[sustran] Re: (From: Cornie Huizenga) Consultation on Singapore's National Climate Change Strategy - Transport

[eric britton]

Comment by Lake Sagaris appearing in World Streets today – in reflection on
yesterday's Op-Ed piece by Cornie Huizinga:

Source:
http://worldstreets.wordpress.com/2011/09/26/op-ed-cornie-huizenga-the-trans
port-sector-as-leader-in-the-sustainability-debate/#comments

 

1.
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%2F%2Fs0.wp.com%2Fi%2Fmu.gif&r=GLake Sagaris <http://www.ciudadviva.cl>  |
26 September 2011 at 22:28
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The Achilles heel of the transport sector is its failure to engage citizens
and particularly their organizations, at both the community and the thematic
levels, in framing the issues and setting political agendas. Part of the
problem is that “innovative” projects themselves often interact with
existing urban systems, particularly parks and public space, as brutally as
highways, sending a very negative message to city users, i.e. citizens. Hard
to identify BRT with a socially just, inclusive transport plan when it is
destroying bike lanes and public space, as occurred in Santiago (Chile) with
Transantiago.

Transport engineers and planners continue to insist on transportation as if
it were just a “technical” problem, involving project design and
implementation. But above all it is a political issue, which requires
careful attention to the design of processes that will favour innovation in
thinking, planning, design and use of cities. Where are the grassroots
advocates of BRT and other more sustainable transport systems? We all need
to take a good look at how cyclists and walkers are successfully pushing
their highly marginalized modes back onto public agendas, all over the
world. We need to learn from them. And work with them, as well as
neighbourhood, recycler/wastepicker and other constituent communities.

An additional weakness to date is that cities and neighbourhoods are treated
as if they were just smaller versions of national (or global) issues, rather
than cultural and spatial realities with their own very particular
possibilities for pushing a sustainable transport agenda ahead, or blocking
its progress. 

It is largely citizens and particularly those organized in civil society
organizations at different policy-making and implementation scales that have
put the environment and energy on public agendas so successfully. Until
innovative and sustainable transport initiatives can start building broad
coalitions that bring in walkers, cyclists, environmentalists, poor and
marginal communities and other organizations, sustainable transport may hit
the occasional political agenda, but it will not stay there long enough to
really make the kind of deep changes required for a sustainable world in the
face of 21st century challenges.

 

 

 

 

_____________________________________________________

World Streets

 

 

            

 

    

 

   Eric Britton, Editor / Managing Director

    <http://www.worldstreets.org/> World Streets /
<http://www.newmobility.org/> New Mobility Partnerships  /
<http://seminars.ecoplan.org/> Sustainability Seminar Series

   8, rue Jospeh Bara   75006 Paris France

   Tel. +331 7550 3788   |  editor at newmobility.org   |  Skype: newmobility

 

P Avant d'imprimer, pensez à l'environnement

 

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