Full Version - Issue 7 | November 2011 - LTA Academy

Mohinder Singh
Dean
LTA Academy
A
s we publish yet another issue
of JOURNEYS, the contributions
of our authors attest to the
fact that matters relating to urban and
transport planning continue to challenge
governments, policy makers and societies all
over the world. It is clear that great minds
are kept busy with ideas and concepts on
how to move people, goods and services in
the best possible way. The issue is getting
more complex with greater urbanisation in
every country, and as the global village gets
smaller, as more people want or need to
travel or transport things. Yet, rising to the
challenge, urban and transport planners
are unstinting in their efforts to make
improvements and chart the way forward.
Professor KW Axhausen and Alex Erath
from ETH Zurich (Swiss Federal Institute of
Technology Zurich) give a glimpse of the
research on Mobility and Transportation at
the Future Cities Laboratory. The goal is to
derive tools to manage, plan and optimise
the flow of people and goods at different
Dean’s Words
time scales and in their interactions with all
elements of the future city. The project has
both medium and long-term perspectives.
The authors say that the integration of the
medium and long term horizons in the
research is a significant methodological
innovation that will enable a global analysis
of complex issues related to mobility in the
future.
From Mott MacDonald, Damian Price
and Amy Leather explore what is still
considered a relatively new element of the
transport practitioner’s toolbox, Transport
Mobility Management (TMM). They present
examples of international best practices in
TMM and examine the degrees of success.
They have found that the more successful
TMM initiatives are those embedded in the
wider transport approach of a government,
authority or service provider. The authors
have even distilled the Top Ten Measures for
success in TMM to share with our readers.
Collaborating at the LTA Academy, Professor
David Hensher and Gabriel Wong examine
the different approaches to the provision
of public transport in various cities around
the world. These approaches include
government operation, competition in the
market, government regulation of fares
and services, competitive tendering, and
negotiated performance-based contracts.
What emerges is that there is no one-size fits
JOURNEYS | November 2011
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