Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
In addition, the public transport system, if well integrated along the lines of Zurich and
other similar cities, may be less dependent on increased development intensification than usually
envisaged. In a future where oil prices are dramatically higher than the present day, then a
reliance on only a limited use of public transport, and a stronger usage of hybrid cars, is a
vulnerable position if oil remains the main transport fuel. By 2041, the urgency of the climate
change and oil scarcity problem will be much more evident to the public and to politicians,
and urban structural change will become a reality. But of course the retrofit is always much
more difficult than the shaping of new development. This will mean that some seemingly
difficult decisions, in the context of 2012, need to be taken.
Figure 7.26
illustrates what might
be possible in terms of developing the uban structure more effectively around a public transport
network, drawing on the vision in the current Auckland Plan (Auckland Council, 2012). Many
of the areas around the key public transport interchanges can be densified, even in the suburbs,
and perhaps also - much more controversially - the areas that remain poorly accessible to
public transport could be returned to open space provision. This means that areas where public
transport accessibility is poor are not developed and don't become reliant on car usage. This
latter position would take us well beyond the current frame of the urban planning debate in
Auckland and similar examples of the dispersed city. Auckland, however, needs to become
much more progressive in implementing its strategic planning vision - and it is this area that
represents the greatest problem: how to develop a changed awareness and approach to
sustainable travel in politicians and the public.
Moving from the current level of motorisation in Auckland to more sustainable travel behaviours
is a huge step and it will involve a complex range of interventions, covering infrastructure,
pricing, demand management, the built environment and cultural change. This can be viewed
in socio-technical transition terms (Kemp, 1994; Geels, 2002), including a range of issues
such as technological innovation and progress, behavioural change and also governmental
initiative. Hence the system in question, in this case automobility, can be seen as occurring
at multiple levels, covering issues of:
•
Landscape (the city, infrastructure, political ideology, the media, macro-economic
trends, societal values and beliefs);
•
Regime (activities of transport users, firms, transport planners, engineers, politicians,
the motor industry, prevailing habits and norms);
•
Niche (a new practice, technology or policy measure).
(Geels and Schot, 2007; Geels, 2011a)
The transition approach has been criticised in terms of the structuring of the factors involved
in transition, in the over-emphasis on technological innovation, and lack of focus on agency
(individual change), power and politics, and the cultural dimension (Geels, 2011b). Nevertheless,
it does provide an improved understanding of the complexity of the problems faced and
potential solutions that can be employed, and is useful to contexts such as Auckland in
highlighting the extent of change required. There are no simple and effective measures that
are available that will make a significant difference by themselves, and no direct causalities
between intervention and outcome; rather, a complex package that needs to be developed and
tailored to the context. Infrastructure design and investment levels remain important, but efforts
are also required in changed governance systems and enhanced attempts to influence the cultural
