A better world is possible - Global Commons Institute

Copyright Bruce Nixon 2010. All rights reserved. This electronic copy is provided free for personal, non-commercial use only.
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patterns are made possible by the availability and cost of transport networks. However, there is an
intervening factor at work—behavioural choice, in other words, how people react to the many different
combinations of location and methods of travel which are available to them.
A national funding scheme for smarter transportation, of £200 million a year for 10 years, with specific
initiatives for:
shopping (including home delivery, local collection centres, local outlets, local sourcing;
schools (including walking and cycling initiatives but with school safety zones and non-statutory
school bus initiatives in rural areas);
workplaces (including established techniques to encourage video conferencing, car share, public
transport, cycling and walking); and
leisure facilities
Walkable Streets Policies such as a new “Walkable Streets” fund, provide cycle priority networks and bike
hire schemes in major towns and cities, along with reformed street priorities and street design to increase
safety and make walking and cycling a real option for short journeys.
Planning policies should reduce the need to travel and support higher density development around highfrequency
public transport. Policy statements on economic development and shopping should include a
stronger focus on developments in, rather than outside, town centres.
Longer term policy recommendations include:
New parking policies, including maximum parking levels in new commercial developments, reducing
over time and charges for car parking over these limits, with the revenue going to reductions in
business rates.
Better local services and shops in new developments: housing developers should give endowments
rather than one-off planning gain deals to fund these.
Use eco-towns and eco-developments to show it’s possible to create developments where people
can choose not to own a car.
Expose real transport costs of other decisions: Government decisions on the location/centralisation
of health, education, leisure and other facilities (like post offices) should take full account of
increased transport costs and emissions and the results of such analyses should be made public.
Increase public transport trips. Improving public transport in association with the other policies
already mentioned would produce a “total sustainable travel offer” to allow households to replace
second and third cars and to target other journeys producing large CO 2 emissions, such as
“chauffeur” trips where parents act as unpaid taxi drivers (15% of passenger transport CO 2 ).
Cut freight emissions. Freight transport accounts for 36% of UK transport CO 2 emissions: 23% for trucks, 12%
for vans and 1% for rail freight. Emissions from this segment are growing faster than emissions from cars. The
report recommends:
Road charging for trucks, with incentives for greater efficiency and reductions in vehicle duty.
Increasing rail freight by increasing capacity on the rail network and using the planning system to
locate new freight warehousing next to rail lines.
Increasing water freight and reducing its emissions by promoting the use of more local ports, use of
bio-fuels and more efficient ship designs.
Reducing van emissions through encouraging cleaner vehicles and fuels through tax breaks and
regulation, as now applied to cars, and also driver training and vehicle maintenance.
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