Cities and innovative urban transport policies.

INTRODUCTION

The second half of the 20th century was characterized by the strong relationship established between economic growth and growth in transport activities. It was generally accepted by analysts that the first was not achievable without the second. Over time, however, the negative externalities caused by transport, mainly emissions and pollution, have posed a serious constraint on further economic development.

Transport is responsible for 26% of C[O.sub.2] emission at global level and is one of the few sectors where emissions are still growing (Chapman 2007). In the European Union (EU-15), one fifth (21%) of total greenhouse gas emissions are now caused by transport, especially road transport. The period 1990-2004 saw greenhouse gas emissions decrease in many sectors, notably in energy supply, industry and agriculture, but not in transport. In contrast, over the same period, emissions from transport increased by more than a quarter (26%). With 93% of the transport sector share, road transport is by far the biggest emission source within that sector. Emissions from passenger road transport increased 27% between 1990 and 2004; those of freight road transport increased of 51% in the period 1990-2003 (Europe Environment Agency 2007).

In particular, road vehicle transport is a major cause of urban smog (Kahn 2008). Transport-related emissions of this kind are the single most important factor in determining air quality in many urban regions, depending on the altitude and thus the dispersion pattern of emissions (DCMR Milieudienst Rijnmond 2007). In most major urban areas, air pollution is now badly affecting quality of life and the improvement of air quality has become a priority for most cities in developed countries. Worldwide, initiatives such as the C40 cities included in the Clinton Climate Initiative (www.c40cities.org) and the Climate Alliance (www.climatealliance.org) confirm the importance of this issue for city managers. Failure to improve air quality can have dramatic consequences for cities in terms of image and economic development. Innovation in transport is therefore critical.

Successful cities in the knowledge economy are places which provide economic growth, easy access and a good and healthy environment (van den Berg et al. 2005). These aspects of city life often conflict with each other in such a way that increasing a city's accessibility, for instance, might be detrimental to the environment and, vice versa, the improvement of urban air quality might restrict the accessibility of the city.

One of the central challenges for 21st century city managers is therefore to find ways to maintain economic growth and the associated high levels of wellbeing of citizens while reducing the negative effects of transport on many aspects of city life. Development of policies to decouple transport intensity from economic growth is now a spearhead of most transport policies, both at European level and at the level of individual countries.

This paper uses two innovative transport policies developed by two European cities--London in the UK and Gothenburg in Sweden--to illustrate ways to move out of the economic growth-easy access and environmental results dilemma.

Section 2 below presents a number of fundamental developments that have changed the way cities should address their transport policies. Section 3 presents the innovative transport policies selected and used by London and Gothenburg. Section 4 presents the conclusions.

CITIES AND TRANSPORT IN THE 21ST CENTURY: THE NEED FOR DECOUPLING

Even in the present era of fast communications and high levels of use of information and communications technology, physical mobility systems are essential to both individuals and organizations (Bertolini et al. 2008). Cities and regions need high levels of accessibility, both internally and externally, and recent research (Mingardo & van Haaren 2007; European Spatial Planning Observation Network 2004) has confirmed again that accessibility and economic performance are still believed to be firmly related to each other, both at urban level and at regional level. Figure 1 presents the relationship between GDP per head and multimodal accessibility in European cities; Figure 2 shows the same relationship for European regions.

The general belief that transport and economic activity are linked together has long characterized policy interventions in the operations of cities (Quinet & Vickerman 2004). In Europe, moreover, policymakers habitually use transport as a means of realizing policy objectives that lie far beyond transport itself. Transport policy has, for example, been used to encourage local and regional development, to support different branches of industry, to provide social assistance and to boost employment, both directly and indirectly (Blauwens et al. 2006). The issue now is to decouple transport and economic growth

Decoupling refers to policies that 'contribute to reducing the transport intensity of activities whilst at the same time maintaining economic growth' (Banister & Stead 2002: 161) and the more general issue of how to de-link economic success and rapidly increasing environmental problems (Tapio 2005), on the assumption that there is no inevitable link between growth in GDP and growth in the transport sector. It is important here to distinguish between relative and absolute decoupling. Relative decoupling means that economic growth occurs and is accompanied by lower, but still some, growth in environmental pressures while with absolute decoupling environmental pressures are absolutely decreasing while the city economy continues to grow (Giljum et al. 2005). Absolute decoupling is the ultimate aim for today's transport policies. In other words, 'just slowing the growth in emissions of greenhouse gases from transport is not enough' (EEA 2007: 8).

Decoupling transport intensity overall from policies aimed at economic growth is a key issue for the European Union as seen both in the 2001 White Paper on Transport (Commission of the European Communities 2001) and in its 2006 mid-term review (CEC 2006). In 2007, the EU Green Paper on Urban Mobility (CEC 2007) made decoupling a primary aim at city level as well. Decoupling economic growth from use of natural resources and the production of emissions is central for cities in order to achieve the goals of the 'Lisbon Strategy' (Giljum et al. 2005), the official strategy of the European Council that aims at making the European Union the most competitive economy in the world by 2010. Over the period 1970-2000 in the EU15, transport flows, both passenger and freight, grew more than the economy (see Table 1). This means that no decoupling between energy use and GDP occurred over the period.

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Demand-side measures and marketing

Decoupling can be addressed in several ways. Traditional (urban) transport policies are usually supply-based: they focus either on the quantitative and qualitative improvement of the public transport system or on the enlargement of the road network and parking capacity. Most of them are no longer either effective or sustainable. The problems now faced are exacerbated by the fact that in most urban areas there is little room for further enlargement of transport infrastructure, either physically or economically. On the one hand, urban land is scarce and must be used in the most productive way while on the other hand, the construction or upgrading of public transport systems is very expensive and might have little effect on modal shift.

For these reasons, demand-oriented transport policies, which try to reduce the need for travel and/or the need for traveling by car, are now gaining prominence. Implementing them, however, may demand strong political will since mobility is often considered an essential human right and influencing mobility demand can be seen as restricting individual freedom and be resisted (Bertolini et al. 2008). Politicians are therefore especially reluctant to introduce measures, such as congestion charging and/or parking restrictions, that restrict car use.

Policies aiming at reducing transport-related emissions usually rely on technical change, behavioral change or a combination of both. Technical change at present includes ambitious fuel economy and/or fuel switch targets for automotives and usually translates into the promotion of clean vehicles. Behavioral change aims at encouraging citizens to make a modal shift and/or to reduce the length and number of journeys made, both for work- and non-work- related journeys. Most such policies are included under the name of Transportation Demand Management (TDM) or Mobility Management (MM). Taken separately, both technical and mobility management policies need to be quite radical if they are indeed to deliver sustainable transport mechanisms. If they are used in combination they are more likely to succeed than when used separately (Potter 2008: 13).

To ensure success, urban transport policies need to make extensive use of marketing campaigns, whether when seeking to increase the use of public transport, cycling and walking or to discourage driving. 'Discouraging driving' refers to the 'demarketing' of car use and is most effective when it focuses mainly on people's self-image as good citizens rather than their sense of public duty (Wright & Egan 2000). At the end of the nineties an innovative marketing approach called 'individualized marketing' was developed to increase public transport use. The assumption behind this approach is that lack of experience and motivation are the main constraints on the use of public transport for many people. Individualized marketing aims at contacting directly potential public transport users with the intent of motivating them to think about their travel behavior (Brog 1998). Evidence shows that 'individualized marketing' has achieved reduction in car use of between 2% and 15% in several countries (Fujii & Taniguchi 2006).