<html xmlns:v="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:vml" xmlns:o="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" xmlns:w="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:word" xmlns:m="http://schemas.microsoft.com/office/2004/12/omml" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40"> <head> <meta name=ProgId content=Word.Document> <meta name=Generator content="Microsoft Word 12"> <meta name=Originator content="Microsoft Word 12"> <link rel=File-List href="cid:filelist.xml@01C9ABB2.63A1B440">  <link rel=themeData href="~~themedata~~"> <link rel=colorSchemeMapping href="~~colorschememapping~~">  <style>  </style>  </head> <body lang=EN-US link=blue vlink=purple style='tab-interval:.5in'> <div class=Section1> <span style='mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri;mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin;mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri;mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi'>Dear Colleagues,<o:p></o:p> <span style='mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri;mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin;mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri;mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi'><o:p> </o:p> <span style='mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri;mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin;mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri;mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi'>I would like to invite your attention to the following small strategic piece, which I hope will be of interest to you. And if you have any questions, comments, or suggestions on how to improve, it would be good to have them either in private to me at eric.britton@newmobility.org or if you feel it appropriate via <a href="mailto:NewMobilityCafe@yahoogroups.com">NewMobilityCafe@yahoogroups.com</a> <o:p></o:p> <span style='mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri;mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin;mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri;mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi'><o:p> </o:p> <span style='mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri;mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin;mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri;mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi'>If I learn from you that it is good enough I would like to prepare it as an editorial for World Streets.<o:p></o:p> <span style='mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri;mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin;mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri;mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi'><o:p> </o:p> <span style='mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri;mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin;mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri;mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi'>Kind regards/Eric britton<o:p></o:p> <span style='mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri;mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin;mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri;mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi'><o:p> </o:p> <o:p> </o:p> <div style='mso-element:para-border-div;border:none;border-bottom:solid windowtext 1.0pt; mso-border-bottom-alt:solid windowtext .75pt;padding:0in 0in 1.0pt 0in'> <o:p> </o:p> </div> <o:p> </o:p> What/who keeps holding back newmobility reform.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> If you get it, newmobility is a no-brainer.  However  while that is a great starting place, it is not going to get the job somehow miraculously done. We have a few sticking points here to overcome first.  Let's have a quick look.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> After some years of talking with cities, and working and observing in many different circumstances, here are some of the barriers we and others most frequently  encounter in trying to get collaborative transportation reform programs off the ground, including even in cities that really do need a major mobility overhaul.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> <![if !supportLists]>1.    <![endif]>Mayor/city manager: The mayor or prime city leader either: does not get it, feels that she knows the whole area well enough to require nothing else, does not think this is a matter of high priority, does not have enough time to get his arms around it, feels confident that his staff has this well under control, or or<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> <![if !supportLists]>2.    <![endif]>City council: Where you have city councils taking these decisions, it turns out that they are often much better at disagreeing then agreeing, at least  when any unfamiliar idea comes before them. And yet, if we do not get some kind of consensus for change at the top  this is never going to happen.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> <![if !supportLists]>3.    <![endif]>City's transportation experts: The city's main transportation expert, team, is not that interested in having any "outside help", other than the usuals. Anything else is often seen as a challenge to their authority and expertise. <o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> <![if !supportLists]>4.    <![endif]>Local Consultants: The specialized consultants who work in the sector in that city, or have contact with it, feel that they do not need any additional help since this is after all they are job and specialty.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> <![if !supportLists]>5.    <![endif]>Local business groups, who the most part are firmly wedded to the idea of cars and car access (AKA parking) as being the key to the success of their businesses.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> <![if !supportLists]>6.    <![endif]>Public interest groups: Specific transportation, environmental groups (cycling, pedestrian, public space, emissions, quality of life, specific neighborhood groups, etc.) tend to be committed to their specific missions and far more often than not simply do not get together to create a global sustainable cities program, as indeed should be the case.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> <![if !supportLists]>7.    <![endif]>In-place transportation service providers: bus/transit services, taxis, others -- tend to be the most part quite narrowly focused on their specific business area, often already under some financial duress, and by and large not known to be open to new ideas or new ways of doing things.  Including new and much broader partnerships with other service providers and actors in the community. And finally. . .<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> <![if !supportLists]>8.    <![endif]>Local media: For reasons of their own, advertising revenues included, have rarely really bought into the sustainability agenda. <o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> <![if !supportLists]>9.    <![endif]>The "local car lobby".  While there are financial interests tied to the continuing abundant unfettered use of cars in the city, including local auto dealers, any businesses that might be suppliers to the sector, parking businesses, the great bulk of this "lobby" is an unquestioned implied understanding that nothing should be done that would change your relationship with your car.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> <![if !supportLists]>10.  <![endif]>All of us: Doubtless the biggest single obstacle to deep  transportation reform is a result of the fact that  that it deals with a highly visible area of public life  in which just about everybody, from mayor to dogcatcher, feels that they have a high degree of implicit expertise in figuring out what works and what will not work in their city. . . because transport is something that they do every day and can see with their own eyes. This is the Achilles' heel of transportation policy, this very human tendency for just about everybody to feel that if they do it i.e. move around every day) this means they understand it.  The trouble with this is that transport in cities is a highly complex metabolism of great systemic complexity that is far closer to that of the human brain than say another glass of beer. Thus one of the main challenges of deep transportation reform is to help citizens and decision makers come to grips with these challenges of complexity, without at the same time removing it from their role as active and responsible citizens and placing it entirely in the hands of centralized experts. There is a major communications challenge here.  And a governance challenge as well. <o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> How many potential barriers is that already, ten?  And if you think of it in terms of your city, I am sure you are going to spot most if not all of the above and yet others, making it the first challenge of anyone who wishes to advance the sustainable transportation agenda in that place to understand this terrain and to figure out ways of coping with it.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> For sure, it is going to be impossible to take on and convert all of these interests at once.  But the fundamental concepts and potential of a 21st-century mobility system are such that if we take a strategic approach to dealing with these barriers, taking them on one at a time and with great patience and foresight, the policy agenda can be opened up and perhaps some first small victories can be achieved.  Once this has happened, the rest will follow in due course.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> <o:p> </o:p> </div> </body> </html>