[sustran] Re: Traffic in Shanghai

John Ernst itdpasia at adelphia.net
Tue Nov 2 15:02:26 JST 2004


Sujit Patwardhan has raised a good question, and I hope that information on 
Shanghai could also be sent "online" to the SUSTRAN list.

Overpasses, or flyovers, as an attempt to alleviate traffic congestion have 
been implemented in most large Asian cities, and seem to be the latest 
thing in India (Hyderabad is now planning 5 new ones).

Studies in the west to show that new road space fills with new traffic -- 
much of it from trips that wouldn't have occurred without the new road 
space.  (See Todd Litman's site for more information on this, or 
specifically http://www.vtpi.org/tdm/tdm61.htm for definitions of generated 
and induced traffic.)

I believe new road space fills much more quickly in the rapidly growing 
populations and economies of Asian cities, but it would really be great to 
have numbers to back this up.

Lacking numbers, anecdotes can be useful.  I can offer one - photos of 
Bejing's third ring road empty in 1989 and jammed in 1998.  Of course, 
photos are not scientific,... but still effective political tools.

Does anyone have statistics on average traffic speed in Bangkok before and 
10-years after some of the flyovers were built there?  Or photos?

[Note that this list is not designed for attached files, i.e., photos.  It 
might be possible, however, to upload photos to a free service such as 
www.yousendit.com (which keeps the attached file for 7-days) and then send 
the link to sustran-discuss...?]

John Ernst
ITDP-Asia

At 01:35 PM 11/1/2004, you wrote:
>1 November 2004
>
>
>Dear Sustran Friends,
>If anyone has information or data on the traffic scene in Shanghai 
>(China), I will be grateful if you could send it to me (directly to my 
>Email : <sujit at vsnl.com> if you feel the rest of the list may not be 
>interested in the subject).
>This is because there is a lot of confusion about the real situation in 
>Shanghai. Many people on a short visit there say the facilities are 
>wonderful, with scores of flyovers, wide roads and traffic flowing without 
>congestion, and this is what we need to do in our cities.
>We find this hard to believe because we feel such "infrastructure only" 
>approach is what has brought the public transport situation to such a bad 
>condition. In most Indian cities, auto vehicles are growing like cancer, 
>air is full of auto effluents and accident are on the rise, natural and 
>built environment, including heritage structures are under threat from the 
>ever growing appetite of roads, parking spaces and vehicles.
>We are therefore advocating the more sustainable option - of TDM, improved 
>public transport and better facilities for the cyclists and pedestrians to 
>meet the mobility needs of our cities without damaging the environment.
>Will welcome your inputs.
>Many thanks,
>--
>Sujit Patwardhan
>
>
>
>Sustainable Urban Transport
>---------------------------------------------------
>Sujit Patwardhan
>Member
>
>PTTF
>Pune Traffic & Transportation Forum,
>c/o Parisar, "Yamuna",
>ICS Colony,Ganeshkhind Road,
>Pune 411 007
>
>Tel: +91 20 25537955
>Cell: +91 98220 26627
>Email: sujit at vsnl.com
>www.pttf.net
>(under construction)
>-----------------------------------------------------

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John Ernst   -  Director, Asia Region
    ITDP - The Institute for Transport and Development Policy
Subscribe to ITDP's Sustainable Transport e-update at www.itdp.org
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