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On phasing out cars in cities
I’m sharing another article on reducing car dependence. The article was referred to by the previous series that I shared recently.
Nicholas, K. (April 14, 2022) “12 best ways to get cars out of cities – ranked by new research,” The Conversation, https://theconversation.com/12-best-ways-to-get-cars-out-of-cities-ranked-by-new-research-180642 [Last accessed: 5/20/2022]
Here are a few excerpts from the article:
“Question: what do the following statistics have in common?
The second-largest (and growing) source of climate pollution in Europe.
The leading killer of children in both the US and Europe.
A principal cause of stress-inducing noise pollution and life-shortening air pollution in European cities.
A leading driver of the widening gap between rich and poor urban residents.Answer: the vehicles on our streets, primarily the not-so-humble passenger car.”
also this:
“The research is clear: to improve health outcomes, meet climate targets and create more liveable cities, reducing car use should be an urgent priority.”
and this:
“To meet the planet’s health and climate goals, city governments need to make the necessary transitions for sustainable mobility by, first, avoiding the need for mobility (see Paris’s 15-minute city); second, shifting remaining mobility needs from cars to active and public transport wherever possible; and finally, improving the cars that remain to be zero-emission.”
You can also listen instead of reading it as it is a narrated article.
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Articles on examining the role of the planning profession in both perpetuating and solving traffic congestion
Planetizen recently published a three-part series of articles examining the role of the planning profession in both perpetuating and solving traffic congestion:
Part 1: Brasuell, J. (April 13, 2022) “Planning and the Complicated Causes and Effects of Congestion,” Planetizen, https://www.planetizen.com/features/116834-planning-and-complicated-causes-and-effects-congestion [Last accessed: 5/17/2022]
Part 2: Brasuell, J. (April 20, 2022) “How Planning Fails to Solve Congestion,” Planetizen, https://www.planetizen.com/features/116914-how-planning-fails-solve-congestion%5BLast accessed: 5/17/2022]
Part 3: Brasuell, J. (May 12, 2022) “Planning for Congestion Relief,” Planetizen, https://www.planetizen.com/features/117153-planning-congestion-relief?utm_source=newswire&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=news-05162022&mc_cid=34b0612d40&mc_eid=9ccfe464b1 [Last accessed: 5/17/2022]
I think these articles are a must read especially for students (and not just practitioners or professionals) and is sort of a crash course on transportation engineering and planning. It covers many concepts and learnings from so many decades and touches on certain programs that are most effective in reducing car trips. To quote from the article, the top 12 programs based on case studies in Europe are:
- Congestion Pricing (12-33% reduction in city-center cars)
- Parking and Traffic Controls (11-19% reduction in city-center cars)
- Limited Traffic Zones (10-20% reduction in city-center cars)
- Workplace Mobility Services (37% drop in car commuters)
- Workplace Parking Charges (8-25% reduction in car commuters)
- Workplace Travel Planning (3-18% drop in car use by commuters)
- University Travel Planning (7-27% reduction in car use by university commuters)
- University Mobility Services (24% drop in students commuting by car)
- Car Sharing (12-15 private cars replaced by each shared car)
- School Travel Planning (5-11% reduction in car use for school trips)
- Personalized Travel Planning (6-12% drop in car use share among residents)
- App-Based Incentives (73% – proportion of app users declaring reduced car use)
Are we ready to confront congestion and at the least start discussing these car trip reduction programs? Or are we content with the current discourse, which remains car-centric?
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On walkability and walkability scores
I’m sharing a couple of articles on walkability and walkability scores. The first one actually points to the second but provides brief insights about the concept of walkability while the second is a more detailed article on the findings of a study on walkability.
Ionesco, D. (May 4, 2022) “Walkability Scores Don’t Tell the Whole Story,” Planetizen, https://www.planetizen.com/news/2022/05/117075-walkability-scores-dont-tell-whole-story?utm_source=newswire&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=news-05052022&mc_cid=c04e3e4dc0&mc_eid=9ccfe464b1 [Last accessed: 5/7/2022]
To quote from the article:
“if cities truly want to be pedestrian-friendly, they need to think beyond the sidewalk…”
The second article is from late April:
Gwam, P., Noble, E. and Freemark, Y. (April 28, 2022) “Redefining Walkability,” urban.org, https://www.urban.org/features/redefining-walkability [Last accessed: 5/7/2022]
To quote from the article:
“To create a more comfortable walking experience, our research points to a few steps DC planners and policymakers can take to increase racially equitable walkability across the city:
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expand tree cover in the densest parts of the city,
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increase nonautomotive modes of transportation in central areas,
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reduce noise pollution,
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support more equitable access to key resources, and
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prioritize road design that limits the need for police traffic enforcement.”
While the article puts emphasis on the topic of racial equity, such concept can easily be adapted and adopted for our purposes. For one, it could be interpreted as being inclusive if one is not comfortable with the term “race”.
Don’t miss downloading the technical appendix of their report. This will be very useful to researchers, practitioners and advocates of active transport.
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NAIA Parking Rates as of April 2022
Here’s a quick share of information about the parking rates at the NAIA airport terminals:
The infographic is from the DOTr Facebook Page and should be useful for those picking up people at the airport or who would be leaving their vehicles there as they travel again with the easing of restrictions due to the pandemic.
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History: article on how jaywalking came to be
I am sharing this article on the invention of jaywalking. It is a very informative articles and gives context to the current situation where cars dominate streets and car-centric policies and infrastructure diminish pedestrians and walking. I’ve always said that history should enlighten us about how it was, how it came to be and what we need to change now if we are to attain a more sustainable transport system that will contribute to improving safety and ultimately, quality of life.
Thompson, C. (March 29, 2022) “The invention of ‘Jaywalking’,” Marker, https://marker.medium.com/the-invention-of-jaywalking-afd48f994c05 [Last accessed: 4/2/2022]
To quote from the article:
“It’s not totally clear who invented the phrase, but it was a fiendishly clever portmanteau. In the early 20th century, the word “jay” mean an uncultured rube from the countryside. To be a “jaywalker” thus was to be a country bumpkin who blundered around urban streets — guileless of the sophisticated ways of the city…
Ever after, “the street would be monopolized by motor vehicles,” Norton tells me. “Most of the children would be gone; those who were still there would be on the sidewalks.” By the 1960s, cars had become so dominant that when civil engineers made the first computer models to study how traffic flowed, they didn’t even bother to include pedestrians.”
The article showed photos of pre-automobile times in the US. Here’s a photo of pre-automobile Manila for context:
And here’s Manila during the American period but with most people walking or taking public transport in the form of the tranvias:
Chaotic as the scenes appear to be, these streets were definitely safer and perhaps saner than what he have now. The challenge is how to re-orient our streets and reclaim it to favor people instead of cars.
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On the future on urban transportation
I’m sharing the following article on the idea of mobility hubs in cities:
Descant, S (March 16, 2022) “Are mobility hubs the future of urban transportation?” Government Technology, https://www.govtech.com/fs/are-mobility-hubs-the-future-of-urban-transportation [Last accessed: 3/18/2022]
To quote from the article:
“As cities reimagine transportation and transit, they’re turning toward innovative attempts to bring multiple modes together, with the essential aim of making it easier for residents and others to choose a mode of travel other than the single-occupancy car.”
Though I support this idea, I think it only implies that housing issues are already covered. In reality, there should be clear-cut and simultaneous initiatives covering both housing and transport. In Metro Manila’s case, for example, the sprawl is over a much wider area and covers at least 4 provinces surround the metropolis where people have chosen to settle/reside due to the high and rising cost of housing in the MM. While the example of Tokyo and its railway lines may be used as inspiration, it will take a lot for Metro Manila to have such a transit network to carry so many people around MM+.
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On bicycle economics in the Philippines
I am sharing this link to a newly minted reference that should be useful to policy or decision-makers (yes, that includes politicians) in justifying bicycle facilities including bike lanes around the country.
https://www.freiheit.org/philippines/bikenomics-assessing-value-cycling-philippines
There’s been a dearth in local references and this should suffice for now pending more in-depth studies on the benefits of cycling and related-facilities and programs in the Philippines. Note that while the reference mentions certain calculations and unit costs, it would be better to have the actual numbers from the various LGUs that have constructed bike lanes and facilities, and implementing bike programs and projects. Quezon City and Mandaue City, for example, should have the numbers that can serve as initial data for compiling and eventual publication of unit costs per type or design of bike lanes or bikeways. LGUs and national government should gather, process and make use of such data in aid of bike facilities and infrastructure development that will attract people away from private motor vehicle use while reinforcing both active and public transport mode shares.
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Is the concept of induced demand a hard sell?
Here’s a quick share of an article on ‘induced demand’ particularly why it appears to be a hard sell:
Blumgart, J. (February 28, 2022) “Why the concept of induced demand is a hard sell,” Governing, https://www.governing.com/now/why-the-concept-of-induced-demand-is-a-hard-sell [Last accessed: 3/8/2022]
To quote from the article:
“Transportation experts say that the way to defeat induced demand, and actually ease traffic, would be to price roadways through tolls and congestion fees. But such alternatives are not popular. It’s hard to imagine running a political campaign on such a promise, as opposed to pledging an answer that looks free and easy… “Highway expansion is an attractive project regardless of your political orientation or what the state of the economy is,” says Thigpen. “There’s always a good argument for why we should be expanding highways. We need more jobs, or we need to unlock economic opportunity. There’s always a good political argument in favor of that.”
That last statement there relating highway or road expansion to politics is relevant everywhere. In our case in the Philippines, politicians are perceived to be very conservative and the type to use road projects as accomplishments. They are not as progressive as politicians abroad who may have the backgrounds and/or advocacies relating to sustainable transport to pursue the more difficult programs and projects needed improve the transport system. Instead, most are content with projects that they can put their name on and claim as hard accomplishments. Many of their constituents appear to agree. And agencies like the DPWH are only too happy to support this never-ending road construction and widening projects with the length of roads and the number of lanes added being their metrics for success. Of course, these (e.g., understanding and how to address induced demand, performance metrics, etc.) need to change if we really want to transform our transportation system towards something more efficient for everyone’s benefit.
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On development density and transportation
The term ‘density’ here does not refer to transport or traffic density in the traffic engineering sense but to density of development such as urban density or building density. Here is an interesting article about building during a climate crisis. While it is very much applicable to any situation, the need to revisit plans and designs has become more urgent with the current pandemic.
Alter, L. (November 19, 2021) “What’s the Right Way to Build in a Climate Crisis?” Tree Hugger, https://www.treehugger.com/what-is-right-way-to-build-in-climate-crisis-5210156 [Last accessed: 2/23/2022]
There are mentions to various references throughout the article so it is not entirely an opinion piece but supported by evidence or studies. There is also a note that the article has been fact-checked. Quoting from the article:
“Adding gentle density can help ensure there are enough people in a neighborhood to support local schools, health, and community services and keep shops and restaurants open. It can provide a range of housing types and tenures that support the needs of individuals and families throughout all stages of life and allow for aging in place. It can also support public transit services, providing residents with efficient and affordable transportation options without relying on private automobiles.”
What do you think is the ‘right’ density for Philippine cities and municipalities?
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Roadside bike repair stations
Walking along 38th Street at the Uptown side of Bonifacio Global City (BGC) in Taguig, I came along this mini bike repair station conveniently located along the bike lane and just across from the schools along the street. It had some tools and a pump. Typical of what a cyclist or biker may need in case some quick repairs, adjustments or tire inflation are required. The first time I saw something like this was along Commonwealth Avenue; provided by a bicycle group that helped promote bike-to-work along that corridor and Quezon City.
We need more of these especially along the major roads used by cyclists; especially those who bike to work. Granted that there are many bike shops and perhaps the vulcanizing shops as well as cyclists bringing their own tools and pumps but you never know when you will need some tools or perhaps a pump to inflate tires. Of course, these will need to be secured as there are people who have the propensity to steal, damage or vandalize tools.
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Caught (up) in traffic 