Improving Transport-related Health Impacts by Promoting Active Transport and Public Transport

Abstract

Health is always an important aspect of every individual and every community to ensure a happy life, happy community, well-being, to increase productivity, and to save health care costs. For every individual and community, good health is considered one of their main goals and one of the vital inputs for sustainable development. In the first International Conference on Health Promotion, there was a statement that “Good Health is a major resource for social, economic and personal development and an important dimension of quality of life” (WHO,1986). However, human health is a complex issue and is influenced by many sectors beyond the health sectors. Among these sectors, transport plays an essential role in both promoting and threatening health. Health benefits of transport include providing people with accessibility to employment, education, shops, recreation, social and family networks, health care services, a wide range of other services, and giving the opportunities for integrating physical activity into daily life through walking and cycling. However, transport also creates tremendous detrimental health effects directly through traffic accidents, air pollution, noise pollution, and stress. These adverse health effects of transport are becoming global issues. Additionally, transport generates other indirect health effects on the population through land consumption, community severance, and climate change, which are generally ignored when thinking about the health impacts of transport. The negative health impacts of the transport system are highly related to private motorised transport, which are consequences of transport infrastructure and transport policies that focus on the movement of private motor vehicles. Despite the adverse health effects associated with private motorised vehicles, the number of individual motorised vehicles is still increasing as a result of the increase in travel demand. The travel demand is predicted to grow continuously due to economic development, population growth and urbanisation, particularly in urban areas where the current transport system has already experienced an imbalance between supply and demand. Consequently, the negative health impacts of transport will continue to increase and if no effective solution is implemented, the negative health effects of the transport system will become worse. A number of actions have been implemented to mitigate the negative impacts of the transport system, such as mixed land use, control vehicle ownership, apply stricter emission standards, congestion charge, vehicle sharing, and parking control. However, the benefits of these actions are limited and largely offset by the growth in travel demand. Among solutions, the shifting from private motorised transport to active transport (walking and cycling) and public transport seems to bring health benefits for both, individual and community. This approach is presented as an obvious solution to improve health and wellbeing through increased physical activity, reduced air and noise pollution, decreased greenhouse gas emissions, increased social interaction, reduced land consumption, provided equal opportunity, livability and transport efficiency without the side-effect of pollution. As health awareness is increasing rapidly, promoting active transport and public transport as healthy transport modes may contribute to improve the image and increase the attractiveness of these transport modes. Therefore, the infrastructure supporting active transport and public transport, together with policies to promote walking, cycling, and public transport use are crucial for transport systems and deserves ongoing attention. This study aims to improve transport-related health impacts through promoting active transport and public transport. Firstly, the primary transport-related health impacts have been investigated. Four primary transport-related health impacts have selected for detailed investigation, including traffic accidents, health impacts of exposure to traffic-related air pollution, health impacts of exposure to traffic-related noise pollution, and transport-related physical activity. The cause-effect relationships have been developed for these four major transport-related health impacts showing the health impact pathway of transport from the source to the human. Factors influencing these health impacts have been comprehensively described. Secondly, the literature review on the association of transport mode use and its health impacts on its users and other road users as well as on the general population has been conducted. Thirdly, as a case study, the transport-related health impacts in Ho Chi Minh City have been investigated in more detail. The awareness of commuters, the general population, and city authorities about the health impacts of transport is also evaluated. Then, the health impact assessment has been reviewed, and a causal pathway of transport and health has been proposed. Based on that, a qualitative health impact assessment of increasing active transport and public transport in HCM has been conducted. Fifthly, a health-oriented transport policy has been discussed, and a goal and objective system of the health-oriented transport policy has been proposed. Then, the importance of active transport and public transport in a healthy transport system has been highlighted. Finally, five strategies to promote active transport and public transport have been proposed.