Bijlage 6 Effecten impact lucht geluidskwaliteit

Accounting for people: The distribution of active travel benefits and disbenefits The balance of evidence overwhelmingly indicates that society benefits from active travel in safe and secure conditions. But what does the evidence say about the distribution of those benefits in different contexts and among different population groups, and especially for lower-income, under-represented and otherwise disadvantaged groups? The answer to this question matters because pro-active travel policies may not deliver intended outcomes across the whole of society if most of the benefits flow only to some of the population. Likewise, pro-active travel policies may not deliver expected benefits in contexts and countries where the ability or willingness of people to act on them is curtailed or where the starting points impact how strongly or how quickly benefits accrue. The balance of evidence on the distribution of the benefits of active travel indicates that active travel is “healthy for all but less beneficial for many” (Braun et al., 2023). On a basic level, the benefits of active travel are only realised if people actually walk, cycle or otherwise engage in active forms of travel.

In many instances – and especially in lower- and middle-income countries and within lower-income populations – people walk or cycle not out of choice or concern for health but because no affordable alternatives are available (Arellana et al., 2020; Benton et al., 2023; Ghimire and Bardaka, 2023; Keall et al., 2022; Loo and Siiba, 2019; Sagaris et al., 2022; Stehlin, 2019; Vanderschuren and Jennings, 2016). Nonetheless, the link between perceptions of active travel as being synonymous with poverty does not always hold, as in the case of a recent survey in Nairobi (Basil and Nyachieo, 2023). An additional factor to consider is that the prevalence of ill health and multi-morbidity among low-income populations also dampens the uptake of maintenance of active travel in those population segments (Braun et al., 2023; Braun, Rodriguez and Gordon-Larsen, 2019; Vancampfort et al., 2018). In all countries, the travelling environment may discourage walking and cycling due to network discontinuities, pollution and unwelcoming and dangerous traffic and street environments (Benton et al., 2023; Bostock, 2001; Carboni, 2021; Carboni et al., 2022; Figueroa Martínez et al., 2019; Grudgings et al., 2018; Mullen, 2021; Prati, 2018; Stark and Meschik, 2018). Active travel in inhospitable contexts is unpleasant, dangerous, uncomfortable and strenuous.

As soon as people can afford other options such as motorbikes, public transport or cars, many will stop walking and cycling to get around (Benton et al., 2023; Ghimire and Bardaka, 2023; Sagaris et al., 2022; Stehlin, 2019). Among higher-income groups and contexts, unwelcoming traffic and street environments will prevent many people not already walking or cycling from ever starting. Encouraging the maintenance or increase of walking or cycling based on health or other benefits in these contexts will not match many people’s lived experiences or priorities and thus will likely not deliver the expected results. Spatially disaggregated or population-specific assessments of active travel benefits ensure that policies supporting active travel uptake are more equitably distributed. Evidence from such assessments shows that, in many cases, this equitable distribution does not occur. A spatially disaggregated HIA of increased cycling in the greater Los Angeles area found that while all race and income groups benefited, some benefited much less than others (Braun et al., 2023). The overall estimated effect of more cycling (a 50% increase over current levels) was a net reduction of 12.4% in overall mortality and net block-level reductions in mortality ranging from 4% to 14% (Braun et al., 2023).

Disaggregated analysis of benefits shows that benefits accrue most strongly to non-Hispanic white, upperincome and college-educated population segments. Blocks with higher percentages of Black and Hispanic residents, lower income and higher poverty levels and a higher percentage of no-car households experienced significantly fewer benefits. There are many plausible reasons for this disparity. These include

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reduced traffic safety and increased crash risks, closer proximity to motorways, higher ambient air pollution levels, and a lack of cycling infrastructure. At the same time, low physical activity levels and poor baseline health imply that these neighbourhoods would benefit most, and most quickly, from increased cycling (Braun et al., 2023). Another study examining the association between active travel, socio-economic status, gentrification and self-reported health in the United States found similar racial and socio-economic disparities (Barajas and Braun, 2021). Overall, cycling for utilitarian travel in the previous week and increased walking were correlated with higher levels of self-reported health. This was much less the case for cyclists of colour and lower-income cyclists. Racial and socioeconomic disparities in reported health differed little among population groups for walking trips. Many of the same explanations for the gap in active travel and selfreported health between different population groups outlined above also hold for this study. For example, 18.1% of Black adults self-reported poor or fair health compared to only 7.9% of White adults (Barajas and Braun, 2021). The uneven distribution of active travel benefits affects how well pro-active travel policies achieve their aims and materially improve people’s lives.

People experience these benefits in different ways and at different levels. Government policies must account for these differences. For instance, general active travel promotion, cycling skill classes or communication efforts based on the health benefits of active travel will most likely not gain traction where active travel environments are inhospitable. Policies deploying infrastructure, improving safety and security and reducing exposure to pollution may be more effective in realising overall benefits in these instances. Likewise, focusing infrastructure development where the relative benefits of active travel are already high (e.g. in high-income neighbourhoods with less disadvantaged populations) will likely bring fewer societal benefits than if they were rolled out uniformly on a regional basis or at least in disadvantaged communities first (Barajas and Braun, 2021; Stehlin, 2019).

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Why improving the quality of walking and cycling is so challenging in many modern cities Clear and compelling reasons exist to retain or increase walking and cycling in cities and towns worldwide. Doing so, however, will require addressing the physical, social and institutional space given to privately owned motorised transport, including cars, vans and lorries. Simply seeking to deploy pro-walking and procycling policies in places designed to facilitate the use of large motor vehicles is rarely a successful strategy. Understanding, addressing and adjusting the technological embeddedness of individual motorised transport in cities is critical to improving walking and cycling in cities. Technologies – especially those adopted at scale – are consequential because of how they change the world around them and not only because of what they enable people to do. Technologies are not isolated from their use and effect. Acquiring the skills needed to use a technology – and its concomitant use – creates a mental model of linkages between action, effect and meaning. This mental model or “system of meaning” supports the further use and anchoring of that technology in society (Nye, 2007). This has been true for successive technological revolutions from the invention of the wheel, the printing press, electricity, the shipping container and many others.

The changes to which technology contributes are often directed and desired. Indeed, successful technologies create value for their users, which is why they are popular. But “latent in every tool are unforeseen transformations” (Nye, 2007) that are not anticipated, often not wanted, and almost always grow stronger with time. As with other technologies, the uptake of the car has shaped society – particularly cities and towns – in ways that reinforce its use. Changes in transport infrastructure, land-use patterns, related services such as insurance and financing, and policy-making frameworks favour car use – and, in doing so, suppress walking, cycling and other non-mobility uses of public space. Other underestimated or unforeseen outcomes of 20th-century automobile-focused development include its contribution to traffic deaths, injuries and other degraded health outcomes; local environmental stresses and global climate disruption; and the economic burden generated by congestion, pollution, diminished health and mortality. Automobility has positively contributed to the lives of many people. Still, it has also imposed costs that have only been understood and measured long after cars first showed up on city streets. Automobility has also physically reshaped cities and changed how people carry out activities in urban space.

Today’s cities and towns are larger and more spread out than ever before. They are designed in ways that often require residents to travel quickly and for long distances to fully participate in society and maintain access to labour, social and leisure opportunities, healthcare, and other necessities. This spatial distribution of opportunities and the accompanying framework of institutional support makes cities both car-friendly and car-dependent – just as it makes them walking- and cycling-deterrent. In cities built to facilitate car use, and given the historical benefits the car initially conferred, it becomes difficult to address their role objectively. Furthermore, any assessment of the car versus other alternatives is influenced by largely unspoken and unconscious assumptions about car travel as the default, preferred and permanent way to get around (Walker, Tapp and Davis, 2022). This “moto-normative” worldview results in a built-in acceptance of risks and harms from motor vehicles that would not be acceptable in other domains. This worldview also complicates accurately assessing the severity and range of negative impacts associated with car use (Verkade and te Brömmelstroet, 2022).

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How the car became the norm in cities Like other transport modes such as the bicycle, the rail-based streetcar and the horse-drawn carriage, the car was first introduced into cities as a luxury good. All these technologies had two things in common when introduced. First, each allowed people to access more opportunities in the roughly one hour that people globally devote to daily travel, irrespective of city and era (Marchetti, 1994). Second, each was universally explicitly opposed on the grounds that the speed they introduced was both dangerous and socially undesirable. As with prior transport technologies, mass production brought down the purchase cost of cars, and public support for infrastructure and energy supply brought down operating costs. What differed with the car was that the speed differential with other transport modes was significant and led to so-called “hypermobile” societies (Norton, 2007, 2008; Adams, 2005). Cities in hypermobile societies are designed or often redesigned, with motorised transport as the default (and often unquestioned) modal choice. This approach focuses on delivering speed-induced travel time savings to individuals but often ignores the impact on other users and amenities in cities – notably the use of space by non-car occupants (Crozet, 2019, 2020).

These cities are, in many ways, fundamentally “cardependent” (Goodwin et al., 1995; Gössling S., Mattioli, 2020). Society has increasingly conflated the mobility of people with the mobility of people in cars (Gartman, 2004). This shift frames what defines freedom of movement, what constitutes a good life and what it requires, with automobility at the centre of all three answers (Sheller and Urry, 2000). The increase in access and opportunity afforded by the car and its contribution to economic and societal advances are clear and unquestioned. But these benefits have eroded conditions for travel by other means (walking and cycling in particular) just as the benefits they confer to car occupants have themselves eroded with mass motorisation. In hypermobile societies, opportunities are dispersed across ever-expanding and sprawling urban and nonurban agglomerations. Those who cannot take part in this hypermobility are disadvantaged and have an increased risk of social exclusion. Beyond the negative impact on those who cannot benefit from hypermobility, hypermobility impacts all. Evidence suggests that hypermobile societies are more dangerous, anonymous, less trusting and, as a result, much more isolating (Adams, 2005). As with other technologies that exert large and systemic effects with their dominance, the uptake of car usage crowds out the use of other transport modes.

As car-based planning has taken hold, land uses best served by longer distances and fast travel have become the norm (Crozet, 2020; Norton, 2008). Commercial or other amenities and opportunities are spaced out in clusters best accessed by cars, and the area delineated by streets increases just as the number of amenities and opportunities within those areas decreases. Changes to the physical layout of the city make it easier to use a car to go about daily life, but the distances and travel speeds it imposes make it increasingly difficult – or impossible – to live without access to a car. In this way, the car (like other dominant technologies) exerts a “radical monopoly”, whereby its consumption becomes compulsory to lead a fulfilled life (Illich, 1974). This radical monopoly has been reinforced through network externalities (Webber, 1992) that increased the value of private vehicle ownership as vehicle ownership increased. This increase in value is directly tied to the complementary public (and private) investment increases that accompanied the growing prevalence of private cars (King, Smart and Manville, 2022). Much of the intrinsic utilitarian value of the car can only be achieved by restricting other non-motorised activities.

From a utilitarian perspective, the car gives users the ability and potential to travel at very high speeds and over long distances with limited physical exertion. However, this can only be achieved if the

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car driver can travel without major obstacles. These benefits decrease if car drivers are not prioritised or allocated enough reserved space to reach those speeds. They also fall as the number of drivers increases. The car provides its users with the highest value when several conditions are met. First, policy makers maximise the space reserved for large and motorised vehicles’ exclusive use. Second, priority is given to car users over other modes and the number of potential conflicts with other modes is minimised by removing these other modes from “car space”. Third, the number of car users must be contained. In short, if the movement of pedestrians, cyclists and other road users with lower maximum and average speeds are restricted while reserving space for car drivers, the first condition for car drivers to travel faster is achieved. The wider the space, the faster the possible speeds. Similarly, prioritising the speed of car drivers by reducing the number of intersections (e.g. limiting where pedestrians may cross and how they may cross the car space) further benefits car users. However, as the number of car drivers increases, the degree to which these benefits are conferred to their users decreases through crowding and congestion.

Moto-normativity contributes to the systematic marginalisation of non-car transport modes (and other public space usages) across several domains, including investment, space allocation and use, and traffic priority. This system has also perpetuated power and gender imbalances. Moto-normative traffic systems have largely been designed for (some) men by other men. Planners and engineers seeking to be “gender blind” have, in practice, neglected women’s needs and desires (Sahama, Wyeth and Pojani, 2021). As a result, the least powerful members of society have tended to be those who more often travel without cars. Racialised communities, women and low-income groups are often overrepresented in public transport ridership (see e.g. American Public Transportation Association, 2017), and women have also been found to make more walking trips than men in a variety of different contexts (Goel et al., 2023). Additionally, non-car travel modes have generally garnered less interest and funding. A central feature of moto-normativity has been the monopolisation of mobility space by motorised transport. Mobility space is among the most contested spaces in cities, and there is ample evidence of its unequal and often inequitable distribution (e.g. ITF, 2022a).

Urban street space and mobility space have long been spaces of competition between different socio-technical systems, with proponents of different uses fighting to establish or retain the “legitimate” right to use this space (Norton, 2007) and thus influence how it is allocated. Over the last century, motor vehicle proponents and policy makers largely succeeded in prioritising street space usage for motorised transport and thus de-emphasised its use for nonmotorised transport alternatives and other non-mobility uses. The resulting disproportional over-allocation of public mobility space for the use and storage of private vehicles was part of a larger trend in the 20th century of privatising and commoditising public spaces. This process has had important social and political implications limiting (to varying degrees) people's ability to move, meet, and interact freely (Kirby, 2008; Kohn, 2004). Within the larger prism of public space tension between the private and public realms, urban road space was ceded to (private) motorised transport, effectively constraining all other uses for the benefit of a few. This over-allocation of space to the car is particularly inefficient. More than 80% of personal vehicle space usage per unit of time corresponds to the static use of space while vehicles are parked (ITF, 2022a).

For much of the past century, policy makers have allocated ever more space to the car. Road capacity for motorised vehicles has been expanded to increase car speeds, simultaneously reducing the space allocated to other modes and uses. Increased road capacity has, however, given rise to further demand for motorised travel, including induced demand (see Goodwin, 1996). This has contributed to increases in travel times, which have often triggered a new bout of road capacity expansion at the expense of all other users and uses. While local conditions mediate the impact of induced demand, there is widespread

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evidence of its significance. Importantly, induced demand is likely higher for capacity improvements in urban areas or on highly congested routes (WSP and Rand Europe, 2018). Re-centring cities around walking and cycling requires changing the moto-normative model of city life and development. However, shifting away from the private-car paradigm can be complex and slow (Pisoni, Christidis, and Navajas Cawood, 2022). One of the principal reasons for this is that moto-normativity encourages car “blindness” and car “blinders”, both of which emerge from cognitive processing biases. Both forms of bias make it difficult to re-legitimise non-motorised road space usage.

How moto-normativity shapes our view of mobility in cities Moto-normative assumptions may suppress efforts to increase walking and cycling, as well as more diverse uses of urban public space. The associated unintended biases that can arise from these assumptions must be acknowledged and understood to successfully guide efforts to diversify urban mobility and provide more choices to people in how they move and live in cities and towns. This section describes how motonormativity shapes views of mobility and how “car blindness” and “car blinders” in both public discourse and in decision making can make it more difficult to see past the car but easier to ignore many of its negative impacts. What that was a convergence of a worldview, business interests, and individual interests conflated into a societal imperative to shape cities for speed and individual convenience. The transport systems of cities today did not occur by chance: cities became car-centric cities because they were designed to accommodate and facilitate car use. Over time, the processes that reinforce the car as the default norm for urban mobility become less visible as the system is further shaped around the car. Car blindness: The invisibility of moto-normativity

The car has achieved such hegemonic power that its role in policy making and target setting is often invisible. In the chaos of urban reality, cars can come to seem endemic given how abundant, ever-present, and engrained they are in the everyday existence of so many urban centres. Under these conditions, the scale of the space allocated and used to accommodate car travel in cities is difficult to contextualise. In contrast, small micromobility vehicles (fewer in number and much smaller in size), street vendors and sidewalk cafés tend to be viewed by some sections of the population and policy makers as cluttering up public space. Too often in these discussions on public space usage, private cars are not seen – nor is the amount of space given to them in urban landscapes questioned. Any attempt to re-allocate space is contested by different users, who would like the space to be allocated in their favour, with motorists being particularly averse to bike-lane introductions (see e.g. Wild et al., 2018). Wilson and Mitra (2020) have also argued, relying on a Canadian case study, that opposition to cycling infrastructure tends to relate to policy makers concerns regarding the loss of road space for the car, with politicians often hesitant to support policies perceived to deter motorised transport usage.

Users of alternative modes of transport are often seen as illegitimate usurpers of space that should be reserved for car users (e.g. Kaplan and Prato, 2016). Additionally, despite disproportionate amounts of space already allocated to motorised travel, there is evidence that the general public systematically overestimates the amount of mobility space allocated to non-motorised modes while underestimating the space allocated to the car (Szell, 2018). Car blindness is also prominent in discussions on perceptions of road safety. Despite the overwhelming nature of vehicular violence, whereby drivers of cars disproportionately injure and kill other road users, 28

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users of other modes are typically held to significantly higher standards than car drivers concerning the violence they perpetuate and other associated risks. For example, 45% of fatalities in the EU resulting from crashes occur in collisions with a car; this figure rises to 65% when including collisions with other large, motorised vehicles such as buses, trucks and lorries. These values increase to 66% and 95%, respectively, when considering only collisions between two road user and excluding unknown causes and single user crashes (EC, 2023; see also Figure 8 in the following chapter). Deaths and injuries perpetuated by users of alternative modes also appear more politically unacceptable than the violence perpetuated by car users. In everyday life, and in different contexts, how the risks of any vehicles that are not large cars and vans are presented to the public does not reflect the reality that car drivers are the ones injuring, maiming and killing most people involved in crashes and collisions. A clear example of the disparity in public discourse between car drivers and users of alternative modes is seen in how safety is discussed and often framed for new emerging micromobility alternatives such as e-kick scooters.

It is common to read headlines in leading newspapers, periodicals and news agencies, particularly in the Global North, highlighting the dangers of these vehicles. For instance: “Pedestrians ‘will face danger if e‑scooters get road approval’: Plan for street trials poses serious threat to health, experts warn” (Tapper, 2020) in the Guardian, and “Electric scooters described as an ‘absolute menace’” in the BBC (2022). These headlines, and the broader blindness to the car’s negative impacts, align with discursive storylines that are often seen in different stages of socio-technical transitions, including the transition from the horse and boogie in the late-19th and early-20th centuries (see e.g. Geels, 2005), the establishment of car dominance in the 20th century (see e.g. Roberts and Geels, 2018) and the more recent attempt to decarbonise societies more broadly (see e.g. Geels, 2014). Socio-technical transitions can be broadly understood as potentially including four stages (Roberts and Geels, 2018). In the first stage, the radical innovation emerges in the fringes, and its early proponents attempt to establish legitimacy. This is followed by a stage where the proponents seek to embed the innovation in a broader societal context. Here they can achieve further support for the development of their innovation but are faced with problems arising from the system's expansion.

A stabilisation of expectations and rules characterises this stage. The third stage sees the more mature innovation attempt to compete directly with the established regime and replace it. Its success or failure at this stage likely rests on the ability to seize windows of opportunity caused by the disruption of the former hegemony. Finally, the final stage sees the once radical innovation becoming “institutionalised and taken for-granted, resulting in adjustments in infrastructures, policies, lifestyles and views on normality” (Roberts and Geels, 2018: 516). The differences in how the car is portrayed in public discourse and the portrayal of new emerging mobility modes (e.g. the e-kick scooter or the pedelec) or older modes (e.g. the bicycle), whose proponents are seeking to establish or re-establish within the mobility landscape, can be better understood by relying on this socio-technical transition lens. The car is firmly entrenched as the dominant mobility mode, and its supporters are interested in maintaining the status quo. At this stage, some of the most salient supporting storylines relate to the car being here to stay and about how car use has become a “basic right” (Roberts and Geels, 2018).

This is reflected in the common complaints about space re-allocation benefitting cyclists or other users which is present in many different contexts where the prioritization of the car is deeply entrenched. Examples of this “bikelash” (Wild et al., 2018) can be found in mass media reporting worldwide, especially when space is re-distributed from car users. In different contexts, including, Latin America (Diario Libre, 2022; Noticias SIN, 2021; Segovia, 2022), North America (Barron, 2019; Maslin-Nir, 2023), Europe (Bradshaw, 2020; SIC Noticias, 2021) and Australasia (Ore, 2022) the reporting highlights citizen and business complaints about

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the introduction of bike lanes using similar arguments of the added difficulty of finding parking or the supposed increase in car traffic congestion. At the same time, e-scooters and, to a lesser extent, bicycles can be better understood as currently being somewhere between the first and second stages of a socio-technical transition in most contexts. Their proponents are still trying to legitimise the transport mode and seek political support to further embed these modes in the urban mobility sphere. Ironically, much of the discourse around e-scooters being dangerous “toys”, a nuisance, and of little value to the general population mirror the storylines that were used against the introduction of the car in the early and mid-20th century in the United Kingdom (Roberts and Geels, 2018) and the United States (Norton, 2008). Roberts and Geels’ (2018) historical analysis highlights that in the late-19th and early-20th century, motor vehicles were often discussed as dangerous nuisances that were toys for the upper classes and endangered others. This backlash against e-scooters and their users has successfully impacted policies despite little empirical evidence of their negative impact. The criticisms also starkly contrast with the continued acceptance of the negative impacts car drivers impose on others in cities.

The discourse of e-scooters as dangerous and annoying additions to urban mobility systems has prompted many cities, including Paris, to reconsider their acceptability as part of cities’ mobility landscapes. For example, the mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo, described the scooters as “nuisances” (France24, 2023). Complaints from residents about “reckless driving” by scooter users, scooters cluttering the sidewalks and their perceived danger following fatal collisions prompted the city to hold a referendum on the legality of rental scooter operators (Le Monde, 2023). The outcome of the referendum resulted in Paris not renewing any e-scooter operators’ contracts, with all ceasing operations by 31 August 2023 (Ville de Paris, 2023). Any death or injury is one too many and should rightfully be seen as unacceptable. Similarly, every incident where citizens feel unsafe while using the transport system needs to be scrutinised by the public in general and, particularly, by policy makers. Precisely because of this, as the transport system diversifies and a greater variety of vehicles and form factors enter the mobility system, great care must be taken so that their inclusion does not come at the expense of those who choose to walk (ITF, 2023c). However, moto-normativity does not allow societies to examine the potential dangers car drivers impose on others with the same critical lens.

While the discussion over the safety challenges of e-scooters was taking place in Paris, the scale of the problem did not reflect which vehicles were more often involved in crashes that resulted in injuries in the city. In 2020, small electric personal mobility devices (EDP Moteur in French), including e-scooters, solo-wheels and hoverboards represented less than 5% of all vehicles involved in road incidents resulting in injury. In contrast, motorbikes represented 28.6% of the vehicles, and 39.8% of the vehicles were large four-wheeled vehicles, including cars, sports utility vehicles, buses, vans and lorries (ONISR, 2023). But Paris is not alone in this framing of e-scooters as dangerous public nuisances. The City of Sydney refused to take part in a rental e-scooter scheme trial because of concerns for pedestrian safety (Cassidy, 2022). The mayor, Clover Moore, stated: “The data from emergency departments both nationally and internationally on e-scooter injuries is sobering . . . The risks, not just for riders but for pedestrians, especially people with disability and the elderly, are obvious” (Cassidy, 2022). At the same time, in the Australian state of Queensland, three scooter-user deaths led to calls to re-think regulations (Kelly, 2022).

Similarly, leading newspapers in Spain have often included articles focused on the speed at which e-scooter users travel (Marinas, 2022), and on concerns that they are likely to injure pedestrians because of their “wrong use”, highlighting instances were elderly citizens have been injured by carelessly parked scooters, or been frightened by the speed at which passing scooters were traveling or being injured by collisions (e.g. Vila Galán, 2022). However, very few scooters are capable of travelling at maximum speeds that 30

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approach car speeds. Data for the EU demonstrates that cars injure, maim and kill all users of the roads – regardless of mode (EC, 2023). Additionally, where data is available (e.g. in the United Kingdom, statistics show that a great proportion of drivers exceed speed limits on all roads, including local roads, where speeds are limited to 30 mph (approximately 50 km/h). In 2022, under free-flowing traffic conditions, 50% of car drivers exceeded the speed limit on 30 mph roads (UK DfT, 2023). In contrast, incidents of car violence are often discussed as inevitable (te Brömmelstroet, 2020), and the discourse often focuses on the victim’s responsibility. For example, many practitioners and policy makers see distracted walking as a problem despite weak evidence of its impact (Ralph and Girardeau, 2020). Until policy makers can objectively and dispassionately confront the adverse effects of the car and the directionality of many of these impacts with the same clarity that they address the potential negative consequences of other modes, tackling the inequity related to transport outcomes in cities worldwide will remain a challenge. Car blinders: The inability to see beyond the car

While car blindness renders the negative impact automobiles effectively invisible, the idea of the car is also so entrenched that it can become difficult to see beyond the car. This inability to identify alternatives to the car can be described as a “blinder”. Car blinders have become so prevalent that even in cities and countries where a small or very small minority of the population owns or has access to private vehicles, moto-normativity remains central to policy making, design and planning. The notion of car “blinders” emerges from similar cognitive processing biases as car “blindness”. Car drivers adopt mental representations of their environment that are linked to the complex task of operating a motor vehicle (Bellet et al., 2009; Galpin, Underwood and Crundall, 2009). What drivers look for and notice is shaped by what matters to car drivers – for example, where to accelerate, what hazards to look for, or where to park. In practice, this means that car drivers are less aware of other users of road space when these do not register as critical to the driving task. Reverse evidence shows that cyclists who are drivers perform much better at perceiving other road occupants (Beanland and Hansen, 2017).

Related to saliency bias is “normal bias” where people fail to see a clearly visible element in their environment – for example, the “looked but failed to see” error (Wolfe, Kosovicheva and Wolfe, 2022). In these instances, the brain filters out rare elements that are not considered crucial to an immediate task, even if these things may be clearly and prominently visible. Post-crash car interviews often reveal that drivers looked but failed to see pedestrians, cyclists or other non-car road users simply because they were not part of the driver’s task perception. Another example of how car use influences driver perception is that car drivers driving through low-income areas form negative views of these neighbourhoods, whereas people walking through the same neighbourhoods tend to have more positive perceptions of the neighbourhood and of its inhabitants (Gatersleben, Murtagh and White, 2013). The biases that give rise to literal “blinders” in the context of visual and cognitive processing tasks can also manifest themselves through broader cognitive processing and awareness formation concerning which uses and users of shared urban space are seen or not. Many cities with low motorisation rates design their streetscapes for private cars and not for walking and public or informal transport, which are the majority forms of travel in most cases.

This results from both aspirational aims, whereby the car is conflated with a notion of progress and the belief in the inevitability of the car. The inability to see beyond the car or to focus on other modes features prominently in many transport policies, particularly congestion-reduction policies. Congestion is often framed as a critical urban issue, and in recent years there has been an increased understanding of and interest in its associated negative

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externalities and the co-benefits of congestion reduction. However, reducing travel times for car drivers and users remains a core policy aim of congestion-reduction policies. It is easy to see why congestion receives so much attention and investment through a moto-normative lens. It is costly, frustrating to car drivers (who are aware of how much faster they could travel if other cars were not on the road) and highly visible. Congestion delays car travellers while negatively impacting the wellbeing and health of many city dwellers. However, the congestion problem is a relative one. Even with congestion-related travel-time losses, car users in cities worldwide almost universally have better access to opportunities and can travel faster than users of all other modes. For instance, a large-scale study comparing 117 cities across 16 countries and 6 continents found that the automobile provided better access than walking, cycling and public transport in almost all cities (Wu et al., 2021). In the one exception, Shanghai, the difference in access provided by public transport and the car was less than 10%. In many urban contexts, the focus on, and treatment of, car-traffic congestion raises a fundamental equity concern.

Why should transport policies seek to benefit those who are most well-off and experience the highest service quality? Car occupants are often relatively well off (in comparison to other travellers), as highlighted above. They also travel in the most comfortable conditions, with access to climate control, adequate personal space and an environment they control. They are shielded from much of the violence of the mobility system. Finally, they are allocated and use much more street space than all other users. Removing car blinders could help authorities prioritise travellers who currently receive less access to opportunities via the transport system, and who often need to travel in less comfortable and less safe conditions. Placing the impact of congestion on car mobility within the context of people’s overall mobility could help redirect policies towards supporting all people’s travel options – not just those of car occupants.

How moto-normativity influences transport appraisal Policy makers’ tools to evaluate proposed transport projects can also be biased towards the car. This bias is evident in all stages of the transport appraisal process but particularly in four specific stages: 1) the assessment of need, 2) the proposal of projects for consideration, 3) the selection of appraisal methods and 4) the application of these methods. Car blinders when assessing the need for transport projects

Transport appraisal processes commonly include a needs assessment phase, assessing the need for any potential transport intervention. This stage of project appraisal precedes the definition of any specific project that could respond to this stated need. Traditional “predict and provide” paradigms are still prevalent in transport policy. These methods define needs based on past transport activities and trends. They forecast demand, which is equated with needs, and provide infrastructure (within budgetary constraints) to meet this perceived need (Owens, 1995). This decision-making paradigm perpetuates moto-normativity because, as highlighted by Lyons (2015), it fails to recognise that investment choices will shape transport demand. Investment in pro-car development encourages further car use, creating a tautological and self-enforcing loop. The fact that an already established system of provision for the car encourages this type of travel behaviour provides the justification for even further investment in the car. It also perpetuates a decisionmaking framework that makes it difficult to explore alternatives to the current system of provision. In

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effect, it becomes impossible to even consider the aims of the transport system, including whether it should seek to meet or accommodate the growing demand for motorised car-based transport. A vision-led approach can be effective in addressing these shortcomings. Vision-led planning, also called a “decide and provide” approach, defines transport needs based on their strategic alignment to a vision of the future. It does not seek to predict future demand but instead engages with the underpinning goals and aims of the transport system itself. It looks to define what the future of the system should be and then implement policies and make investment choices that can help bring about these intended changes (ITF, 2023a; Lyons, 2015). A vision-led approach that, from the outset, considers alternative travel options can therefore be effective in creating an environment where policy makers can pivot away from moto-normativity. It can help ensure that the systemic benefits to the car, accumulated through years of prioritisation within urban transport systems, do not determine or control future policies or maintain the car’s current hegemony. As an example of putting a vision-led approach into action, policy makers should consider justifying how any proposed policy or project contributes to achieving a new vision for transport instead of reinforcing the existing vision.

Car blinders impact which project proposals are appraised

The way in which projects are selected for consideration in transport appraisal processes plays an obvious but crucial role in determining which projects are ultimately funded and developed. Regardless of the selected appraisal method, if the policy goals and proposed projects are car-centric, the appraisal process will result in the selection and implementation of car-centric policies. To remedy this bias, policy makers should consider exploring a broader range of potential projects and expanding the guiding principles for defining need. This sets the stage for the possibility that a transport project that does not favour the car is implemented. To achieve this break with traditional, motonormative policies and processes, there should be robust consultation processes that include a broad range of stakeholders including non-governmental and civil society organisations, universities and private individuals. Car blinders in the selection of appraisal methods

Transport appraisal is highly reliant on CBA, which can be a useful tool but has some inherent limitations that policy makers do not always consider properly when making decisions. Experts (see e.g. ITF, 2022) have repeatedly called for the expansion of transport appraisal methods to overcome these limitations. Significantly, efforts have been made to incorporate more dimensions within CBA and to provide policy makers with other frameworks which can be used instead of, or as a complement to, existing CBA frameworks. Policy makers should understand what is being considered in any assessment framework, particularly the limitations of the methods and data inputs. Understanding appraisal weaknesses and potential blind spots can allow policy makers and analysts to select appropriate complementary frameworks enabling more informed decisions. While no standard appraisal method is perfect, when correctly applied such methods provide a valuable policy-making tool. However, policy makers must remain vigilant when applying appraisal methods, choosing variables and addressing any potential biases.

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WHY IMPROVING THE QUALITY OF WALKING AND CYCLING IS SO CHALLENGING IN MANY MODERN CITIES

Car blinders are prominent in standard appraisal methods and their application

Although the standard transport appraisal (reliant on CBA) attempts to provide an unbiased comparison between alternative proposals, the biases inherent in its application often favour further investment in the car. The traditional approach to CBA in transport appraisal adopts the aggregated value of travel-time savings as the central benefit measure for infrastructure investments (ITF, 2022b). However, the treatment of travel time savings can favour car users and investments benefiting car use. Those traveling by car tend to be wealthier and have higher car availability, thus resulting in higher ascribed values of time and consequently a larger impact on the outcomes of the results of the CBA (Nahmias-Biran, Martens and Shiftan, 2017). Moreover, CBA, by its nature, aims to estimate the aggregate net welfare of the population. Although the framework allows the reporting of distribution effects (e.g. across income classes or regions) this is not always applied. (Van Wee, 2012). From a utilitarian perspective, the value of each benefit is aggregated, but in practice, who benefits and who loses and to what extent are important political and ethical considerations.

In their analysis, Nahmias-Biran, Martens and Shiftan (2017) show that without explicitly evaluating the benefits of vulnerable populations when performing economic evaluations, these aggregate frameworks can favour solutions that exacerbate inequities by favouring smaller travel-time savings for wealthier car drivers over larger travel-time savings for others. CBA’s emphasis on maximising net welfare for all the population means that micro benefits for many or more well-off travellers generate higher appraisal values than more significant travel-time savings for fewer individuals or the less well off. Moving from a focus on mobility (i.e. travel times) to a spatial accessibility focus (i.e. the potential to reach opportunities) can help mitigate some of the limitations inherent to the overreliance on travel time savings in CBA (see e.g. Martens and Di Ciommo, 2017). This highlights how decisions about which costs and benefits to include in the analysis (e.g. travel time, motoring costs or injuries) impact the results. Additionally, assigning monetary values to benefits may be more complicated for some than for others. This can bias results if those harder-to-quantify benefits are not included in the larger appraisal framework. The likelihood of better policies increases when a broad spectrum of impacts is considered.

Ensuring that car “blinders” are not embedded in transport appraisal requires a vision-led approach to policy making that expands the scope of considered projects. It also calls for careful consideration and selection of appraisal frameworks and variables that explicitly aim to capture a broader range of impacts, that evaluates the benefits to specific groups of interest (e.g. vulnerable or underprivileged groups), and where decision makers are cognisant of the limitations of any of the chosen frameworks.

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CREATING SAFE AND INVITING CITIES TO WALK AND CYCLE REQUIRES ADDRESSING BROADER SOCIETAL ISSUES

Creating safe and inviting cities to walk and cycle requires addressing broader societal issues Adequately designed walking and cycling infrastructure can contribute to safer environments. Cycling infrastructure has been shown to have some impact on cycling activity (see e.g. Félix, Cambra and Moura, 2020). Still, there is ample evidence of people walking and cycling despite very poor or non-existent infrastructure, as well as evidence of underused infrastructure in other contexts. Understanding how, when, where and why people walk or cycle in cities is a much more complex endeavour than simply looking at infrastructure provision. From a broader perspective, an infrastructure-only – or even an infrastructure-centric – approach to walking and cycling is insufficient to ensure that cyclists and pedestrians can move around cities safely, securely and enjoyably. Infrastructure alone cannot ensure that people can travel without being subjected to violence, disadvantaged in terms of their access to necessities and opportunities, or exposed to other negative impacts of moto-normative environments. It is also not enough to encourage individuals to start walking or cycling or to do so more often or for longer distances.

The challenge of creating a safe and inviting city where citizens can walk, cycle or otherwise travel in a dignified manner in a wide(r) variety of ways regardless of their capabilities, motivations or preferences extends beyond the transport system itself. Because transport serves as a connective tissue in cities, it interacts and is intertwined with other urban systems – including physical, social, and spatial systems, which also influence how, when, and where individuals move. Additionally, the transport system often reflects broader societal issues, including those related to public space allocation and use or violence and insecurity. While many of these issues have deep-rooted causes beyond the transport system, the transport system is not independent of the societal context in which it is embedded. As such, policies aimed at improving the quality of walking and cycling must not be limited to an infrastructure provision lens. In practice, this means that a siloed approach that views walking and cycling policies and outcomes as a transport issue is unlikely to achieve the full extent of the potential benefits of active mobility in cities.

Understanding how travel decisions are made Policy makers need to consider behavioural levers and systemic changes to better understand why people walk or cycle in cities and why they may choose not to do so. This includes understanding the social and cultural framework that informs the local context, individuals’ needs and preferences and how these are formed, the decision-making processes people adopt to select their travel options, the characteristics, benefits, and constraints different modes offer, and the impact of the built environment on travel choices (see Figure 7).

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Figure 7. Travel decision-making considerations

Source: ITF (2023).

A shift away from personal motorised vehicles requires understanding people’s motives for car use. These include instrumental, symbolic and affective factors (Steg, 2005). These symbolic and affective factors, which include the idea of the car as a conspicuous status symbol, have been characterised as “car pride” (see e.g. Moody and Zhao, 2019). As Zhao and Zhao state: “The self-conscious emotion derived from the appraisal of owning and using cars as a positive self-representation” (2020: 797) must be addressed while encouraging this sustainable transition. Additionally, land-use and transport systems have promoted and enabled car use, providing extrinsic value to car travel by making it more utilitarian and functional. However, travel is also influenced by extrinsic and intrinsic motivations (Mokhtarian, Salomon and Singer, 2015). Therefore, changing the resulting travel behaviour will require redefining the land-use and transport systems to augment other travel modes' utilitarian and functional characteristics and address the intrinsic motivations for car use.

Recognising the potential of other factors beyond infrastructure An essential component to consider is the environment that pedestrians and users of slower active modes experience, the context that surrounds them, and the stressors that are part of their lived experience. Many of these other factors, including stress, exposure to violence and insecurity, fall outside the purview of transport ministries and cannot be solved solely with transportation policies. However, successfully achieving many transport aims, particularly those related to active mobility, requires understanding the roles these factors play in the population’s mobility. 36

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Perceptions and feelings of insecurity directly shape how travelling is experienced and influence travelmaking decisions. If people considering walking or using active modes such as cycling perceive these activities as risky or insecure, this will have a negative impact on their willingness to make use of such modes. For instance, walking while being concerned about one’s physical well-being, or expecting to be accosted by criminals or the police, being hit by a car, or sexually harassed or attacked, will always be an unpleasant experience. In this context, other qualities of the built or natural environment, including any active mobility infrastructure, become less relevant. It is, therefore, essential to consider perceived risk in relation to other measurements associated with the feared event. Transport research, and criminology studies more broadly, have found that experiencing a particular event is highly correlated with the expressed fear of that specific event occurring (see e.g. Ceccato and Loukaitou-Sideris, 2022). However, risk is amplified through social context. Fear and perceived risk may not always perfectly correlate with other less personal risk measures. Institutional structures, social group behaviour and individual responses can shape the perceived experience of risk.

The social amplification of risk can also have secondary impacts, including enduring mental perceptions and attitudes (Kasperson et al., 1988). These perceptions and attitudes that socially amplify risk are relevant to policy makers, advocates and special interest groups interested in changes. This is because, during transitional moments of change, it takes time for individuals to modify their attitudes and for new perceptions to take hold. This necessitates a consistent commitment to new policy directions, and the proposed solutions must be comprehensive enough to communicate an actual change in the paradigm. In the context of increasing active mobility and improving the lived experience of walking and cycling, exposure to violence and lack of safety can suppress these activities. Safe and enjoyable active city travel requires physical and social safety (London Cycling Campaign, 2023). Infrastructure provision with high standards is integral to providing physical safety to pedestrians, cyclists and other road users. Efforts are underway in various contexts to radically improve road safety (e.g. through “Vision Zero” policies). However, these efforts must be accompanied by an equally radical reframing of how road traffic violence is addressed and perceived in public and policy discourse.

For example, reporting that uses words such as “accident” – as opposed to “crash” – suggests that car crashes are unavoidable or unpredictable events (Culver, 2018). Furthermore, reporting of crashes often hides the directionality of their impacts. Car drivers and drivers of other large, motorised vehicles such as vans, lorries and trucks are overwhelmingly involved in severe crashes in urban areas. And those that are more exposed, including pedestrians and cyclists, are disproportionately impacted. For instance, data from the EU shows that pedestrians account for almost 35% of all urban traffic fatalities. Additionally, most pedestrians (64%) die from being hit by someone driving a car (see Figure 8), and 90% die as a result of collisions with large, motorised vehicles of any kind (car, bus, van, truck or lorry). In fact, regardless of the chosen travel mode, most fatalities occur in collisions with cars. Excluding single-vehicle collisions, 62% of all fatalities resulting from collisions between two or more parties in urban areas occur in crashes where the other party is using a car. Together, fast and large vehicles (i.e. cars, lorries and trucks) are involved in 89% of crashes between two or more parties that result in the death of another road user. Reporting around crashes also dehumanises the incidents, often focusing on efficiency (e.g.

travel delays, congestion) and material losses (e.g. associated costs of material damages) rather than the person or persons killed or injured (te Brömmelstroet, 2020).

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Figure 8. Road traffic fatalities matrix in urban areas in the European Union, 2021

FATALITIES IN URBAN AREAS IN THE EU (2021)

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When greater numbers of people walk and cycle, this makes cities safer, especially if the people walking and cycling represent a diversity of ages, genders and social classes. At the same time, pedestrians, cyclists and micromobility and motorcycle users are the most vulnerable road users. Traffic collision rates in which people are killed or serious injured (so-called KSI rates) are lower in cities with higher walking and cycling rates and increase as the number of pedestrians and cyclists decreases (Jacobsen, 2003; Klanjčić et al., 2022). Recent data from London shows that pedestrians, cyclists and motorcyclists make up 80% of those seriously injured or killed in road incidents and these severe injuries and deaths are much more prevalent in the London ‘s most deprived areas (TfL, 2023). Similarly, pedestrian fatalities continue to increase in the United States. In 2020 there were more than 6 500 pedestrian deaths, a 3.9% increase from 2019 and a 46.2% increase from 2011 (National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, 2022). Members of lower socio-economic groups are more impacted by serious injury and fatal crashes, and these incidents are also more likely to occur in particular geographic locations (Culver, 2018).

This is because lower-income individuals are less likely to have access to personal motor vehicles for their trips and because disadvantaged areas tend to have higher rates of substandard and often unsafe infrastructure. 38

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