A successful transition to zero-emission urban mobility begins by framing the conversation around a modified set of goals. We’ve seen some cities and businesses starting to rethink urban space and mobility costs, defining an ambitious vision as the basis for success.
Laying the foundation
Transport
Traffic focus, motorized with emphasis on automobile
Large in scale
Street as a road, physical dimensions
Reactive and static traffic management
Economic evaluation
Travel as derived demand
Demand based (speeding up traffic)
Minimizing travel time
Separating people and traffic
From ...
... to ...
Accessibility focused on equity and fairness
Human-centered urban design, including bike, foot, and wheels (not only motorized)
Local in scale based on a multistakeholder approach
Street as a space with social and environmental dimensions
Real-time, tech-enabled holistic solutions for entire ecosystems
Multi-criteria evaluation (including social, environmental)
Travel as a valued activity and derived demand
Management-based (slowing movement down)
Reasonable travel time, travel time reliability
Transformation of street as a common good, clean mobility as a service
Establish work principles for all stakeholders up front
The transition to zero emission mobility requires inclusive and multistakeholder collaboration. Contributors should align on principles for working together in advance of partnerships.
Engage external stakeholders
including the public sector, businesses, academia, residents and commuters.
Align on language and information sharing
by, for example, forming a clear terminology glossary to facilitate smooth communications. Revisit the glossary periodically to account for new and evolving socio-technological configurations.
Create an environment for open collective data usage
in order to allow for maximum innovation and synergies between different players in the ecosystem (eg, mobility innovators, tech firms etc.).
Avoid or break down internal silos
by engaging with all stakeholders and seeking cross-ministerial participation to enable action that builds on multiple perspectives and experiences. This should include—but not be limited to—legal, financing, monitoring, and enforcing entities.
Ensure agile governance
that minimizes regulatory patchwork, is focused on a clear vision, and continuously improves and adapts to changing context.
Keep track
by forming efficient, transparent, and authoritative management, evaluation, and enforcement capacities.
Establish performance indices
and risk guidelines
in advance to efficiently solve technical, organizational, and operational issues, including prior alignment on how to address issues.
Principles
Engage external stakeholders
including the public sector, businesses, academia, residents and commuters.
Ensure agile governance
that minimizes regulatory patchwork, is focused on a clear vision, and continuously improves and adapts to changing context.
Keep track
by forming efficient, transparent, and authoritative management, evaluation, and enforcement capacities.
Establish performance indices
and risk guidelines
in advance to efficiently solve technical, organizational, and operational issues, including prior alignment on how to address issues.
Align on language and information sharing
by, for example, forming a clear terminology glossary to facilitate smooth communications. Revisit the glossary periodically to account for new and evolving socio-technological configurations.
Create an environment for open collective data usage
in order to allow for maximum innovation and synergies between different players in the ecosystem (eg, mobility innovators, tech firms etc.).
Avoid or break down internal silos
by engaging with all stakeholders and seeking cross-ministerial participation to enable action that builds on multiple perspectives and experiences. This should include—but not be limited to—legal, financing, monitoring, and enforcing entities.
Economic
Economic
Societal
Societal
Societal
Environmental
Environmental
Community livability
Health impacts
Intergenerational
Mobility underserved
Human-centered design
Equity and social justice (eg, race, income, gender, age, etc.)
Societal
Societal
Cost for businesses
Cost for residents and commuters
Vehicle crash damages
Traffic congestion
Cost for cities and national governments
Economic
Economic
Depletion of non-renewable resources
Climate impacts
Habitat and biodiversity loss
Air, water, and soil pollution
Environmental
Environmental
Define an ambitious vision for success
An ambitious vision for ZEAs recognizes and integrates economic, societal, and environmental needs. When defining a vision, it is important to include not only direct effects (for example, reduced emissions within the area), but also indirect effects (for example, additional congestion in the surrounding areas, impact on stakeholders like residents and local retail). Some of these impacts can be quantified (for example, traffic volume); some will be more qualitative and will only emerge over time (for example, perceived quality of living).
Work with concrete dashboards and performance indicators
The best impact dashboard is simple and measures impact across societal, economic, and environmental areas. Some of these metrics will be directly linked to the implementation of ZEAs (like emissions); some of them will be more qualitative and look at externalities as well as macro-level effects (for example, DP gains) of ZEAs. Taking political feasibility, required time for impact, and scalability into consideration (for example, from street-level to more holistic district-level ZEAs) is critical.
Scalability
Ability to scale solutions from a single street to a larger district or even the state/country level
Time to implementation
Year of implementation
Year in which impact can be measured
Political feasibility and acceptance
Acceptance by all stakeholders
Likelihood of implementation considering local context (eg, culture, current state etc.)
CO₂/NOx emissions per km travelled
PM emissions
Noise emissions
Emissions
Environmental
Economic
Cost/revenues for all ecosystem stakeholders
Cost per commute/trip
New jobs created
Cost and revenues for cities and governments, businesses, residents
Efficiency/congestion
Congestion/hours lost in traffic
Average trip or commute time
Equity, accessibility, and convenience
Multi-modal ticketing
Share of residents within 1 mile of public transit
Access to affordable, efficient modes
Share of direct trips/point-to-point
Health and safety
Number of crashes
Indirect health-related impact based on surveys (eg, quality of living, perceived stress, etc.)
Societal
Laying the foundation
Laying the foundation
Defining a winning concept
Defining a winning concept
Quantifying the model
Quantifying the model
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