Sustainable Urban Transport and deprived urban areas: Good Practice Examples in Europe (NEW UPDATE)
Social cohesion and participation in social life are determined with a growing demand for accessibility. Everyone is expected to be mobile and it is taken for grant that everybody is mobile. In practice many people are disadvantaged when it comes to opportunities for mobility.
Some areas have a high level of accessibility where other are hard to reach. Besides this, divergent cost depending on distance and location can form a problem for some people. Thus, individual opportunities to use a wide range of urban transport are not equal for everybody. This is specially the case in deprived neighbourhoods.
Accessibility and health endangering
An important aim of transport planning is the safeguarding of mobility opportunities for all. It is necessary to pay more concerns to the social need when developing urban transport systems. Besides the problem of accessibility, unacceptable and health endangering impact on local residents because of heavy traffic volumes need attention. Noise, problems of air pollution and accident hazards cause health problems and a poor quality of life, once again most common in deprived areas.
Attention for the social, economic and ecological dimension of transport
This research, carried out by the German institute of Urban Affairs (Difu), introduces concepts which illustrate how an integrated planning approach can improve mobility in urban areas without interfering with sustainable transport development. An integrated approach is an important part of Cohesion Policy. This approach emphasizes that promoting development requires the close coordination of public policies. In the paper equal attention will be given on the social, economic and ecological dimension of sustainable transport development.
The integrated approach illustrated by 21 good practices
For illustrating this integrated approach, 21 examples of good practice from 12 Member States are presented in this paper. These examples show a move away from infrastructural projects towards so-called soft policies like providing information on transport, transport consultation and transport education. This trend is not yet equally developed through whole Europe. Besides these soft policies there is also a trend towards prohibition and charging noticeable. Road traffic regularity instruments, access restrictions and regulation on parking indicate this second trend. A last important conclusion is the participation of players. The majority of the examples show that a participation of players is crucial for projects to succeed.