Urban Policies and Planning Approaches for a Safer and Climate Friendlier Mobility in Cities: Strategies, Initiatives and Some Analysis

Abstract

How can urban policies and planning approaches help in achieving a safer mobility and carbon reduction in the transport sector? The attention of planners and policy makers towards the promotion of sustainability and reduction of environmental impacts has grown in recent years. This paper investigates the role that Urban Planning plays in the long term towards a safer and climate friendlier mobility, highlighting the need for integrated approaches gathering spatial planning and mobility management. After a review of several urban policies and planning strategies, initiatives, and approaches, mainly based on the urban scale, the paper presents an urban regeneration case study leading to an increase of pedestrian accessibility at the neighborhood level. This can be seen as a support tool to foster sustainable, safe, and climate friendly mobility in cities. The results of the performed analysis show a dependency of accessibility from two different factors: the distribution of services and the capillarity of the soft mobility network, which can contribute to creating a more walkable space.

Time Cost and Demand: Implications for Public Policy

“…Furthermore, in many cities, the highway system is in competition with the public transit system. Policy makers seeking to encourage more climate friendly solutions may wish to shift commuters from the highways to the transit system (Tiboni et al, 2021 ). Given the pervasive importance of time factors in controlling the behavior of commuters and their choice of alternatives, behavioral economic tools provide a relatively inexpensive and rapid way to assess how time delays affect the demand for different alternative means of travel.…”

The Safer City: A New Planning Perspective for the Traditional City Development

“…Therefore, it is necessary to create well-connected and safe places through careful and creative design based on local evaluation [15]. Car traffic must be calmed and slowed down to create suitable urban environments for other modes of transportation, such as cycling and walking, to provide effective transportation alternatives to the car through an integrated strategy that enhances security and sustainability [1]. This calls for the establishment of multiple centers with mixed land uses and suitable densities, linked to high-quality public transportation [16].…”

“…The processes of urbanization and the increase in the population within cities contribute significantly to reducing the levels of security within them, through the increase in traffic accidents and the inability to control crime. The government, society, and urban characteristics contribute to providing security and reducing crime, as urban policies and planning methods can help achieve a safer life [1]. The safe city is part of the concept of livable cities and focuses on the problem of crime in urban areas [2].…”

“…Tiboni et al [1] investigated the role urban planning plays in achieving safer, more climate-friendly mobility. They demonstrated the need for integrated approaches that can combine spatial planning and mobility management, by reviewing several urban policies and urban planning strategies.…”

Exploring the 15-minute neighbourhoods. An evaluation based on the walkability performance to public facilities

“…In the perspective of the 15-minute city, many other authors have recently focused both on urban accessibility (Balletto et al, 2021;Da Silva et al, 2020;Tiboni et al, 2021) to assess the potential interaction between homes and destinations, residents and activities spatially distributed, and urban walkability (Weng et al, 2019;Ignaccolo et al, 2020;Campisi et al, 2020), providing indices to measure the performance of the pedestrian network and enhance active mobility. Several GIS models have been proposed as support tools, both on a vector or raster basis (Rossetti et al, 2020;Carpentieri et al, 2019;Mezoued et al, 2021), experimenting with survey methods, audit systems, and walkability indices, e.g., PEF, PEI (Weng et al, 2019;Ignaccolo et al, 2020;Campisi et al, 2020), etc.…”