Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
and the quality of life are developed to make a positive contribution to well-being, livelihoods
and capabilities (Sen, 2009; Jackson, 2009). This will require a very different basis for transport
and city planning, internationally, but there is much to be gained from a new approach. Central
to this will be the informed public; like Debord (1967) we hope we can 'wake up the spectator
who has been drugged by spectacular images'.
We have sketched only the barest outlines of potential transport futures at the city level.
We have left many loose ends, but perhaps some of these can be developed, and we hope to
have begun a serious discussion of the possibilities for changing travel behaviours at the city
scale. Mobility is critical to social relations, it is important to the human condition, and very
often this is currently delivered by the petrol or diesel private motor car. This latter social
construction, however, can - and must - be changed. Progress must be made now, but not
incrementally. A 'quantum change' is required that involves composite actions that are flexible
but mutually supporting, so that a new direction is initiated that can be consistently followed
over a period of time. Thus the direction of policy is not towards any one societal goal, but
many, and the pathway is not fixed, but will be iteratively changed over time as we understand
what progress is being made.
We hope to have begun a serious debate about the possibilities for changing the relationships
between transport, climate change and the city, and that the scale and immediacy for action
have both been made very clear. But in thinking about utopian or dystopian futures, we should
consider a final warning (More, 1516, p. 118): 'there are many features of the Utopian
commonwealth that I can more easily wish for in our own societies than hope to see realised'.
Dystopian, inequitable and unsustainable futures loom large if we fail to plan for and deliver
radical changes to our travel and city futures. But the final message must be optimistic, namely
that the present dependence on the car and carbon can, should and will, be substantially reduced
in cities internationally as we progress to 2030 and beyond.
Notes
1
Borges discusses the mysterious country called Uqbar, where a conspiracy of intellectuals imagine (and
thereby create) a world known as Tlön.The people of Tlön deny the reality of the world, including most
of what would usually be considered common-sense reality.
2
Moore's Law (named after Intel co-founder Gordon Moore): the observation that, over the history of
computing hardware, the number and performance of transistors on integrated circuits doubles
approximately every 18-24 months. If Moore's Law applied in transport, we would 'drive to the city
centre in one car, and they would be so cheap we would pick up a new one to drive home. Your first
tank of petrol would be your only refill in each car.The only problem is, each car would be so small that
you would never be able to find them' (Gelsinger, 2002; cited in Department for Trade and Industry and
Office of Science and Technology, 2006b).
3
The 'complexity brake': borrowed from the world of artificial intelligence and the debate around the
potential for 'The Singularity' - where artificial intelligent 'agents' become more powerful than their
human equivalents (Kurzweil, 2005). The complexity brake, however, is found as we go deeper into our
understanding of natural systems, and typically find that we require more and more specialised knowledge
to characterise them, forcing the continual expansion of our scientific theories in more and more complex
ways. This seems to apply in transport - the 'silver bullet' of the clean vehicle never arrives, due to
difficulties in design and production, and delivery to the mass market; and indeed in understanding the
complex rationales for travel and vehicle purchasing patterns.
4
Augmented reality (AR) is a live view of a real-world environment, where the elements are augmented
by computer-generated content such as sound, video, text or graphics, facilitated by GPS positioning of
the user. It is related to mediated reality, in which reality is modified (perhaps diminished as well as
augmented). The technology functions by changing the current perception of reality. In contrast, virtual
reality replaces the real world with a simulated one.The possibilities are endless in informational,
entertainment or educational terms.
