YOUR GUIDE TO THE FUTURE

Germany is introducing an affordable public transit offer,known as the Deutschland-Ticket, setting a new standard for encouraging carowners to switch to public transportation. For €49 a month, travelers can enjoyunlimited rides on city buses, subways, and trams across the country.

Despite the growing population, the resources of land and road infrastructure in the cities are finite and limited. Thus, the future of urban transport is public transport (PT) while discouraging the growth of private cars. There are several essential elements in the development of better Smart Public Transport that will have an important impact on the shaping of next generation, urban transportation systems. 

What would the next generation of urban transport offer? Ceder (2021) explains the trends in the innovation and technology and the possibilities of logistics and travel modes of future urban transportation. The future urban transport is going towards a more sustainable approach that considers the integration of environment, society, and economics aspects of the mobility system.

In promoting active mobility, urban planning and transport planning sectors play a critical role in providing the infrastructure, design and engineering of the city roads. However, the public health sector is also in support of the promotion of active mobility due to the health benefits of walking and cycling for the human body.

Active mobility is so crucial in promoting physical activity that the World Health Organisation (WHO) provided a tool that could help cities quantify and monetize the effect of measures from promoting walking and cycling.

There are two determinants that are most significant in establishing active mobility identified in the research of the past years. The two determinants are Built Environment and social, economic & psychological aspects of the demographics. 

How cities design their built environment is one crucial determinants of the utilisation of active mobility in their local municipalities. The land use planning that determines the diversity of use, density of population, connectivity to nearby areas and the accessibility of the infrastructure can either invite or hinder people to choose walking and cycling as their transport mode for daily and leisure commutes.

The future of mobility in Smart Cities incorporates transport systems that are socially and environmentally sustainable. A sustainable transport system can improve the quality of living in cities as it reduces the risk of air & noise pollution as well as the decrease the threat of traffic collision.

Modern lifestyles that neglect physical activity pose significant risk to our physical well-being. One of the ways smart cities can promote better quality of life for their citizens is to push for active mobility as part of their sustainable transport system.

The implementation of smart technologies in the city expected to promote connectivity and accessibility to public services for everyone. However, in reality, there is a disparity of accessibility to digital infrastructure for various socio-economic groups.

Road diet is a technique to redesign the street configuration that reduces the number of vehicular lanes. The most common road diet practice is the reduction of two lanes of two-way roads that is converted into two lanes of two-way roads with an additional third lane in the centre used as a turning lane.

Reconfiguration of road design that reduce the number of lanes, or Road Diet is an approach that is widely used to improve traffic safety on the road. A study of 36 segment sites and 39 intersections by Lim and Fontaine (2022) showed that the implementation of Road Diet reduces the number of car crashes and improve the road safety for pedestrian.

Road infrastructure takes up a significant proportion of the land use in cities. This city infrastructure is essential for the mobility of people and good, yet the default program of it today is mostly centred around the use of automobiles.

The adoption of Complete Street has been proven to create safer streets for all road users of all abilities from various transportation modes. Complete Street have transformed cities to shift towards sustainable transportation by prioritising non-motorised modes of transport. Nonetheless, the implementation of this concept may not be universally successful.

Roads that are planned and designed for cars are dangerous for other commuting forms of cycling. This is due to the fact that there are many points of conflict between these two forms of road users. Cars and bicycles also use the road differently, the speed and masses of the car users and cyclists make them incompatible to be gathered in the same road network.

The World’s Health Organisation estimates that there are 50 million injuries and 1.35 million deaths caused by road accidents every year. The Safe System is a widely used concept for road transport systems that put forward the reduction of the injuries and deaths of road accidents as its safety goal.

Data in Greece shows that elderly citizens account for 29% of total road fatalities and 58% of that occurs in the urban areas. Physical vulnerabilities and functional limitation of their age makes the elderly population susceptible to this road fatalities.

From the analysis of over 14 years of police reported crash from South Australia (SA) and New South Wales (NSW), Doecke et al. (2018) concluded the safe speed limit to reduce the fatality of various traffic crashes in the urban area. The study strongly suggests the correlation between increasing speed of vehicle to the injury severity of crashes.

Following social restriction during the pandemic, many cities took the initiatives to redesign and repurpose their streets in hope for more active inclusive use of road space. Halifax, Canada, has reallocated 16 km of its city street since 2020.

Complete Street is a design approach that puts forward the safety of all modes of travel, accommodating all ages and types of abilities. This is a system that provides alternatives to designing streets exclusive for motorised vehicles.

Improving the quality of the streets that are inviting and attractive is one way to increase the walkability of a street. Enhancing the quality of experience of the local street, or place-making, can also encourage the use of public space especially in areas that are socio-economically disadvantaged.

The Mayor of London believes that improving walkability in the city can significantly improve the people’s quality of life. It is a mode of transport that is low in emission, reduces the noise pollution, encourages interaction in the public space while also improving the citizens’ health.

The level of user-friendliness on our city streets is an important quality to ensure people come and enjoy the city, especially the commercial area. A successful street is part of the public space in cities, measured by how well they attract people and how many people are present.

Adaptive reuse is a historical & cultural preservation strategy that can benefit the economy of the city. Through the Adaptive Reuse Ordinance (ARO), Los Angeles shows how encouraging adaptive reuse within the city’s transit hubs has helped the economic revitalisation of Downtown Los Angeles.

Generally, people choose their mode of transport based on the information that they are exposed to. However, this mostly leads to non-optimised travel choices or even inefficiency. Mobility-as-a-Service (MaaS), is a concept that integrates travel modes and service in a single platform to create transit that is seamless and sustainable.

In the last few years, various alternatives of mobility pop up that integrates advance technology, including e-scooters. this welcomes the discussion of how cities can support, manage and regulate the various alternatives in the public roads.

With the rise of the concept of Mobility as a Servicer (MaaS), the use of ride hailing apps in cities including in Indonesia flourish. Ride hailing, especially the motorcycle type is popular in Indonesia’s cities as they are convenient, relatively reliable and accessible. However

With the upgrade of Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR) by the Police Department in Jakarta in their CCTV System, the Electronic Traffic Law Enforcement (ETLE) was launched simultaneously. The smart system was installed to detect traffic offense by motorised vehicle using the road.

The capital city of Jakarta rolled out a scheme that integrated the various transportation mode in Jakarta, called Jaklingko. This scheme is the government effort to create reliable, seamless and comfortable public transportation system that serves the greater Jakarta metropolitan by not only integrating the infrastructure but also ticketing and fare system.