[sustran] Re: Slowth (was "Slow transport?")

[Lee Schipper]

There is a much more deadly disease you get from cycling -helmet hair!

 

Lee Schipper

Director of Research,

EMBARQ the WRI Center for  Sustainable Transport

www.embarq.wri.org

and

Visiting Scholar,

Univ of Calif Transport Center

Berkeley CA

www.uctc.net

skype: mrmeter

510 642 6889

202 262 7476

 

From: Carlosfelipe Pardo [mailto:carlosfpardo at gmail.com] 
Sent: Tuesday, January 01, 2008 2:40 PM
To: eric.britton at ecoplan.org
Cc: NewMobilityCafe at yahoogroups.com; sustran-discuss at list.jca.apc.org;
Lee Schipper; 'Sujit Patwardhan'; Todd Litman (Todd Litman);
s.p.platt at bham.ac.uk; Hans Monderman; Jan Gehl; Aaron Naparstek; Peter
Newman; Jeff Kenworthy
Subject: Re: Slowth (was "Slow transport?")

 

Yes! This was more or less what I was aiming at when I asked my initial
question about "slow transport" or "slowth" or whatever name comes out
of this. Other than the "tortoise and hare" concept, there are other
arguments such as the whole idea behind slow food, slow cities and slow
living in general (there have been various documents on this recently,
such as the book by Wendy Parkins or the work of Paul Virilio). 

It's also interesting to see what Peter Newman mentioned about human
capacities of 20-30 km/h. If you look at the history of the bicycle,
everyone was afraid to ride it because of the risk of getting "bicycle
face" (your face would suffer a deformation due to the "high speeds" of
the vehicle). Also, people did not like the train ride because they
didn't feel they could perceive the journey and its surroundings, due to
its very high speeds (initially, around 30 km/h!).

And to make it all more complex, we have followed a process of "speed
desensitization" (not sure if this term is right, it's the shortest way
to describe the concept): in the 19th century, trains h were
"excessively fast" as were also bicycles, Today, speed limits of 30 km/h
are difficult (or impossible) to enforce and bicycles and choo-choo
trainers are the slowest vehicles one can think of. Thus, we don't
perceive the impressive acceleration of our daily lives, but we want to
go faster.

To reiterate the idea from the beginning: In transport and land use,
greater speeds generate greater distances traveled, which in turn can
generate the idea (or action) of living farther from work, study and
everything else. This normally has greater sprawl as a consequence, and
thus greater energy use and increased emissions. Most of this is common
to many, but the issue of speed as a factor in this is normally
neglected.

I really think there should be more work on this issue of speed, and
I've seen that speed (or slowness) has not been treated as a goal, but
as a means for something else. If we improve the situation, we could see
as a result: lower speeds = reduced distances traveled = living closer
to work, study, etc =more appropriate densities = reduced energy use =
reduced emissions... increased quality of life.

Thanks for your feedback, especially around new year! 

Best regards,




Carlosfelipe Pardo


eric.britton wrote: 

Thanks, Carlos, Todd, Lee, Sujit, Simon.

 

Much in this spirit I have for some years been a firm supporter of the
concept of "slowth" - that which occurs in situations when your top
speed is limited but somehow you get there first.  Myriad examples
abound, and in addition to Aesop's good write-up of this highly
technical point a few years back, we have the example of thousands of
cities - Paris being one -- in which you or  I just about invariably get
there first if we take our bike and not our Ferrari.

 

(I am not sure as to when or where I first ran into this word, but I
have been using it rather often in my own work for more than a decade
now. 

 

A traffic system based on slowth is going to be carefully calibrated to
lower top speeds - way 20 or 30 kph works well for me - but where the
entire system leads to far steadier flows and throughput, and, with it,
greater safety, lower emissions, and higher quality of life all around. 

 

If I were a young traffic engineer, I would certainly want to make this
a pillar of my life work - which of course is exactly what wonderful
people like Hans Monderman, Jan Gehl and a growing cohort of young
practitioners are now doing.   It's a splendid thing to do.

 

Eric Britton

 

PS.  Just looked slowth up in the Urban Dictionary which provides the
following, to me, rather unpromising definition: "Slowness. Generally
sloth-like behavior, especially of computers or co-workers."
(http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=slowth)

 

PS2. That done I next looked up slowth just now in the Wikipedia and
found no entry.  But now if you go to
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slowth you will see the following entry,
which I hope that one or more of you may wish to jump in and complete.
It's a very important concept and really does need a far higher profile.
Words count. 

 

 

Slowth is a New Mobility
<http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=New_Mobility&action=edit>
transport planning concept, describing a physical situation, usually in
a city, in which lower top speeds can lead to shorter overall travel
times.

(The traditional "model" for this is of course Aesop's tale of the race
between the tortoise and the hare, in which the slow turtle arrives well
before the fast rabbit.)

This is a powerful model which transport and city planners are only
recently starting to take seriously.

A traffic system based on slowth is carefully calibrated to lower top
speeds - 20 or 30 kph on most city streets is one common target - but
where the entire system leads to far steadier flows and throughput, and,
with it, greater safety, lower emissions, and higher quality of life all
around.

************ now help make this better. *******