy that is a constant reminder to all. Used in Paris, San-Francisco, recently in Reykjavik, and in many other cities. (e.g. in Australia and North America )

Rural settings and some major roads in cities can demand different solutions. There higher speeds of cars can have its merits and separation will increase the accessibility and competitiveness HT / HPT. But the lessons from urban areas should still be kept in mind. Big detours or bad designs or lousy maintenance should be avoided.

I am sorry if my style conveys that I purport some great authority on the subject. That was not my intention. I wish the proponents of segregation and expensive infrastructure would also include similar disclaimers :-)

If anyone wants references to studies that support my claims, I guess many on the list will be able to help, including myself.

Best Regards,

Morten Lange,
Reykjavik Iceland (and a former resident of Dar-es-Salaam, Tanzania)


Some background:
Original note of Gabrielle Hermann to the Global South/Sustran group under the title " Road Safety Infrastructure Spending devoted NMT--project examples and figures needed!" - http://groups.yahoo.com/group/sustran-discuss/message/5535

The author:
Morten Lange describes himself as "as advocate for cycling and other health transport (in my spare time and then some)". He lives, works and pedals in Reykjavik Iceland

Discussion:
Follows just below. Click Comment

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The Year of the Woman in Transport – Part II “Don't treat women equally”.

How to move from this fine sounding idea to concrete operational reality? For starters each of us here can take it upon ourselves as an individual commitment first to ponder and then to try to ensure full and fair representation of women in every transportation planning and decision forum we are involved in (starting with World Streets itself). But we cannot afford to stop there.

That picture of course is a photo-montage showing Jane Jacobs and Robert Moses, two 20th century icons with highly contrasting attitudes toward transport in and around cities. (Source of photo being sought.)

One great advantage of taking the full year of 2010 to grapple with these issues is that by joining forces we will have the time and brainpower to be wiser about this than can be a single author writing on a single day.

What about just a bit of parity?

Surface parity, while a start, is unlikely to be sufficient.

We can observe that all too often women who do get into key roles very rapidly begin behaving like or reflecting the behavior and values of men. Examples would be very dangerous ... but try to think of women in such powerful positions who HAVE acted differently to the males in previous or similar positions of influence and power.

It’s just that the worldviews and values of our sector at the top are in general, very male! And this is precisely what we need to change to realize our very different future.

<-- Have you responded to the reader poll on this yet?
Please do. It's just over to your left.

Broaden the skills base of the deciders

The forced, high-priority network expansion that full gender parity requires can open up another priority need that also requires significant rectification. Specifically it can help us to increase greatly the range of backgrounds and skills we bring into the various decision fora. This therefore gives us a golden opportunity to rectify some of the debilitating historical inadequacies in the sector that have led to its underperformance in so many areas.

Of course, as we look to bring in more women we need of course to bring in more expertise in the entrenched professional skills such as transport planning, traffic management, engineering, financial planning, technical modeling and the usual array of “hard skills” which have the front stage in the sector. But that is not enough.

But to get the job done right we also need greatly enhanced competence in such areas as environment, climate, land use, public health, cities, rural areas, community relations, demographics, local government, social services , behavioral psychology, education, childcare, job creation, poverty reduction, communications and all those other key areas of our daily lives which thus far have not received the necessary attention in the transport discussions and decision-making process. And in these, we need both women and men to enhance our understanding of these mission-critical issues and to inform policy and practice in the sector.

Sexism?

Now, is it that I really believe that women are for some reason better, smarter or more noble than we Y chromosome-encumbered males? That’s not the point. Rather it is my experience that women often have a different view of the world in many respects. It is this differentness that we need to bring in and profit from.

However to give this full scope we need to go beyond the usual token representation. We need their strength. And we need their numbers. A scattered handful of females does not appear to suffice to force the change. Put enough women into a forum and they will keep us on our toes. I promise. (The key being the ”enough”.)

There is an analogy with our recent experience with the expanding role of cyclists in some of our cities. If there are none out there on the streets, few people even think about it. If there are a few, this makes no great difference. But once there is a strong quorum, strong presence, this starts to change everything. And not just for the cyclists. There is ample proof in this in city after city where this transformation has started to take place.

One important wrinkle on this is provided by a singing phrase of the Gender and Built Environment collaborative program at http://www.gendersite.org/ who advise us: “Don't treat women equally”. Hmm. Something I think that is important for each of us to think through for ourselves.

Now what?

However it works out, I would hope we do not need yet another law to make this happen. But we will need a high profile public commitment by leaders and a growing culture which accepts that there is simply no other way of going about this. (And if that doesn't work, well there is always the law. No reason to be excessively timid about this.)

On August 26th 1920, almost 89 years to the day, the Nineteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution formally passed into the law, guaranteeing the right of women's' suffrage. A long journey that get its symbolic start when Abigail Adams in 1776 asked her husband, one of the framers of the Constitution and one of our first president to "remember the ladies". To which he responded that men will fight the "despotism of the petticoat".

It then took something like 134 years for this oversight to be rectified. We don't have, and we don't need, that much time to do what we should be doing in our bit of daily life. We can get the job done in 2010. If we do it together.

The editor

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2010: The Year of the Woman in Transport (Now, how do we get there and where do we start?)

In this piece the editor of World Streets goes out on a limb and proposes not only that the year 2010 should be formally nominated as "The Year of the Woman in Transportation" but also that something resembling gender parity be established at least as high profile examples in as many places as possible – DURING THE YEAR. (But there is plenty of room for you to express yourself on this too. Vote, comment, make your voice heard )

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Admit it. We have made a right mess of our transportation arrangements.

So we should do better, right?

But for us to do better, we cannot content ourselves with more of the same. More roads, higher speeds, heavier vehicles, more time in transit, more fossil fuel burned, more accidents and lives lost, ever more people excluded from fair transportation, and ever longer distances to be traveled, stretching our communities far beyond the breaking point. This old mobility formula is at the root cause of the problems we all face today. Or at least most of us.

Hmm. So it looks like it's time for a leadership change.

Let's take a quick step back first to get a bit of perspective. What were the outstanding characteristics of the leadership that got us into this mess in the first place?

Well, for one, they were almost all male -- and political, and pretty well educated, often with engineering, financial and technical skills, and middle class. And yes, just about all drivers and car owners. (That is right, isn't it?)

And even when there were females in place here and there at the level of the policy and investment decisions, the basic behavioral environment, the template, the culture of the process, was and is to this day in almost all corners of the world essentially masculine.

So these good people engineered the system that would serve them best.

This was not a conspiracy as such, far from it, but just a banal result of how the cards got shuffled at the top of the deck.

Fair enough, eh? Or perhaps not?

Now if this is true – and I count on you to contradict me if it is not – it gives us a foundation for moving ahead and doing something about it.

What happens if we decide to use the power of the law to increase the number of women in leadership and decision positions by a very significant amount? And that in a very short period of time?

We have placed a one-minute poll on this just to your left, and invite you to take that minute to register your view on this we think important point. And since you will surely have more to say than just to check one box, we invite you to scroll down to the end of this piece and click the Comment button and let us hear what you have to share with us on this important subject.

But for this to happen there has to be a structured, broadly supported, insistent and effective program to create a consensus around this issue.

And it will help to have, and to know about successful models in which this has at least in part been achieved in different places around the world. (Because there are counties and cities that are starting to do much better. So as part of this worldwide collaborative project let us band together and make their examples more broadly known,)

To this end, World Streets proposes that next year, the year 2010, should be named as the "Year of the Woman in Transport"

And as a step in this direction, we propose to open up the pages of World Streets over the entire month of September to articles and comments on this proposal, with a view to making it our major theme for 2010. If, that is, we can agree that this is something worth pursuing.

In the coming weeks we intend to post a number of articles on various aspects
this, and we invite you to be a part of the solution. Let us hear from, both by way of your poll vote and comment here, and with your ideas for articles, authors, themes and actions to make this a real collaborative accomplishment of our growing group of believers in sustainable transport, sustainable cities and sustainable and just lives.

PS. Let's dedicate this to Mrs. Jacobs.

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Eric Britton is editor of World Streets and has for many years been a vigorous supporter of planning and policy for and by women in a sector that has for far too long been male dominated and as a result shaped by the values of not only males, but males of a certain social, economic and behavioral culture. Time for a change, he says.

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World Transport Policy and Practice Vision for transport in the UK to be in place by 2050

John Whitlegg, founder and editor of our sister publication, the Journal of World Transport Policy and Practice makes a frontal attack on the need for radical overhaul of our transportation arrangements to move them closer to something that is sustainable and just. He takes the European Commission to task for utterly failing to develop a viable "Vision for the future of EU transport" -- and offers a vision of his own.

This big picture vision of the sector opens the just published Vol. 15, No. 2 edition of the journal which is freely available at http://www.eco-logica.co.uk/pdf/wtpp15.2.pdf

Commission's 'future of transport strategy needs a reality check says T&E

In June this year the European Commission which is responsible for high level policy development for 27 member countries and over 300 million citizens produced its “Vision for the future of EU transport”. It was so bad that words fail your editorial team and we shall leave it to an impressive Brussels based organisation to comment on the “vision”:

Commission's 'future of transport' strategy needs a reality check says T&E

Brussels, Wednesday, June 17, 2009

The European Commission has published its vision for the future of transport policy in the European Union. But the paper completely underestimates the challenges and proposes no concrete solutions, according to Transport and Environment.

Jos Dings, director of Transport and Environment said: "If this is the strategy for fixing rapidly growing pollution, congestion and accidents caused by transport, then we have a big problem: it doesn't even scratch the surface."

"Climate change, Europe's flagship environmental policy, is mentioned only in passing, despite the fact that transport is the single most important sector holding back progress."

"The International Energy Agency has recognised that conventional oil is running out and ‘unconventional’ alternatives such as tar sands will be even costlier and dirtier. But the Commission doesn't give any clue as to how it proposes to deal with this issue of fundamental strategic importance to the EU."

"The question of managing demand for transport is not mentioned, and even traffic congestion which costs the European economy EUR 120 billion every year gets little serious attention."

"The current economic climate, and the impact that will have on national infrastructure budgets and on demand for transport is not considered. Governments need lean and green transport policies now. Road pricing schemes could help plug the gap and also bring huge economic and environmental benefits. But this has also escaped the Commission's attention."

"The only positive aspect of this paper lies in the recognition that technological leadership in environmental technology will benefit the European economy, not drag it down, as has often been said in the past."

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Source: European Federation for Transport and the Environment - http://www.transportenvironment.org/News/2009/6/Commissions-future-of-transport-strategy-needs-a-reality-check-says-TE/

The original European Commission document can be seen on: http://ec.europa.eu/transport/strategies/doc/2009_future_of_transport/2009_comm_future_of_transport_policy_en.pdf


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The World Transport Policy and Practice Vision for transport in the UK to be in place by 2050

Given the lack of understanding on the part of the European Commission on what a vision could and should involve we have produced our own vision and sent it to them today. This is it:

Transport in the future will be zero carbon. The zero carbon future will provide better access for more people to more things than is currently the case. Traffic congestion and time wasted stuck in jams will be a thing of the past and time currently wasted on commuter trips will be spent on rewarding and enriching activities.

All urban and rural areas will by 2050 have significantly enhanced public transport and cycling facilities bringing high quality and low cost transport choices within the reach of everyone. Those who opt not to use a car will save thousands of pounds a year by avoiding the fixed and variable costs of car ownership and use and will also avoid the uncertainties and potential disruption of oil price shocks as the world adjusts to shortages of supply and increased demand from developing countries. Individuals and families will have much improved air quality, reduced noise and stress from traffic and much improved community life stimulated by reduced levels of motorised traffic and reduced traffic on streets and through villages.

The shift to bike, foot and public transport will increase the spend of local people in local areas and will result in a renaissance of local shops and newly created jobs in local communities serving the increased level of spending locally that previously leaked out to global oil and car making sectors of the economy. Those that have given up individual car ownership will have an average of £3000-£4000 each to spend on local goods and services giving a further boost to local economies.

The car will still exist and be used by those who feels it has an advantage over other choices but fuel prices will rise to cover the full costs of supporting motorisation (the polluter pays principle) and parking will be recognised as a valuable asset that must be charged for at market rates.

Speeds will be limited to a maximum of 20mph/30kph in all residential areas and through villages to support the rapid take up of walking and cycling and to create high quality living environments. Speeds on motorways and dual carriageways will be limited to 60mph to reduce CO2 emissions and to encourage the take-up of eco driving techniques.

Cars will be alternatively fuelled either as plug in electric vehicles (PEVs) or hydrogen powered or hybrids of various kinds and all electric vehicles will be using electricity from a decarbonised electricity supply system based on renewable energy and micro-generation in all businesses, homes, schools and health care facilities.

Businesses of all kinds will find ways to introduce flexible working, videoconferencing, more family and child friendly working practices and will actively promote the end of the long commute. Links between businesses, businesses and customers and workers at home or in local “area offices” will be facilitated by a large number of electronic methods.

Deliveries of raw materials and goods to manufacturing sites will exploit the advantages of canals, inland waterways, estuaries and the UK’s excellent network of 300 ports as well as make better use of the rail network e.g. the German “Rollende Landstrasse” where whole lorries go on trains for sections of their journeys. Lorries will operate in ways that avoid cities, avoid long trunk-haul routes on motorways and are fuelled by alternatives to diesel that significantly reduce CO2 emissions.

More UK residents than is currently the case will take holidays within the Uk and broaden the concept of tourism to include a wide range of activities that involve gaining new skills and becoming expert in a wide range of sports and leisure activities. Traditional package tourism based on flights will be much reduced in number as a result of changes in the price of oil and the clearly developed policies of the Treasury to internalise the externalities associated with flying and driving. Travel opportunities to European destinations will be available in abundance and rail dominated (including Greece and Turkey). Shipping, cruises and ferries will be an integral part of the holiday experience.

The aviation industry will still be important but no larger than in 2009 and airlines and companies owning airports will be far more profitable and successful as they diversify into all kinds of communication and mobility activities and services. There will be significant job gains across all sectors of the aviation, rail and bus industries.

The health of all citizens will improve in the zero carbon world. There will be more lively local economies making jobs available in the community. There will be more social interaction giving everyone the health generating social context of living in a supportive community. There will be less noise and air pollution with attendant health benefits and much more physical activity contributing to a reduction in rates of obesity.

The demands on public finance and spending will be reduced. There will be no need for new roads, bypasses and motorway widening at current prices approaching £25 million per mile. A healthier and more supportive population and community will reduce NHS costs e.g. the predicted £50 billion pa costs of obesity by 2050.

Local communities will be far more resilient in the sense that a larger proportion of jobs, food and other items of consumption will be sourced locally and this will reduce the risks of disruption associated with long distance sourcing, oil price disruption and vulnerability to interruption in supply as transport infrastructure succumbs to damage from extreme weather events or shortfalls in fuel availability.

Cities will change so that there is far more green space and woodland and a higher number of homes and employment opportunities than is currently the case in low density developments. Land for eco-efficient car free housing can be found on car parks that will now be surplus to requirements and the projected need for new homes can be met without taking away valuable land in rural areas that will be needed for increased food production.

Cities will be far more friendly and supportive of children and the elderly with calmer environments, reduced traffic and increased feelings of confidence nd security. The shift away from the car will increase the amount of walking and cycling and the degree of mutual, friendly “surveillance” of all those using the public realm by each other. Everyone will feel safer. Children will rediscover the delights of independent mobility, the joys of getting to and from school, friends and local swimming pools under their own steam and the elderly will find it much easier to cross roads, hold conversations on the street and engage with neighbours in ways that ends social isolation and its related health damaging consequences

Urban and rural residents alike will be happier (Layard, 2004). A much improved local environmental quality linked to higher levels of integration with local food production, an income from microgeneration, heightened involvement with neighbours and community activities and a greater feeling of security and comfort from a more resilient society will all contribute to increase happiness and to higher levels of social cohesion.

The transformation of urban and rural society into one that has shifted a rather one dimensional emphasis on economic growth to one based on community growth, growth in happiness, reduced pollution, improved health and the creation of far more jobs, jobs that are far more evenly located across every locality and far more resilient to the unpredictable shocks and challenges of a globalised economy will also bring enormous benefits to population groups and sub-groups. No groups or sub-groups are worse off in the decarbonised transport future when compared with 2009.

John Whitelegg, Editor
World Transport Policy and Practice

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John Whitelegg is visiting Professor of Sustainable Transport at Liverpool John Moores University and Professor of Sustainable Development at University of York's Stockholm Environment Institute, and is founder and editor of the Journal of World Transport Policy and Practice. John is a local councillor in Lancaster, and Leader of the North West (of England) Green Party.

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It goes without saying that comments are warmly invited. Just below.

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