Carbon neutrality demands data-driven transport planning.
Smart Transport Planning
Transportation creates 37% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions (by end-use), and that share is increasing as developing countries move toward fossil-fuel, auto-centric communities such as those in the U.S.
There is no scenario for avoiding the worst of climate change’s impact on society that doesn’t include a massive reduction in emissions from transportation, which is a complex and difficult transition.
Recent policy, business and economic drivers have gravitated toward electrification of vehicles as the panacea for transport emissions. But experts agree that while electrification is absolutely necessary, it’s not a complete solution1. As shown in the diagram below, electric vehicles (EV) only cover two of the four major levers we have to activate to achieve transportation carbon reduction.
A society’s transportation emissions are the product of four factors*.
To reach necessary carbon-cutting targets, we must reduce the vehicle miles traveled (VMT) and improve vehicle occupancy (for example, a personal mode shift to transit and better freight load factors) in auto-centric countries and help those countries that are not yet auto-centric find a better path. Transportation planning is the most effective tool to do this, and it helps EV adoption too.
* The diagram represents my transportation modification of the IPAT (impact, population, affluence and technology) framework for environmental impact developed in 1971 by Erlich and Holdren.
Influencing transportation behavior
Available infrastructure drives people’s transportation behavior, and transportation planning is what's behind infrastructure decisions. Quite simply — if there’s no bus route connecting your home neighborhood to your work neighborhood, you’ll never take the bus to work. If there are no groceries or day cares near your home due to poor zoning and planning, you’ll be driving many miles each day for basic necessities. If the EV charging stations aren’t in the right locations, we’ll never get the EV adoption we need. A well-developed infrastructure plan that places roads, trails, chargers, transit lines and basic needs in the right places can last 30 or 50 years, reducing transportation emissions every single day.
Good transportation planning involves changes in land use, policy and incorporation of real human behavior on top of asphalt and steel, but it’s always been a challenge because it requires coordinating many different sectors of society and government. And it’s getting harder as behavioral “norms” are shattering in the face of the pandemic, delivery of everything, ride-hailing, electrification and autonomous driving. During the next 50 years, the very landscape of many cities will shift as climate change moves coast lines and alters the location of “safe” places to live.
Good transportation planning involves changes in land use, policy and incorporation of real human behavior on top of asphalt and steel.
Better planning with big data
How can we plan in such a dynamic world, and with the greenhouse gas stakes so high? First — we must have consistent data about how the transportation system is working today. Most planners plan with either no data, or data that’s sparse and years out of date. We simply can’t manage what we don’t measure. New big data options can plug this gap, and many agencies have already had great success.
Planners must quickly use this data to adopt a new framework of planning amidst uncertainty. This requires identifying choices that will reduce emissions under multiple scenarios. Thus, planners must consider an array of futures, not just one future. This may also require new types of iterative planning. Planners can use data to measure how a transportation system is working and acknowledge when and why decisions made aren’t achieving their intended outcomes. This shouldn’t be seen as failure, but as an opportunity to adapt the plan to a constantly changing world.
None of this is easy! The job of transportation planning in the coming decades requires more creativity, more flexibility, more data skills, more compelling communication tactics and more social engagement. And that job has never been more important. ■
More Resources
Jacobs Acquires Mobility Analytics Leader StreetLight Data, Inc.
StreetLight Data’s Laura Schewel on Putting Big Data to Work | “Our New Mobility Future”
What If Surface Transport Could Be Carbonized with Economic Incentives?
1For more information, review the International Energy Agency’s Sustainable Development Scenario, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s Transportation Chapter, and many academic papers, including Milovanoff et al., 2021.