Where does active travel fit within local community narratives of mobility space and place?

Abstract

Encouraging sustainable mobility patterns is at the forefront of policymaking at all scales of governance as the collective consciousness surrounding climate change continues to expand. Not every community, however, possesses the necessary economic or socio-cultural capital to encourage modal shifts away from private motorized vehicles towards active modes. The current literature on 'soft' policy emphasizes the importance of tailoring behavior change campaigns to individual or geographic context. Yet, there is a lack of insight and appropriate tools to promote active mobility and overcome transport disadvantage from the local community perspective. The current study investigates the promotion of walking and cycling adoption using a series of focus groups with local residents in two geographic communities, namely Chicago's (1) Humboldt Park neighborhood and (2) suburb of Evanston. The research approach combines traditional qualitative discourse analysis with quantitative text-mining tools, namely topic modeling and sentiment analysis. The aim of the analysis is to uncover the local mobility culture, embedded norms and values associated with acceptance of active travel modes in different communities. The analysis uncovers that underserved populations within diverse communities view active mobility simultaneously as a necessity and as a symbol of privilege that is sometimes at odds with the local culture. Thereby, this research expands on the walking and cycling literature by providing novel insights regarding the perceived benefits of, and barriers to, equitable promotion of these modes. The mixed methods approach to analyzing community member discourses is translated into policy findings that are either tailored to local context or broadly applicable to curbing automobile dominance. Overall, residents of both Humboldt Park and Evanston envision a society in which multimodalism replaces car-centrism, but differences in the local physical and social environments would and should influence the manner in which overarching policy objectives are met.

Disparities in Bicycle Commuting: Could Bike Lane Investment Widen the Gap?

“…Some of this work has suggested that investments in infrastructure such as bike lanes and bicycle sharing stations, in isolation, are insufficient to encourage notable shifts to cycling, particularly when these investments are made in the otherwise unsuitable or unsupportive environments that tend to be disproportionately faced in low-income communities of color (Dill et al 2014; Wang and Lindsey 2019). Other research has focused on the role of perceptions and attitudes, finding these and other forms of social support to be important determinants of cycling—particularly among low-income populations and people of color—that warrant consideration alongside infrastructure investments (Barajas 2019; Biehl et al 2019; Dill et al 2014). Pritchard et al (2019) note that some structural barriers to cycling, such as the socio-spatial distribution of employment opportunities and corresponding commute distances, may be challenging to overcome.…”

Cycling projects in low‐income communities: Exploring community perceptions of Te Ara Mua – Future Streets

“…As in other neighbourhoods, connectivity with the wider network is also likely to be important in increasing the perceived viability of cycling. Indeed, as has been noted in other low-income, ethnically diverse communities internationally (Biehl et al, 2019), participants in this study discussed the need to access places beyond their own neighbourhood due to its perceived lack of amenities.…”

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“…Over the last decade, equity-oriented studies have highlighted social-spatial inequalities encompassing active mobility in cities worldwide ( Biehl et al, 2019 ; Feitelson, 2002 ; Lee et al, 2017 ). Empirical evidence indicates that despite the general political efforts to improve cycling conditions in cities, the use of the bicycle for daily activities remains limited to specific demographic and socioeconomic segments of society ( Goodman et al, 2013 ; Mora et al, 2021 ; Tucker & Manaugh, 2018 ).…”