Urban Mobility

Author: Dr. Jean-Paul Rodrigue

1. Evolution of Urban mobility

Rapid urban development occurring across much of the globe implies increased quantities of passengers and freight moving within urban areas. Movements also tend to involve longer distances, but evidence suggests that commuting times have remained relatively similar through the last hundred years, approximately 1.2 hours per day. This means that commuting has gradually shifted to faster transport modes and consequently greater distances could be traveled using the same amount of time. Different transport technologies and infrastructures have been implemented, resulting in a wide variety of urban transport systems around the world. In developed countries, there have been three general eras of urban development, and each is associated with a different form of urban mobility:

• The Walking-Horsecar Era (1800-1890). Even during the onslaught of the industrial revolution, the dominant mean of getting around was on foot. Cities were typically less than 5 kilometers in diameter, making it possible to walk from the downtown to the city edge in about 30 minutes. Land use was mixed and density was high (e.g. 100 to 200 people per hectare). The city was compact and its shape was more-or-less circular. The development of the first public transit in the form of omnibus service extended the diameter of the city but did not change the overall urban structure. The railroad facilitated the first real change in urban morphology. These new developments, often referred to as trackside suburbs, emerged as small nodes that were physically separated from the city itself and from one another. The nodes coincided with the location of rail stations and stretched out a considerable distance from the city center, usually up to a half hour train ride. Within the city proper, rail lines were also laid down and horse-cars introduced mass transit.
• The Electric Streetcar or Transit Era (1890 - 1920s). The invention of the electric traction motor created a revolution in urban travel. The first electric trolley line opened in 1888 in Richmond. The operating speed of electric trolley was three times faster than that of horse-drawn vehicles. The city spread outward 20 to 30 kilometers along the streetcar lines, creating an irregular, star-shaped pattern. The urban fringes became areas of rapid residential development. Trolley corridors became commercial strips. The city core was further entrenched as a mixed-use, high density zone. Overall densities were reduced to between 50 and 100 people per hectare. Land use patterns reflected social stratification where suburban outer areas were typically middle class while the working class continued to concentrate in the central city. As street congestion increased in the first half of the 20th century, the efficiency of streetcar systems deteriorated and fell of favor; many were abandoned.
• The Automobile Era (1930 onward). The automobile was introduced in European and North American cities in the 1890's, but only the wealthy could afford this innovation. From the 1920s, ownership rates increased dramatically, with lower prices made possible by Henry Ford's revolutionary assembly-line production techniques. As automobiles became more common, land development patterns changed. Developers were attracted to green-field areas located between the suburban rail axes, and the public was attracted to these single-use zones, thus avoiding many inconveniences associated with city, mainly pollution, crowding and lack of space. Transit companies ran into financial difficulties and eventually transit services throughout North America and Europe became subsidized, publicly-owned enterprises. As time went on, commercial activities also began to suburbanize. Within a short time, the automobile was the dominant mode of travel in all cities of North America. The automobile has reduced the friction of distance considerably which has lead to urban sprawl.

In many areas of the world where urbanization is more recent, the above synthetic phases did not took place. In the majority of cases fast urban growth led to a scramble to provide transport infrastructure often in an inadequate fashion. Each form of urban mobility, be walking, the private car or urban transit has a level of suitability to fill mobility needs. Motorization and the diffusion of personal mobility has been an ongoing trend linked with substantial declines in the share of public transit in urban mobility.

2. Types of Urban Movements

Movements are linked to specific urban activities and their land use. Each type of land use involves the generation and attraction of a particular array of movements. This relationship is complex, but is linked to factors such as recurrence, income, urban form, spatial accumulation, level of development and technology. Urban movements are either obligatory, when they are linked to scheduled activities (such as home-to-work movements), or voluntary, when those generating it are free to decide of their scheduling (such as leisure). The most common types of urban movements are:

• Pendular movements. These are obligatory movements involving commuting between locations of residence and work. They are highly cyclical since they are predictable and recurring on a regular basis, most of the time a daily occurrence, thus the term pendulum.
• Professional movements. These are movements linked to professional, work-based, activities such as meetings and customer services, dominantly taking place during work hours.
• Personal movements. These are voluntary movements linked to the location of commercial activities, which includes shopping and recreation.
• Touristic movements. Important for cities having historical and recreational features they involve interactions between landmarks and amenities such as hotels and restaurants. They tend to be seasonal in nature or occurring at specific moments. Major sport events such as the World Cup or the Olympics are important generators of urban movements during their occurrence.
• Distribution movements. These are concerned with the distribution of freight to satisfy consumption and manufacturing requirements. They are linked to distribution centers and retail outlets.

The consideration of urban movements involves their generation, the modes and routes used and their destination:

• Trip generation. On average, an urban resident undertakes between 3 and 4 trips per day. Moving in an urban area is usually done to satisfy a purpose such as employment, leisure or access to goods and services. Each time a purpose is satisfied, a trip is generated. Important temporal variations of the number of trips by purpose are observed.
• Modal split. Implies which transportation mode is used for urban trips and is the outcome of a modal choice. Modal choice depends on a number of factors such as technology, availability, preference, travel time and income.
• Trip assignment. Involves which routes will be used for journeys within the city. For instance, a commuter driving a car has most of the time a fixed route. This route may be modified if there is congestion or if another activity (such as shopping) is linked with that trip; often known as trip chaining. Several factors influence trip assignment, the two most important being transport costs and availability.
• Trip destination. Changes in the spatial distribution of economic activities in urban areas have caused important modifications to the destination of movements, notably those related to work. The central city used to be a major destination for movements, but its share has substantially declined in most areas and suburbs now account for the bulk of urban movements.

The share of the automobile in urban trips varies in relation to location, social status, income, quality of public transit and parking availability. Mass transit is often affordable, but several social groups, such as students, the elderly and the poor are a captive market. There are important variations in mobility according to age, income, gender and disability. The so called gender gap in mobility is the outcome of socio-economic differences as access to individual transportation is dominantly a matter of income. Consequently, in some instances modal choice is more a modal constraint linked to economic opportunities.

In central locations, there are generally few transport availability problems because private and public transport facilities are present. However, in locations outside the central core that are accessible only by the automobile, a significant share of the population is isolated if they do not own an automobile. Limited public transit and high automobile ownership costs have created a class of spatially constrained (mobility deprived) people. They do not have access to the services in the suburb, but more importantly to the jobs that are increasingly concentrated in those areas.

3. Urban Transit

Transit is dominantly an urban transportation mode, particularly in large urban agglomerations. The urban environment is particularly suitable for transit because it provides conditions fundamental to its efficiency, namely high density and significant short distance mobility demands. Since transit is a shared public service, it potentially benefits from economies of agglomeration related to high densities and from economies of scale related to high mobility demands. The lower the density in which a transit system is operating, the lower the demand, with the greater likelihood that it will be run at a loss. In fact, the great majority of public transit systems are not financially sound and have to be subsidized. Transit systems are made up of many types of services, each suitable to a specific set of market and spatial context. Different modes are used to provide complementarity services within the transit system and in some cases between the transit system and other transport systems.

Contemporary transit systems tend to be publicly owned, implying that many decisions related to their development and operation are politically motivated. This is a sharp contrast of the past as most transit systems were private and profit driven initiatives. With the fast diffusion of the automobile in the 1950s, many transit companies faced financial difficulties, and the quality of their service declined as in a declining market there were limited incentives to invest. Gradually, they were purchased by public interests and incorporated into large agencies, mainly for the sake of providing mobility. As such, public transit often serves more a social function of public service and a tool of social equity than having any sound economic role. Transit has become dependent on government subsidies, with little if any competition permitted as wages and fares are regulated. As a result, they tend to be disconnected from market forces and subsidies are constantly required to keep a level of service. With suburbanization transit systems tend to have even less relationships with economic activities.

Reliance on urban transit as a mode of urban transportation tends to be high in Asia, intermediate in Europe and low in North America. Since their inception in the early 19th century, comprehensive urban transit systems had significant impacts on the urban form and spatial structure, but this influence is receding. Three major classes of cities can be found in terms of the relationships they have with their transit systems [Cervero, 1998]:

• Adaptive cities. Represent true transit-oriented cities where urban form and urban land use developments are coordinated with transit developments. While central areas are adequately serviced by a metro system and are pedestrian friendly, peripheral areas are oriented along transit rail lines.
• Adaptive transit. Represent cities where transit plays a marginal and residual role and where the automobile accounts for the dominant share of movements. The urban form is decentralized and of low density.
• Hybrids. Represent cities that have sought a balance between transit development and automobile dependency. While central areas have an adequate level of service, peripheral areas are automobile-oriented.

Contemporary land development tends to precede the introduction of urban transit services, as opposed to concomitant developments in earlier phases of urban growth. Thus, new services are established once a demand is deemed to be sufficient, often the subject of public pressures. Transit authorities operate under a service warrant and are often running a recurring deficit as services are becoming more expensive to provide. This has led to a set of considerations aimed at a higher integration of transit in the urban planning process, especially in North America, where such a tradition is not well established. Still, in spite of decades of investment, North American public transit ridership has roughly remained the same.

From a transportation perspective, the potential benefits of a better integration between transit and local land uses are reduced trip frequency and increased use of alternative modes of travel (i.e. walking, biking and transit). Evidence is often lacking to support such expectations has the relative share of public transit ridership is declining across the board. Community design can consequently have a significant influence on travel patterns. Local land use impacts can be categorized in three dimensions of relationships and are influenced by levels of use. Land use initiatives should be coordinated with other planning and policy initiatives to cope with automobile dependence. However, there is a strong bias against transit in the general population because of negative perceptions, especially in North America, but increasingly globally. As personal mobility is a symbol of status and economic success, the users of public transit are perceived as the least successful segment of the population. This bias may undermine the image of transit use within the general population.