[sustran] Financing Transport Projects in Cities with EU Funding or Guarantees: A Proposal for Action

[Eric Britton]

Dear Friends,

At the opening bash for this year’s European Moblity Week which was held in
London last week, we stood up and tossed out a challenge to the conference
in the form of a proposal for what the European Commission might do itself
in very specific, concrete form, and without further delay to make a real
contribution in the tough up-hill struggle to more sustainable cities and
transport systems.  The principal objective of the meeting was to introduce
and explain about all the good things they and their associated cites and
agencies are doing this year under the “Clever Commuting” theme that they
have chosen for the 2005 events – to which they added some very interesting
discussions of the politics of transportation from the vantage of several
mayors who were really very good on the subject .  (See
http://www.mobilityweek-europe.org/page.php?page=information_presentation&la
ng=en
<http://www.mobilityweek-europe.org/page.php?page=information_presentation&l
ang=en>  for more on this from the EU. And
http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/sep2005/2005-09-15-01.asp
<http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/sep2005/2005-09-15-01.asp>  for a general
synopsis from ENS.).

But at the end of the day the main purpose of a Car/Free Day or Mobility
Week is not only to have a nice time, but to give us all an opportunity to
consider how each and every one of us might get ACTIVELY and DIRETLY
involved in advancing the New Mobility Agenda. And in this context it struck
me that this might be a good opportunity to see if we can now hook the
European institutions into all this in a more direct, powerful and shaping
way.  And what better hook than money, eh?  They spend and lend a lot of it
in the sector, but can this be done in a way that is more sustainability
friendly? That’s the challenge.

Here is the proposal that I made off the cup to the closing session of the
meeting, rather quickly and without the help of any images or charts which
would have helped me make this point.  What I noted from the discussions
afterwards was that the savvy picked this up without any trouble, but that
from the glazed eyes here and there I was too fast and too cryptic for most
of those there.  So I should now like to see if I can in the next days put
before the organizers and all those who attended a convincing page or two
which sets out this proposal, which I now am pleased to set before you for
your comments, suggestions, rectifications – and if you think it’s a worthy
idea, perhaps you could let us know that you support it as well.

Financing Transport Projects in Cities with EU Funding or Guarantees: A
Proposal for Action

A new look at how transport projects in cities should to be planned and
financed in the future. The proposal runs as follows, in particular in the
case of financing through any funds make available by any of the
institutions which constitute the European Union, and including the European
Investment Bank, all of whom have a very important role in the sector.  Here
in a nutshell is how this might work.

1.       No public moneys or guarantees should be made available for
projects that do not demonstrate in convincing detail via their technical
planning, independent expert evaluation, local outreach and open public
review efforts that full provision has been made for accessing each of the
main system nodes (think of this perhaps as bus or transit stations) from
their respective hinterlands – and specifically by non motorized transport.
Typically this might take the form of a radius around each stop of something
on the order of 3-500 meters, possibly more. Here is a crude sketch just to
try to get the basic idea across, with the small dots intended to represent
a station or stop, and the circles to give an idea of the surrounding
hinterland to be served via NMT:



2.       Such a proposal offers numerous important advantages for the city
and people in question. First, it provides – and in many places for the
first time – an official recognition and appropriate administrative and
jurisdictional space for the full scale planning and implementation of these
important mobility, sustainable mobility in fact,  components of a livable
city.


3.       Second, it provide for the first time an appropriate level of
funding which takes into account the importance of a structure for
integrating these most environmental and ECONOMICALLY friendly means of
getting around in our cities. (We should never lose sight of the fact that
non-motorized transport, got right, gives by far the most bank per buck of
any that is spent in the transport sector.)

4.       It is of course not possible at this time and at this level of
generality to put a number to the level of funding that will be appropriate
for these important access arrangements.  But if we were to chose a possibly
reasonable target out of a hat, we would put it at the area of 10% of total
project budget. But the appropriate detail on this will come in each case
out of the specific studies and projects needed in each place.


5.       One additional wrinkle in this that is possibly worthy of attention
has to do with the fact that if we are talking about, say, 400 media
radiuses around each transit stop, in point of fact in many cases these
areas of provision for non-motorized access will overlap. . . leading to the
possibility of far more extensive overall “pathing” throughout the city,
meaning that it will now be possibly to move safely and efficiently over
larger distances by cycle, foot or other non-motorized options.



6.       Mikel Murga of MIT and Leber further draws to my attention that
each of these surrounding hinterlands needs to be looked at in the planning
process not only in terms of offering appropriate and safe access to people
moving under their own steam, but that also thought needs to be given to
what can be done in each area, if needed, to provide the right kind of
public space for this kind of transport.  The point here is that for such
areas to be convivial and safe they must be more than open shoots which
channel people to the stop or station, but that they need to be vibrant
areas which offer attractions of their own, commercial and other. (One of
the great advantages of this last wrinkle, is that it offers a way to bring
more people and intersts, including economic intersts, into the planning and
execution stage.  Sustainable Mobility needs friends, and this is one way to
bring them on board.)

Leading by Example:
In closing, I would like to mention that in the event that the Commission
and the others financial institutions of the European Union adopt this as
firm policy for all their own financial support and guarantees in the sector
in the future, but that the Commission will also encourage national and
other levels of government across Europe to do the same.

If we were able to get this onto the books and into practice, there is no
doubt that European Mobility Weeks will go down in the record books as one
of the great ones.

*     *     *

What you can do to help?

*         Send on your editorial and other suggestions and additions to make
this clearer and more convincing.
*         Your ideas about other places where we should be making similar
international peer proposals along these lines.
*         If you wish to add a short annex and commentary of your own, I am
thinking about posting these along with the final proposal to the organizers
of last weeks conference, the respective offices of the EU and a few other
key places.
*         And if you think that this is a good idea and wish to go on public
record as supporting it, a short note with your name, title, institutional
affiliation and address would be most useful.

It is my hope that with your suggestions, and eventually your support, that
we will be able to do something really important with this.  What do you
think?

With all good wishes,

Eric Britton

The New Mobility Agenda is on line at  http://www.newmobility.org
Le Frene, 8/10 rue Joseph Bara                      75006 Paris, France
Tel:  Europe: +331 4326 1323        North America +1 310 601-8468
Mobile: +336 73.21 58.68   F: +331 53.01 28.96  Skype: ericbritton
E: eric.britton at ecoplan.org <mailto:eric.britton at ecoplan.org>
Backup: fekbritton at gmail.com <mailto:fekbritton at gmail.com>

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