3. Early days
• Buchanan & Halcrow
• Maps/town planning
• Road Engineer,
Exeter
• Safety – 8,000 road
deaths p/a in 1930s
less than 2,000 now
4. In the war …
Bridge over the River Nile
Juba, S Sudan
Demobilisation leave
RIBA
5. Petrol Head and Environmentalist?
“Cars – the ultimate go anywhere, at
any time, with anything, transport
machines”
“Nothing is quite so pleasurable as
driving a powerful car slowly”
“There is a great deal at stake,
conserving, in the face of the
onslaught of motor traffic, a major
part of the heritage of the English
speaking world”
6. Rebel?
• Union activist?
− First Division civil servants vs “professionals”
− “temperamentally unsuited to planning” (!)
− Moved to The Inspectorate
• Roskill Commission – Note of Dissent
− Did not accept the results of the cost-benefit
analysis – never trusted economists at all
− Certainly not afraid to stick with his convictions
8. Traffic in Towns Framework
1. Transport a function of land use – origins &
destinations
2. Major roads separated from “environmental
areas”
3. Environmental standards imply absolute
limits to traffic
4. Accessibility – Cost – Environment
5. Environmental management as well as civil
engineering solutions
9. Recommendations & Options
• One recommendation “the sooner attention paid
to the adverse environmental effects of motor
traffic…the better for the nation”
• Rest of report devoted to the choices available
to authorities. We did not choose for them!
11. Legacy Conclusions
• Generations of UK transport planners
• Transport Planning – a UK industry?
• Incredible longevity – the analytical framework &
policy choices much the same today
13. Transport in Cities
If how to cope with future traffic growth was the key issue of
the last 50 years, what are the key issues now?
•
•
•
•
•
•
Urbanisation growing rapidly
Technology changing fast
Economic drivers, environmental constraints
Outward sprawl of cities
Ageing populations
Internationalisation
14. How do we deal with those questions?
•
•
•
•
Fixed land use
Straight line growth forecasts
Transport valued almost entirely in time savings
Policy objectives fixed
16. Growth of Mobility in France
Distance Travelled per Day per Capita (Grubler, 1990)
100,000
TGV
Air
Two-wheeler
Horses
Waterways
1,000
Rail
Cars & buses
100
All modes
Trend
2000
1950
1900
1850
10
1800
METRES
10,000
18. New Technology
Quality of Place
Driverless vehicles
Personal Rapid Transit
Demand Responsive Transport
Real Time Information
How can transport make cities
nicer places to live and work?
What is that worth?
Transport
Policy Support
Infrastructure is not enough!
Policy support across planning,
taxation, charging,
environment is vital
Economy
Transport
In
Cities
Peak Car?
Urbanisation
Wifi connectivity
Walk/cycle
Shared space
Environment
Environment
Economic Drivers
Agglomeration & Density
Transport Efficiency
Flexibility
Investment costs
Operating subsidy/profit
Global Trends
Land Use
Transport & Land Use
Land use sets transport demand, but
transport also sets land use with road
& rail producing v different
development patterns
Carbon
Global Warming
Air Quality
Health – active transport
19. Scenarios for Air Quality/Emissions
Negative
Positive
Urbanisation
More congestion for more
people
Technology
Fuel efficiency
Autonomous vehicles
Electrically powered
Sprawl
More car dependency
Policy Tools
Road Pricing
Travel Demand Management
Active travel
Health
Health issues may be bigger
than we think
Economic Drivers
Quality of Place
Density
20. Conclusions
• Traffic in Towns – remarkably insightful
and longstanding
• Framework for thinking about the issues
rather than an answer
• Still relevant 50 years on
• Transport in Cities – I’m on a hiding to
nothing!
