Prof. Graham Parkhurst, University of the West of England - Air Quality Implications of New Technologies for Urban Mobility.

1. Routes to Clean Air Conference
Air Quality Implications of New Technologies
for Urban Mobility
Bristol, 22 October 2015
Graham Parkhurst
graham.parkhurst@uwe.ac.uk
Professor of Sustainable Mobility
Centre for Transport & Society
Department of Geography and Environmental Management

2. Overview
• Objectives for urban transport policy that addresses air
quality policy needs
• Role of behaviour change and technological transition in
delivering policy
• Emerging urban transport technologies
– Analysis of ‘deliverability’
– Analysis of air quality implications
• Indicative Scenarios and Recommendations
2

3. What does air quality policy require
from urban transport policy?
• Less motor vehicle traffic
• Smoother traffic flow
• Traffic redistribution?
• Emissions per vehicle reduced/eliminated
3
• With appropriate technical ‘due diligence’ regarding
– Geography of exposure
– Evolving scientific knowledge regarding health effects

4. By when?
• Already behind schedule?
4/

5. How can urban transport policy
deliver?
Two broad orientations
5/
Behaviour Technological

6. Behaviour Change
• EU Project
– Review of 22 Sustainable Urban Mobility Plan Measures
6/
http://evidence-project.eu/index.php

7. Site-based travel plans
(Cairns et al. 2010; Bartle 2014a)
• Wide range of effects on car-use reduction (4-18%)
– Associated with average doubling in use-rates of alternatives
• Wide range of expenditure on plan (£2-431 per FTE)
– Expenditure and effectiveness not well related
• Some methodological concerns e.g. selection biases but
also confidence that effects are real (at least for
evaluation periods)
7/

8. Site-based Plans: Success factors
• Willingness of employers to participate
• Funding
• Use of the planning system
• Restraint measures (e.g. parking management)
• Transport infrastructure/service improvements
• Advertising and marketing
8/

9. Personalised Travel Planning
(Bartle, 2014b)
• Reduction in car driver trips typically 8-12%
• Reduction in car-driver mode share typically 5-7%
• Quality of the interactions between travel advisers and
citizens critical for higher extents of change
• But “many evaluations have been vulnerable to a degree
of reporting bias and methodological weaknesses”
– Concluded that there is a real effect but extent of change likely
to be overstated
9/

10. Behaviour change measures…
• Have useful effects amongst participants
• Considerable challenge in rolling out to whole population
– And repeating as necessary to reinforce
• Size of effects, alone, not sufficient
10/

11. Many Citizens Live in Suburban
Car-oriented Development

12. Medium-range Car Journeys Need to be Policy
Focus
Source: Department for Transport (2009) Delivering Sustainable Low Carbon Travel. Figure 2.1

13. 79
32
5
18
56
77
82 84 81
6
12 9 5
4 8
12
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
100
Under 1 mile 1 to under 2
miles
2 to under 5
miles
5 to under 10
miles
10 to under 25
miles
25 miles and
over
Percentage
Walk Bicycle Car/van Local bus Rail Other
DfT (2010) Trips by length and main mode: Britain, 2009
Walking already dominates at short-range
(cycling could at short-to-medium range)

14. Capacity and Efficiency Limits to Public Transport
Solutions
0
100
200
300
400
500
600
700
800
900
1952
1954
1956
1958
1960
1962
1964
1966
1968
1970
1972
1974
1976
1978
1980
1982
1984
1986
1988
1990
1992
1993
1995
1997
1999
2001
2003
2005
2007
2009
Pass-km(billions)
Car/van/taxi
Bus/coach
Rail
Data: Department for Transport (2010) Transport Statistics Great Britain. Table 1.1

15. Therefore new technology needs to be
part of policy
• What combination of technologies?
• What balance between technological and behaviour
change?
15/
Important to be realistic about constraints
of different technologies and possible
unintended consequences, as well as
potential to meet policy objectives.

16. Three contemporary
technologies/transitions
• Electrification
• Automation
• IT-enabled sharing (iCollectiveMobility)
16/

17. Electric cars: the unresolved questions
and issues
• Source of carbon-neutral electricity?
• Distribution capacity?
• Availability of rare raw materials?
• User acceptance of vehicle costs and characteristics?
– 25% higher purchase cost (shorter range EV)
– 75% lower energy cost per mile

18. How to recharge all
these cars?
© Copyright Bontenbal. Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license

19. 19/

20. Too Little Too Late?
Ecars worth -3.1% road transport emissions
reduction by 2020

21. 21
Driverless Cars on UK Roads

22. Benefits identified by DfT (2015)
22/
The Pathway to Driverless Cars: A detailed review of regulations for automated vehicle technologies

23. KPMG (2015):
‘Roadmap’
23/

24. KPMG (2015) UK ‘Market
Penetration’ scenario to 2030
24/
Non-Connected Connected Highly automated Fully automated

25. Outstanding Issues:
• significant technological challenges
• transition ‘pathway’ to full automation
– Major street redesign?
– Need to retrain road users
– Retrofitting of older vehicles?
– Revised road user regulations
– Financing/funding model
• non-transport sector implications
– E.g. land value changes if car parks redundant
– Public health if walking/cycling discouraged
25/
?

26. iCollectiveMobility
• Mobility supply/demand brokerage eplatforms
• Shared travel information e.g. Waze, mytraindelays
• Shared, dynamically-routed taxis and taxibuses
26/

27. Mobility On Demand Laboratory Environment
(MODLE)
Demonstration project for dynamic taxibus service in Bristol northern
suburbs

29. Summary of Implications for air quality
Less traffic Smoother flow Traffic
redistribution
Emissions per
vehicle
Deliverability
by 2025
Deliverability
by 2035
Electrification
-2 (reduced
generalised
cost)
-1 (traffic
growth)
1 (battery
optimisation,
LEZs)
2
Incremental
change
Significant fleet
share
Automation
Levels 2-3
-1 (reduced
‘deterrents’ to
car use)
1 (calming
effect)
-1 (willingness
to use currently
unattractive
routes)
0? (smoother
drive but higher
power demand)
Incremental
change
Significant fleet
share
Automation
Levels 4-5
-2 (cars
available to all;
empty running)
2 (managed
system)
1 (managed
system)
0
Significant
technological
development
needed
Uncertain: part-
automation in
urban areas?
iCollective
Mobility
2 1
0? (Dynamic
routing:
consequences
uncertain)
0
No significant
technological
barriers
No significant
technological
barriers
29/

30. Key points of analysis
• None of the technologies is alone sufficient to solve the Air
Quality problem
– Except electrification in the long-run (but at high congestion cost)
• Synergies occur if all three are delivered in a package
• Only iCollectiveMobility can be delivered at large-scale now
• Automation and electrification have short-term unintended
effects
– Potentially very significant in case of automation
30/

31. Nightmare Scenario
• Little increase in shared mobility
• Electrification worsens air quality in the short run
– Traffic and congestion growth offsets reduction in ICE use
• Automation is a benefit for the purchasers of luxury cars
– Also increases traffic and congestion
• High infrastructure costs reduce funds for other interventions
• Clutter of urban areas increased due to large number of
private vehicles + equipment to connect and charge them
• Walking and cycling less attractive/popular
31/

32. ‘Efficient Automation’
• Walking and cycling continue to be promoted
– health and traffic reduction benefits
• Core urban transport supply is delivered by
buses/taxibuses/shared taxis
– Mostly small to medium-sized vehicles
– Dynamically booked connected vehicles
– Increasingly electrically powered
– Increasingly autonomous
32/

33. Citizens in practice associate
automation concept with:
• collective ownership
• standardised vehicles
• Socially positive goals
• Logical, efficient
transport system
• Better quality of journey
(as passenger)
• Electric/clean power
33/

34. Behaviour Change easier to deliver as
part of a systemic change
• Materials – changes to
vehicles, fuels, streets
• Competences – changes in
traveller/driver/owner skills in
terms of booking, riding,
charging, paying
• Meaning – shared mobility as a
new understanding alongside
public and private transport
Competence
Meaning
Materials
Diagram from
Williams, 2015
Social
Practice
Theory

35. Recommendations for an urban mobility
policy to address air quality
• More serious attention be given to collective mobility
solutions
• Greater targeting in the promotion of electric mobility
– Focus on shared use contexts: car clubs, pool cars
• More informed public debate about benefits and costs of
automation in road transport
35/