Session coverage by guest blogger Melissa Yee
Session Details
- Presented by Rohan White
- Location: Room Two
- Time: Session #1 (11:00am - 11:35am)
- Number of Attendees: 10
- Format: Presentation and discussion
Rohan ran a facilitated discussion whereby each individual in the room was encouraged to contribute their ideas on the issue in a one minute block. The guiding question was: What do you think is most important? Where are we right now and where can we move as a society?
Rohan White ponders the nexus between social justice and transport modes.
Key Discussion Points
Car travel dominates land based transport. Our road system is dominated by cars because of the political system. Roads are designed for cars at an average speed of 50km/hr, pedestrians travel at 5km/hr so the permeability of the system for a pedestrian is much lower. A pedestrian oriented system needs to be much more permeable at those speeds to improve the mobility of pedestrians, walking time and therefore the effectiveness of walking.
Key question: how to ensure that modes work together to ensure best mobility for all. Moving away from car dominated transport to more sustainable modes.
Poor integration of modes. Motorcycles and hybrids under-recognised.
We need more community transport but due to the legal barriers this is not accessible.
Emergency services highest priority.
How do we capture the interdependency of transport and built form to deliver?
Station design. Unfortunate outcomes: e.g. Nunawading, Springvale, Williams Landing, Mitcham brutalist architecture. Managing conflicts between modes not effective. E.g. bus stops located long distances from stations. We have lost the art of designing stations. Low impact and immediate access needed.
A lot of the conflicts between different modes of transport come down to different levels of regulation
Electric car charging. Electric cars provide calmer transport experience. Less likely to result in accidents. Practical, quieter streets, smaller urban vehicles will ensure people are more cooperative on the road. However, changing a car to electric not going to address congestion. Complete re-think required. The system is broken. Get people out of cars and invest in public transport, walking and cycling. Electric cars a band-aid.
We regard stations as things to keep people out of. Rather, they should be connecting points in our suburbs.
Roads aren’t for cars- they’re for cricket!
Hitchhiking a forgotten phenomena. Used to be more common but horror stories have killed it off. Perhaps a role for technology to bring it back, ala Uber. A hitchhiking app.
Justice: respecting people’s time. An invisible part of time on the traffic network is traffic lights which are designed around cars. Costs more human energy to stop and start at lights and makes is less pleasant. Green wave giving priority to cyclists one way that this respect is shown.
Everyone deserves access to transport. We need demand responsive transport.
Andy posed the question: Are we anywhere close to being able to deal with Melbourne @ 8 Million?
Increased population pressures on public transport. Aging population, not reflected in planning. No appreciation of aging. 30-35% of people over 60 who are treated as dependant by the transport planners and not by government. So planning needs to respond to demographic shifts. People over 50 are not dispensable.
Bus network overlooked. Poor service on regular buses. Improvement can play a big role in meeting future transport needs. The bus network needs to be invested in. The smart buses are good but the regular buses are not used because they don’t have the capacity and are not reliable. This is the only way that other connections can be made to complete the “transport system” and get people out of their cars.
Land use planning and transport considered separately. Density debate required. Density doesn’t have to be ugly. Critical mass required to justify public transport. Concentration of land uses, change zoning.
Community consultation - why don’t we consult people in the transport design process. Top-down, forced on people. Software user design one example of an alternative process. Any other product is tested by asking the user. There is room to engage communities and test the usability of the design.
Reliability a major factor in improving people’s experience (e.g trams). Public transport needs to be more reliable which in turn takes away stress and results in more cooperative communities. Compromises need to be made by other road users.
Young people can feel marginalised by government and PTV including ticketing inspectors. Hostile environment.
There is a disconnect between timetabling and responding to stats.
Regional areas - very car depdendent. E.g. Bendigo. PT provision reflects its status as a social service, rather than a mode of choice. As a result, much easier for people to use cars. There needs to be a culture change in making people believe in other options than the car. The bus is the “loser cruiser” which is looked down upon.
Road system an example of cooperation. Each day people manage to cooperate on the roads.
The car is a symbol of cooperation, in that most people do not have crashes. The car is the paradigm of miscommunication, which is a basis to move forward from.
School buses under appreciated. Not thought about as connected to remainder of transport system. The irony of school buses being part of our formative years and then not connected to the rest of the system when you are out of school.
Policy should be based on mobility, not movement. Changes the rules - more then about how to meet needs, rather than modal focus.
Which mode gets priority is really about managing a finite amount of space. Understanding your own behaviour is critical, and how it impacts on the wider system. There’s a finite amount of space for everyone but everyone has a responsibility to work together. Every single person is contributing to the problem so understand your own behaviour. Don’t blame, be part of the change.
Health- it isn’t fair that people are hurt because of bad design choices. Inactivity costs Australia $13 billion- is it fair that our taxes go to people that make bad transport choices which contribute to these negative health outcomes.
Justice: space, mobility, financial justice, equity, health. Parameters for justice.
Driving, rates of obesity, lack of activity. Should taxes fund this mode? Is that just? This should inform priorities.
Access to goods is important. Large shopping centres and the land uses.