Mobility Policies Research Articles

Pursuing cycling equity? A mixed-methods analysis of cycling plans in European cities

Although equity issues are emphasised in sustainable mobility policy worldwide, there is evidence that cycling planning often prioritises advantaged areas and central zones of cities. To overcome such an inequitable scenario, scholars have called for greater attention towards disadvantaged representatives within the planning and decision-making processes.This study contributes to this debate by exploring the equity impacts of cycling plans and infrastructure allocation in three European cities using a mixed-methods approach. First, through GIS and statistical analysis, we quantitively assessed the equity gap of each cycling plan, measuring the distribution of infrastructure and accessibility gains across socio-economic advantaged and disadvantaged groups. In addition, this study performed an inductive content analysis of each plan to investigate to what extent equity issues are addressed and prioritised in planning practice.The main results suggest the most equitable scenario in a city with a long tradition of cycling planning, which has been providing denser cycling infrastructure to connect important activities and neighbourhoods within central zones and outskirts. Conversely, the implementation of the cycling plan in central areas is likely to overlook disadvantaged socio-economic zones. Despite increasing attention towards accessibility, social inclusion and safety issues within the planning guidelines, findings suggest that the evaluated plans did not prioritise or appraise equity in cycling planning practice.

Engineering systems analysis of mobility in Odawara city: New transportation services impacts on community engagement

AbstractLocal cities in Japan are struggling with aging and decreasing populations. Elderly people and parents with young children are uniquely challenged when accessing public transportation, a key to increasing their community engagement and improving local cities' sustainability. This research investigates the introduction of new transportation modes and fares on community engagement of both elderly people and parents of young children. An urban systems model which integrates mobility and civic functions is evaluated by agent‐based simulation to analyze various policies’ impacts on community engagement and financial performance. The model is applied to Odawara City, a typical local city of nearly 200,000 people in Japan. For this case study, two policies which strongly subsidize a community bus and partially subsidize a door‐to‐door van were predicted to generate 10% or greater engagement for the elderly without a financial loss compared to the current baseline case. More specifically, community engagement of elderly people and parents with young children are predicted to increase by 11% with positive (0.25 M yen) net present value per person when the fare of community buses is 100 yen and that of door‐to‐door vans is 300 yen. However, no synergistic effect driven by policies favoring elderly people and those favoring parents is found. Still, the measures to support elderly people's transportation accessibility do not harm the parents’ behavior but rather support their daily activities. The method is demonstrated to be useful for designing new mobility policy in light of a specific population with demographic residential distribution and existing transportation network.

Examination of air pollutants and their risk for human health in urban and suburban environments for two Romanian cities: Brasov and Iasi

To detect the spatial differences of atmospheric pollutants in urban and suburban areas is important for observing their aspects on regional air quality, climate, and human health. This study is focused on the evolution of PM2.5, PM10, NOx and SO2, concentrations, and meteorological parameters from 2010 to 2022, at urban and suburban area in the two Romanian city: Brasov and Iasi. The daily patterns of most pollutants in urban and suburban areas, are strongly linked to land-traffic emissions. The seasonal differences were observation of the studied air pollutants displays visible decreasing in warm period and increased concentrations in cold period. Significant higher (25%- Brasov, 28%- Iasi) PM10 were found in urban area concentration probably caused by enhanced vehicular emissions over these areas induced by urban planning and mobility policies. The average relative risk caused by PM10 for all-cause mortality in the urban region was 1.021 (±0.004) in Brasov, and significantly higher in Iasi 1.030 (±0.005). In suburban regions this risk was lower with 33 % 1.014 (±0.006) in Brasov and 30 % 1.021 (±0.003) in Iasi. The main objective of this research was to identify the difference of air pollutants and meteorological parameters in the urban and suburban region of the studied city.

Policy Mobilities, Infrastructures, and Nonhuman Political Agency

Policy mobilities research has explored how policies—particularly urban development policies—spread among sites around the world, mutate along the way, and take hold in distinct contexts. Within the policy mobilities literature, there is particular attention to circulatory infrastructures, which facilitate encounters, learning, and exchange of knowledge that support the (re)production and movement of policies and “best practices.” Policy mobilities scholarship thus understands policy implementation as emerging from relational assemblages of myriad actors and social processes. Drawing on assemblage theory, this work has been attentive to nonhuman objects and infrastructures, nonetheless it has given little attention to nonhuman life. This article draws on more-than-human geographies, particularly emerging work on nonhuman life and infrastructures, to incorporate nonhuman actors into an understanding of policy mobilization. We present a case study of suburban wildlife management programs in Massachusetts and discuss how human–nonhuman relationships undergird policy development, transfer, and change. Drawing insights from municipal surveys, in-depth interviews, and document analysis, we argue that nonhumans are active in the production of policy assemblages and the mobility of environmental policies. Deer, in particular, are lively actors entangled in the circulation of policies designed to manage social-ecological dynamics and processes that also include ticks, forests, bacteria, and many other nonhuman agents. Through this intervention to situate nonhuman life in policy mobilities, we highlight the political agency of nonhuman actors, the materialities of policy mobilization, and the role of nonhumans in shaping relational networks.

Policy Implementation Analysis of Mobile National Health Insurance for BPJS Health Participants in Sendangan Village, Sonder District

This study aims to determine and describe how the Implementation of the National Health Insurance Mobile Policy for BPJS Health Participants in Sendangan Village, Sonder District. The approach used in this research is a qualitative approach with a descriptive type. The results of this study state that the Implementation of the National Health Insurance Mobile Policy for BPJS Health Participants in Sendangan Village, Sonder District has not been implemented properly and effectively, where: 1) Many people do not know and do not understand about this policy, because there has been no socialization from the government and related agencies, which is also due to the lack of relations between the government and related agencies in this case BPJS Health. Coordination in this policy has not been effective, 2) the ability of the community is felt to be lacking to understand how to use the Mobile National Health Insurance because there is no information obtained by the community, the community also does not know the purpose of this policy and the benefits that the community can get from this policy 3) many people do not have facilities in the form of supporting devices and internet data needs that are not sufficient for the National Health Insurance Mobile Application, and there are also frequent system errors in the application due to frequent updates of the latest version, which results in many devices that cannot easily access the application.

How does a name shape a place? The performativity of urban branding in the case of Songdo, South Korea

ABSTRACT Socially constructed urban branding not only revises the identity and structure of a city but also influences legislation, planning and policy mobility. To overcome the narrow view of the existing debate over whether or not Songdo is a smart city, a performative approach is adopted, focusing on the impact of a succession of urban branding slogans and the symbolic and discursive imaging of Songdo on the evolution of political processes of city development and the mobility of the urban model within and beyond the country. By examining the circular relations among discourses, planning and policy mobilities, this study contributes to academic and practical discussions of development rationales and policies.

Designing Mobility Policies for Vulnerable Users Employing the Living Lab Approach: Cases of a Demand-Responsive Transit Service in Ljubljana and Maribor

In recent years, transport policy has strongly been oriented to develop more inclusive cities and to design mobility services aligned to specific users’ needs. In an attempt to guarantee an adequate level of accessibility, especially to vulnerable users, approaches based on the dialogue between public administration, operators, citizens and researchers (so-called “quadruple helix”) have been proposed. The two case studies presented in this article refer to the development of a minibus demand-responsive transport system, devoted mainly to people with reduced mobility, in the cities of Ljubljana and Maribor (Slovenia) designed using a Living Lab participative approach. In fact, urban mobility stakeholders were engaged in this process during the design and monitoring phases of the pilot projects. Their involvement resulted in producing positive outcomes: citizens actively participated in the projects, and the designed service was perceived to be useful and effective. Both projects were successful, as statistics demonstrate, and are expected to be confirmed and strengthened over the next few years.

FROM BUDAPEST TO BRUSSELS: Discursive and Material Failure in Mobile Policy

AbstractThis article introduces an analytic of discursive and material failure, developing a spatial grammar for analysing both the discursive framing of policies as failed and the actually existing processes and effects of failed policy. Using the case of harm reduction drug policy in Budapest, I demonstrate how a successful policy was made to fail at the local and national scales, and how that failure in turn spurred the mobility of harm reduction's implementation across scales and into the European Union's Drugs Strategy. I show how focusing on policy failure exposes the politics of making and mobilizing urban policy, and how an analysis of failure can uncover unforeseen effects of the local politics of policy mobility. Analysing failure as both discursive and material allows scholars to break down policymaking processes into the political and practical elements assembled in policy mobilization. Discursive policy failures take into consideration the framing and accounting of actions, events and processes, while analysis of material failure begins with seemingly fewer political questions because of its focus on the technical. I argue that it is in understanding the relationship between material and discursive failure that the politics of urban policy mobility becomes a central question.

A machine-learning approach to a mobility policy proposal

The objective of the URBANITE project is to design an open-data, open-source, smart-city framework to enhance the decision-making processes in European cities. The framework's basis is a robust and user-friendly simulation tool that is supplemented with several innovative service modules. One of the modules, a multi-output, machine-learning unit, is deployed on the simulation results, enabling city officials to more effectively analyse vast quantities of data, discern patterns and trends, and so facilitate advanced policy decisions. The city's decision makers define potential city scenarios, key performance indicators, and a utility function, while the module assists in identifying the policy that is best aligned with the stipulated constraints and preferences. One of the main improvements is a speeding up of the policy testing for the decision makers, reducing the time needed for one policy verification from 3 hours to around 10 seconds. The system was evaluated for Bilbao's Moyua area, where it suggested strategies that could result in a decrease in emissions of more than 5% CO2, NOx, PM in the selected area and a broader part of the city with a machine-learning accuracy of 91%. The system was therefore able to provide valuable insights into effective policies for restricting private traffic in specific districts and identifying the most advantageous times for these restrictions.

(Re)drawing Lines in Our Research: Using Policy Mobilities and Network Ethnography to Research Global Policy Networks in Education

(Re)drawing Lines in Our Research: Using Policy Mobilities and Network Ethnography to Research Global Policy Networks in Education

Globalization, Policy Mobilities, and the Method of Network Ethnography

Globalization, Policy Mobilities, and the Method of Network Ethnography

Understanding the Policy Integration Challenges of Sustainable Urban Mobility in the Context of Rapid Decarbonisation

AbstractGiven the state of the climate emergency, European Union (EU) cities must find innovative ways to achieve a sustainable and decarbonised urban mobility trajectory. This requires integrated and cross-sectoral approaches that enable all sectors influencing such mobility to contribute to this goal. Building on the concept of the climate-connected city and drawing on an extensive empirical investigation of two Dutch cities (Rotterdam and Maastricht), this study reflects on how decarbonisation targets are integrated with other sustainability objectives across all policies and levels involved in reconfiguring mobility towards an environmentally sustainable model. The study finds that spatial development tools and processes, in combination with regulatory instruments imposing strict limits on emissions, can strengthen cross-sectoral support for the behavioural changes needed to decarbonise urban mobility. However, this integrative dynamic may be countered by local economic actors and by national and EU economic and fiscal instruments, whose narrow focus on reducing vehicle emissions and expanding road capacity forces cities to dilute their sustainable mobility policies. This suggests that in order to accelerate the decarbonisation of urban mobility, these instruments should be aligned with a broader set of sustainability goals and solutions and be combined with greater attention being given to the urban dimension into national and European transport policies.

THE INFLUENCE OF PHILANTHROPIC FOUNDATIONS ON CITY GOVERNMENT INNOVATION

AbstractIn this study I examine the role of philanthropic foundations in stimulating city government innovation. Reduced budgets and rising consumer demands are challenging organizational capacity in government, prompting government officials to recognize the need for innovation to improve policies, programmes and practices. This empirical study draws upon qualitative interviews and policy reports to generate comparative case studies on three city governments in England: Bristol, Manchester and Newcastle. It builds on work in urban studies and policy mobilities that reveals how foundations can influence urban agendas, finding that philanthropic foundations engage with city governments through three different types of collaboration: direct provision of financial resources, exchange of non‐financial resources with city governments and indirect engagements. Philanthropic foundations are blending financial resources and less tangible provision of space and time to enable city governments to experiment with new ideas, policies and ways of working. The fusion of non‐governmental resources provides city governments with the capacity to act, and city governments often use non‐governmental funding for riskier projects and for projects that may not have taken place if public funding had been used. Through these different collaborations and by deploying a suite of interventions and methods, philanthropic foundations stimulate product, service, process, conceptual and governance innovation in city governments.

Between pace-making and pace-taking: Urban cycle logistics in an accelerated polity

The purpose of this study is to explore the concept of social acceleration by examining how cities are trying to speed up, maintain or slow down the pace of societal change. Through studies of cycle logistics policies and actions in cities in Denmark, Norway, the UK, the Netherlands, and Germany, we show how these balance between acting as pace-makers and pace-takers, as well as what the consequences of this balancing act are for enacting cycle logistics. By using acceleration as an overall theoretical concept, we show how transport planners, mobility policy advisors, and digitalization and innovation strategists understand and position themselves when setting the pace for cycle logistics as part of a broader transition toward sustainable transport. We conclude by discussing the implications of this for the general understanding of acceleration in transformations to urban sustainability.

Policy entrepreneurs and problem definition: the case of European student mobility

AbstractIn the literature on the role of agency in the policy process, relatively little attention has been devoted to how agents define policy problems. This article helps to address this gap by asking when and how policy entrepreneurs are successful in defining problems. The article rests on a framework that shows how policy entrepreneurs holding specific ideas and given a propitious socioeconomic context are able to define problems, translate those problems into new frames, and draw on those frames, while using their personal skills and political and institutional resources, to help build supportive coalitions in favor of policy change. Illustrated by a puzzling case in the field of European mobility policy, the article offers a new perspective on the role of ideas at the problem definition stage of the policy process, while providing a richer understanding of the policy entrepreneur as a driver of policy change.

Integrating logistics into urban planning: best practices from Paris and Rotterdam

ABSTRACT Cities all over the world are rethinking their mobility policies in light of environmental and quality of life objectives. As space is one of cities’ scarcest resources, mobility’s spatial footprint is increasingly scrutinized as externality to mitigate. Similar to passenger transport, goods transport is envisioned to shift towards efficient and zero emission mobilities. To achieve an urban logistics system that eliminates inefficiencies and fossil fuels, the logistics sector requires space to unload, cross-dock, consolidate and stock goods closer to their destinations. Such a ‘proximity logistics’ is however at odds with ‘logistics sprawl’, the historic outward migration pattern of logistics facilities. With policies and planning, cities can support the (re)integration of logistics facilities in urban areas to facilitate and enable the shift to an efficient urban logistics system. Logistics still being a largely neglected policy subject in many cities, knowledge on how to approach this (re)integration is hardly available. Therefore, we compare two pioneering cities: Rotterdam and Paris. Both cities have an established track record in advancing urban logistics policies and are spearheading the practice of planning for logistics. Based on interviews and policy analyses, we develop best practices on how to address the integration of urban logistics facilities for cities.

Economic Governance Quality and Effective Taxation System in Africa

Abstract The study aims at examining the effect of Economic governance institutions on tax revenue mobilization using an empirical panel dataset from 30 African countries for the period 1996–2018. The empirical estimation methods employed in this study is based on Quantile Regression techniques. To this end, one bundled economic governance institution indicator (i.e., general economic governance) is employed. The inspiration for this estimation technique is based on two fundamental reasons. First, the argument that the effect of governance quality on taxation effectiveness is contingent on the existing level of tax revenue mobilization. Second, the economic governance – tax revenue mobilization policies, to be effective, need to be tailored differently across countries with low, intermediate and high levels of tax mobilization effort. The general findings are as follows: First, development in economic governance institutions promotes tax mobilization effort. Second, the effect of economic governance is stronger in terms of significance and magnitude for direct taxes than for indirect taxes. Third, in most of the cases, the impact of economic governance institutions is higher in terms of magnitude in the upper quantiles of the economic governance distributions. The results remain robust over alternative econometric estimation techniques.

Using system dynamics to understand long-term impact of new mobility services and sustainable mobility policies: an analysis pre- and post-COVID-19 pandemic in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

ABSTRACT Sustainable transport policies are fundamental to adapt transport capacity to existing and future travel demand. In this context, this study aims to develop a System Dynamics (SD), to verify the effects of these policies, focusing on congestion and air pollution. Combined with the SD, the discrete choice utility approach was used to predict the modal share in different policy spaces. In addition, it is carried out a case study in Rio de Janeiro in two realities: pre- and post-pandemic. The results show how mitigation policies can reduce transport externalities (congestion and pollution). The encouragement of high-capacity public transport and car ownership control are the best measures, obtaining high simulation scores. The post-pandemic scenario shows that reducing travel demand is the key to achieving better results. All scores obtained in this scenario are better than in pre-pandemic scenario. Finally, results point out that ride-hailing should be used in a conscious way.

Towards sustainable passenger transport: Carbon emission reduction scenarios for a medium-sized city

The sustainability of transportation systems is frequently linked to human preferences, hence it is pertinent to align quotidian commuting choices with sustainable development goals. The main goal of the present research was to simulate eight scenarios designed to reduce the carbon dioxide emissions of passenger transport in a Colombian medium-sized city, taking into account the Global Warming Potential (GWP) of public and private vehicles, obtained by means of Life-Cycle Assessment (LCA). In this work we compared the environmental efficiency of the scenarios in order to make a contribution to the scientific discussion on sustainable mobility policies. Measures such as reducing the number of the most polluting vehicles, optimising the modal shares of public and private transportation systems, integrating electric vehicles, increasing the use of bicycles, and reducing mobility, have been tested. The results show that the current annual emissions from passenger transport in the selected city (263.98 kt CO2-eq) could be decreased by up to 64.28% by implementing a 50% reduction in individual Trips per Day (TpD) and distances travelled by private and public vehicles. In addition, increasing the public bus fleet by 50% could yield a 56.92% reduction in the carbon dioxide released, while using an average occupancy of 30 passengers in buses could decrease the total emissions by 25.73%. Augmenting the occupancy ratio of private vehicles was shown to yield a 22.71% reduction in carbon dioxide released. Also, increasing the electric vehicle fleets by 50% can produce carbon emission reductions of 17.96% for the current energy mix and 20.08% for a 100% renewable energy mix; while boosting the use of bicycles and increasing the diesel car fleet yielded reductions of 9.24% and 5.06%, respectively. This article concludes that managing mobility and restricting commuting could be the most sustainable measure for life-cycle carbon emission reduction.

Policy mobilities and the policy cycle: An analysis using two smart grid case studies

This paper adds to scholarship on policy mobilities by borrowing a typology and set of ideas from political science about the different stages of the policy making process, namely agenda-setting, policy formulation, decision making, implementation, and evaluation. To date policy mobilities scholarship has mostly not been explicit about which stage of the policy process is being examined. We therefore provide a structure for analysing mobile policy inflows to, and outflows from, a policy over time, across the different stages, allowing the analysis of policy mobilities to be aligned more closely with government decision making processes. To test out our ideas we trace the policy mobilities associated with two Australian smart grid policies over their lifetime, i.e. in the lead up to the policy being implemented, and subsequently. The policies are the Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI) program in the State of Victoria, Australia (2009–2013) and the Australian federal government Smart Grid Smart City program (2010–14). We analyse a combination of codified and tacit forms of knowledge sharing, including through policy and industry reports, and interviews with policy practitioners. Key findings include a peak in policy mobilities during the implementation stage, and policy mobility inflows (learning from elsewhere) continuing even in later policy stages. In conclusion we advocate for greater attention to policy mobilities at different stages of the policy process, in order to broaden the scope of policy mobilities research and to develop a stronger understanding of the temporal dimensions of policy mobilities.