ECOMM CONFERENCE IN GRAZ LEPT …Pecha kucha is a format in which presenters can present 20 slides, each for exact 20 seconds – so each presentation has to focus on the essential,

contents news eg-e website

ECOMM CONFERENCE IN GRAZ LEPT CONFERENCE IN LONDON 2nd GENERATION BIOFUELS

MOBILITY MANAGEMENT

Jun – Aug 2010

Volume16 Issues 1 & 2

Promoting local sustainable development

Published by Global to Local Foundation

ISSN 2042-1990

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Anne Finnane

Editor

Welcome to this double-issue on Mobility Management.

We have special reports from two important conferences:

• The ECOMM conference in Graz

• The LEPT conference in London

Presenters from these events have provided eg readers with some excellent articles on a range of topics -Shared Space, Mobility Management monitoring, e-bikes, Workplace Travel Plans and more.

Oil has been hitting the headlines yet again with the deepwater drilling disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. I decided to take at look at the progress being made on 2nd generation biofuels and the prospects for finding a viable alternative to oil.

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Promoting local sustainable development

Published by Global to Local Foundation

In this issue

ECOMM conference • PEWTA awards • e-bikes • Workplace Travel: Ile de France • MaxEva - evaluation and benchmarking • Transhub - mobility plan management • ResSmart in Stockholm • Smarter Travel in Utrecht

LEPT conference • SEGMENT European Project • Shared Space – respect instead of rules • Ashford rings the changes • PIMMS Transfer project

SATRE and SMARTWAY

2nd Generation Biofuels

Spatial Planning & Sustainable Travel

News

hyperlinks to articles


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DOWNLOAD WORKSHOP PRESENTATIONS HERE

Moving people from all over Europe Over 300 participants from 27 countries came to Graz from 5 to 7 May. After last year’s highest ECOMM attendance ever, it was time to break another record: ECOMM 2010 had the highest attendance of new member states. This time, the Netherlands sent the largest foreign delegation.

Moving People - Bridging spaces This year’s conference was a unique and successful cooperation between the Austrian Federal Ministry for Environment, the Department for Transport of the Regional Styrian Government, and the City of Graz.

Cities are constantly changing: new urban districts are created, existing districts get new functions and new inhabitants. This year’s edition

explored how Mobility Management can act as an effective tool to harmonise specific problems related to the consistent change in our mobility, work and leisure activities.

Many subtopics were explored, mainly through the numerous workshops held in 6 different rooms in Graz’s magnificent Conference Centre. One of the focuses was on historical city centres, new districts and districts under redevelopment. Many references were made to the shared space concept.

The basic principles of this concept were presented in the presentation on the art of placemaking by international expert David Engwicht. He explained how bringing social life back on the streets can create “mental speedbumps” slowing traffic down.

Networking Several workshops were dedicated to the establishment and working of networks at various levels. To illustrate the networking activities of EPOMM and EPOMM-PLUS, EPOMM representative Melanie Leroy explained the development of the Mobility Management Monitors within EPOMM-PLUS, as a means to compare countries and have them learn from each other.

14th ECOMM Conference in Graz


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New forms of mobility Another “hot item” was the growing success of e-bikes and pedelecs. ECOMM participants had the opportunity to test different kinds of pedelecs and experience the benefits for themselves. Contrary to an e-bike motor, a pedelec motor only works when one turns the pedals, combining the health benefits of cycling with the comfort of an e-bike in hilly or windy regions. In many countries, companies and authorities are strongly investing in this new form of transport.

Pecha Kucha As ECOMM always strives to improve, this year’s edition experimented with a new presentation format called Pecha Kucha (pronounce as one word: petsja-kutsja). A Pecha Kucha presentation is a PowerPoint presentation consisting of exactly 20 images, each shown for 20 seconds. It lasts exactly 6 minutes and 40 seconds. At ECOMM, 9 Mobility Management projects were presented following the rules of this new form of presentation.

ELTIS Award For the second time, the ELTIS Award for the best submitted paper was handed-over at this years’ ECOMM. The winner was Niels de Vries with his paper “Private sector pays for public transport”.

Next ECOMM at Toulouse From 4 to 6 May 2011, the 15th ECOMM will be hosted by PEWTA-award winner Tisséo-SMTC, the Public Transport Authority of the Greater Toulouse. The conference will take place in the Congress Centre Pierre Baudis, located in a lush green environment at a 10 minute walk from the city centre of Toulouse. The city combines a 2000-year-old history, reflected in the typical brick and tile architecture, with a vast reputation as an important science and technology oriented city.

The conference will address the topic of “The Personalised Travel Assistance: an active mobility management approach for a shift of the current transport demand”. Tisséo invests a lot of effort in supporting inhabitants and companies to reduce their car use, by means of Mobility Agencies and Personalised Travel Assistants. At the conference, they will share their experiences in the field of multimodal information, realisation of Commuter Plans and mobility planning through the recent development of the new sustainable Urban Mobility Plan (PDU). Combine this with the expertise of the different European cities of the EPOMM platform, and the 15th edition of the ECOMM conference promises to be a very interesting one!

M ore from the Graz conference in the following pages.


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Feedback from the conference Karl-Heinz Posch, EPOMM

EPOMM has organised this conference on 14 occasions, this time together with the host city, Graz in Austria, and the two co-hosting organisations, the Province of Styria and the Federal Ministry of Environment. With about 320 delegates the conference was the third most visited ECOMM ever, but had fewer visitors than the last two – hosted by London 2008 and San Sebastian in 2009.

The main reasons were most probably: the general economic slump took its toll, and the marketing effort within Austria and Germany was possibly too late, as the number of delegates from these two countries was clearly lower than expected.

The feedback we got showed that most delegates thought it was an excellent event -very well organised with very attractive social events with a great atmosphere – and all that in a very interesting and beautiful city.

Of course there is always room for improvement:

Speakers still use presentations with too much text. Sometimes they also take a lot of time giving background info (on the location, on the project) instead of getting to the point, what people are interested in.

The interactive sessions providing training or real workshop format again proved to be very popular, similar as the first pecha kucha session. Pecha kucha is a format in which presenters can present 20 slides, each for exact 20 seconds – so each presentation has to focus on the essential, has to be rehearsed and lasts only 6 minute 40 seconds.

For the next ECOMM (2011 in Toulouse) the plan is to have more pecha kucha sessions as a fixture in each session, more interactive workshops, and less workshops running in parallel. In the days before and after the conference the plan is to have more opportunities for training workshops and European project meetings.


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The Ceremony of 2010 Pan

European Workplace Travel

Plan Awards (PEWTA) was held

on Thursday 6 May in Graz,

Austria, as part of the

European Conference on

Mobility Management.

The awards were presented by Lisa Rücker, Deputy Vice Mayor and city-councillor of Graz.

They recognise and reward the strongest and most innovative travel plans across the European Union making significant steps in reducing carbon emissions from the transport sector, particularly from commuting.

This is the third year of the awards, which are also sponsored by the European Platform on Mobility Management (EPOMM). Vice President of EPOMM, Wim Van Tilburg said: “The standard of Travel Plans has improved year on year and we have received over 100 entries to date from public and private sector organisations from across the EU - from France and the UK to Hungary and Romania”.

There were four award categories:

1) Public Authorities Award This recognises the efforts of local authorities to promote and implement workplace Mobility Plans in urban areas, regionally and locally.

2010 WINNER - Tisseo, Grand Toulouse Public Transport Authority, FRANCE Tisseo offers a package of support to companies throughout the city region to help them get their Mobility Plans started. They have 2 dedicated Personalised Travel Assistants who engage companies and then offer tools such as car sharing, car pooling

and bicycles. This will help the city reach its target of 15% cycle modal share by 2020.

RUNNER UP – Lambeth Business Travel Network, London, UK RUNNER UP – Brussels Environment IBGE, Belgium

Left to Right:Wim van Tilburg, EPOMM Vice President, Representatives from Tisseo including Mr. Christian Lavigne, Lisa Rüker, Deputy Mayor Graz

PEWTA Awards


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2) Employers Award This is for large and medium-sized organisations which have delivered innovative and successful workplace Mobility Plans for their own staff.

WINNER - British Sky Broadcasting, London, UK BSkyB’s Mobility Plan covers its 7,000 staff across its Osterley site and has achieved a significant decrease in car use at this site between 2006 and 2009. During the same period the modal share of walking and cycling have both increased thanks to extra showers, personalised travel plans for staff and an on site cycle centre among other things.

RUNNER UP – MaterMisericordiae Hospital, Dublin, Ireland RUNNER UP – Université Catholique de Lille, France

3) Networks Award This is for Mobility Plan Networks such as business parks, shopping centres, airports and hospitals all of which are major journey generators.

WINNER - Heathrow Airport, London, UK There are 42 companies signed up to the Heathrow Travel Plan which accounts for 75% of the 76,000 staff that work at Heathrow. Between 2004 and 2009, the Travel Plan achieved a reduction in single occupancy car use from 72% to 62% modal share.

RUNNER UP –Saint Quentin en Yvelines and CCIV, France RUNNER UP – Teddington Travel to Work, UK

The 3 winners received €1000 cash to spend on Mobility Plan measures as well as a study trip to the destination of their choice to boost their travel plan knowledge and to help them to continue reducing Co2 emissions in urban areas.

Special Achievement Award This special award gives acclaim to organisations that have made significant progress in Mobility Planning, overcoming significant local barriers.

WINNER - Rakoczi Avenue, Studio Metropolitana, Budapest, Hungary The Urban Research Centre, Studio Metropolitana, has worked tirelessly to develop Mobility Plan measures for the businesses and residents along Rakoczi Avenue to make it more attractive to shoppers and improve the walking environment.

The awards are part of the EU-funded COMMERCE Project co-ordinated by Paul Curtis of the London European Partnership for Transport. Winning and shortlisted abstracts can be downloaded from the COMMERCE group within the Allinx website: www.ALLINX.eu

Paul Curtis, Senior European Project Officer, LEPT Email: [email protected] COMMERCE Website: www.commerce-eu.org


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Barbara van Berkum (VCCR)

Once upon a time some people used a bicycle with a little petrol engine at the rear of the bike. Pedalling was not even necessary, just pulling the cord of the engine would get you moving. Nowadays these motorised bicycles are rarely seen in the street. The little, but highly polluting bicycle engine, has been replaced by a battery which ‘fuels’ the electric supporting motor in the wheels of the bicycle. Not just the motor changed, its image did as well. Where the old petrol fuelled bicycle was seen as a transport mode for pensioners, new electric bicycles have modern looks and since the motor merely assists, pedalling is necessary which means this special bike is for people who still want to travel actively without arriving in a sweaty suit.

Because of these special features the electric bicycle (or e-bike) is a perfect alternative for trips that are too long for a normal bicycle and where people are tempted to use their cars. The e-bike gets you there fast, it is healthy, it is a lot cheaper than using a car, no traffic blocks, it is stress relieving and it does not pollute the environment like a car would. Because of these special features the electric bicycle (or e-bike) is a perfect alternative for trips that are too long for a normal bicycle and where people are tempted to use their cars. The e-bike gets you there fast, it is healthy, it is a lot cheaper than using a car, no traffic blocks, it is stress relieving and it does not pollute the environment like a car would. To prove all these statements the pilot project E-bike: get convinced by trying is running in Rotterdam in the Netherlands. Rotterdam is a harbour city with a population of over 500.000 people. The city has the ambition to reduce CO2 exhaustions by 50% in 2025. These ambitions are set by the Rotterdam Climate Initiative. One of the pillars of the programme in the Climate Initiative is promoting and stimulating transition to electrical driven mobility. VCCR developed the project E-bike: get convinced by trying and it was adopted by the Municipality Rotterdam and financed by the air quality program. The project started in March 2009 and will be running for two years. So far so good, since the preliminary results show a very positive effect. Until June 2010 figures show that 11% of the e-bike testers have purchased an e-bike. 7% of that 11% normally commuted by car.

Creating a spark between commuters and an e-bike


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The main objective of the project is to introduce commuters who normally drive to work by car to the e-bike as a suitable and sustainable alternative mode of transport. Every four weeks fifteen different E-bikes are delivered to a different organisation. The e-bikes are available to employees of the organisation for a period of four weeks. One employee can try the e-bike for one week to use for commuting and other purposes. The employee is directed to a website, where the available types of e-bikes are displayed and information is available about the project and how they can borrow an e-bike. Before making the reservation the employee has to fill in a mandatory survey. This survey includes questions such as how long is the distance between your work and home address. How do you travel to work now? Have you ever tried an e-bike before, what do you expect from using an e-bike etc.

The name of the project that is used for participating organisations is Electric Fantastic. The project started when the first pool of e-bikes was available to employees of the municipality of Rotterdam. In total the project has 30 different e-bikes divided over two pools so that two organisations can be facilitated at the same time in one month. It is free of charge for organisations to participate in the project. The only effort that is required from the organisations is to appoint a contact person within the organisation who is responsible for lending out the e-bikes. The organisation is also responsible for internally communicating the project to employees. The effort put into the communication has a strong effect on the take-up rate of the e-bikes. The more promotion of the project there was internally, the more e-bikes were reserved and used by the employees. The take-up rate was lower at organisations where car use was low and the use of alternatives high. The overall take-up rate overall was 84% (including the summer holidays). At three organisations the take-up rate was 100 % after four weeks. The project is going very well. Relatively few problems occurred and abuse of the bikes or theft is rare. Feedback from employees is very positive and enthusiastic. Several people who tested the e-bikes contacted the project organisation for advice about purchasing an e-bike. The data retrieved from the surveys completed by the employees from the organisations up to august 2009 was analysed for preliminary results. The full research will be completed in December 2010. The employees who have tried an e-bike are asked to fill in another survey after six months to see whether their travel behaviour has changed and to see whether they were really convinced and have purchased an e-bike.


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The preliminary results show that 60% of the car users who tested the e-bike think it is a suitable transport mode for daily commuting.

43% of the car users think the e-bike is worth its money (price range is €2000 - 3000). Car users think the e-bike is a good alternative for distances from 9 up to 19 kilometres. The employees who tested the e-bikes were very positive about the bicycles rating them with an average of 4.2 on the scale of 5. The very positive effect the project had so far is that 40% of the car users is planning to buy an e-bike in the near future. The reason for wanting to purchase an e-bike was that the e-bike is fast, comfortable and cycling on an e-bike did not make the testers sweat as much as on a normal bicycle. So, the positive effect that can be concluded from the first analysis was that 40% of the car users are planning to buy an e-bike in the future. In June 2010 we can state that 11% actually purchased an e-bike after trying. But the percentage that could be more interesting is that 53% of the car users are not planning to buy an e-bike in the future because they find it too expensive. How are we going to convince them to change their travel behaviour into a more sustainable mode of transport even though the counter argument for their first reason is very simple? The costs of an average car kilometre is estimated at €0,45 and the average e-bike kilometre at a maximum of €0,12. And that is not even the only benefit one gets for riding an e-bike instead of their cars! Think about how much healthier it is, how much time you could gain and how much CO2 pollution is saved. In a city like Rotterdam with a lower average of bicycle use it is a great success. The e-bike is a really new transport mode (9 to 19 km commuting range) with a lot of fun in it. Commuters in Rotterdam are very enthusiastic and getting out of their car for this. Even though the preliminary results prove that the e-bike has great potential in commuter traffic, some e-bike testers are not willing to pay full price for an e-bike because they consider it too expensive. The tax advantage (bike plan) employees can apply for only covers 749 euro of the purchased bicycle. Bear in mind that a new e-bike easily costs over 1.500 euro. A lot of participants asked for offers such as subsidies if an e-bike is purchased. Many remarked that the government or employer should offer financial incentives to purchase. Respondents did not seem to realise how much driving the car to work costs. One employer in the project made a special arrangement by offering low cost loans if employees bought an e-bike.


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VCCR is a commercial company located in Rotterdam. VCCR is a project organisation whose main task is promoting sustainable mobility, mostly in commuter traffic. Naturally this is not only friendly to the environment, but it can also result in large cost reductions for the employer and for the employee. VCCR manages several projects for the City of Rotterdam, of which this e-bike project is just one example.

Another example is a project in which commuters who travel by bike get tested how fit they are every three months to see if cycling to work makes them more physically fit than people who do not cycle to work. The participants in the project fill in the kilometres they cycled online. It has been proved before that cyclists are more fit by researching the relationship of cyclists with days of absence because of illness. This project will prove this by actually presenting fittest results. For more information on how to promote e-bikes as a sustainable alternative for cars, please contact: Barbara van Berkum. VCCR p/a Schiedamsedijk 39a 3011 ED Rotterdam The Netherlands www.vccr.nl [email protected] T +31 10 4000 244


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From a European project to a regional strategy to promote Work Travel Plans by Nathalie Granes, Unité Aménagement Durable, Direction des Transports

The Ile de France (IDF) Region has been involved in the promotion of WTP since November 2007, the beginning of the European COMMERCE project.

Before then, only a few stakeholders were dealing with WTP: our regional agency for the environment and new energies: ARENE and the regional delegation of the national agency for environment and energy use : ADEME- IDF .

As experts in environmental issues, they tried to raise awareness and convince firms and administrations that commuting trips could have a real big impact to ensure the smooth running of a firm. They supported pilot firms (methodological and financial support) which were interested in dealing with their employees’ mobility.

We also had specific requests from firms which had to relocate to another place in IDF and were asking for specific surveys to analyse the impact of a new location on their staff’s commuting trips.

So it was mainly a case-by-case situation, to answer specific and occasional requests. There was a lack of notoriety and visibility about what was done.

But it helped to build a specific methodology for firms and contribute to the emergence of WTP identified as a whole approach (and not only as some isolated actions).

In 2006, a new element was introduced which changed the context : the air protection plan of IDF was implemented and its first measure was to make WTP mandatory for big companies. http://www.drire.gouv.fr/ile-de-france/extranet_ppa/index.html

Workplace Travel Plans – Ile de France


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What’s new in November 2007

3 opportunities came up at the same time:

- Region IDF (RIF) joins the COMMERCE project as a leader partner along with Great London.

- Our Regional Master plan was being revised

- The legislative framework become more restrictive regarding air pollution (Grenelle law, climate plan quality air plan)

The COMMERCE project really helped us to set up a good strategy to boost WTP. Thanks to the caution of the EU commission and due to the comprehensive and ambitious programme of actions, COMMERCE was a key factor for an exemplary mobilization of partners.

The first task of the Region as COMMERCE partner was to produce a European good practice guide to explain and illustrate how to implement high quality WTP.

This guide was printed in English as a COMMERCE guide and also in French but under another name -Pro’Mobilité guide - for marketing and advertising reasons it was much more powerful to evoke professional mobility.

The success of the guide, and the very effective working group set up to produce it, made it clear for every partner that it was necessary to go on working together to promote WTP.

So at the end of 2008, we were 8 partners (*) committed in the promotion of WTP in IDF under the banner Pro’Mobilité.


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We had the package:

a partnership and a name.

Then we had to develop

the content: what else

after the guide ?

The definition of a new strategy

At the regional scale it was necessary to provide the project holders with operational tools, to organise and disseminate all the useful information about WTP, and to support firms when necessary to help them implement their WTP.

Because of the large scale of the regional territory (5 millions of jobs and about 1 million of companies), we decided to focus on business areas or network travel plans, in order to prevent from spreading subsidies too thinly and to create travel plans that make sense from the regional point of view.

And to help us develop this strategy, we are progressively setting up local networks of mobility advisors to extend the work of the regional network raised by ADEME.

► The operational tools

- a new framework for financial support : RIF voted a new policy to allow financial aid for the implementation of business areas or network TP. RIF’s system is complementary with ADEME’s policy.

- Good practice guide: Pro’Mobilité, but also previous guides produced by ADEME or ARENE , which are more comprehensive and detailed and so are very complementary.

- Promoting tools like PEWTA: Pro’Mobilité partners work together to invite candidates to apply the award.

- The revision of our Transport Master Plan : mobility management is included as a specific challenge

► The information tools: the website

Very soon the partners realised it was necessary to organise the dissemination of information about WTP. Indeed there was a lot of information but split between all the stakeholders, and not always easy to find.

The idea was to gather all the information in a single place, to enhance all the existing sources of information and to fill any gaps.

So we created our own website - www.promobilite.fr dedicated to WTP in IDF.


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The objective is to help companies to more easily find all the information they need for their WTP: links to guides, networks, information about partners , technical and financial help, examples and good practices.

The website has been entirely self made by the Pro’Mobilité partners.

It took about one year to define the content, the objectives and the targets, to design the webpage, and to fulfil all the rubrics.

In order to make the commitment of every one official, but also to recognize the work done, a partnership agreement has been signed by each partner organisation.

This agreement defines the rules between technical partners and editorial staff, for the hosting, the maintenance and the animation of the site.

► The networks

A regional network called Club Mobilite Capitale was set up by ADEME in 2008, further to the demand of managers involved in WTP. The idea was to provide them with regular occasions to share their experience, their questions and ideas about the best way to implement WTP in their firm or administration.

Indeed it was very important for them to feel they were not alone facing the same difficulties - to get new ideas, to discuss with them and convince them about the effectiveness of WTP.

About 8 meetings per year have been organised by ADEME (nearly 1 workshop every 2 months). Each time a new theme related to the implementation of WTP is discussed: urban cycling, economic zone, professional trips, changing behavior, etc.

It has been much appreciated by the companies and within 1 year the membership increased from less than 100 to more than 320, representing about 100 WTP in progress covering about 280,000 employees.

The average attendance of the meetings is about 25 people; most of the time the room size being the limit.


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In June 2009, the 1st forum of the Club was organized: about 150 people attended and it was the occasion to present the new logo of the club.

Since 2010, a new dynamic has been introduced: 3 working groups directly managed by firms’ representatives have been set up to work on 3 topics highlighted by the companies themselves (during the forum:

-one group about “Return on Investment of a WTP”

-one group about “Laws and regulations ”

-one group about “environment-friendly WTP and citizenship approach”

It’s an important evolution because the firms directly commit to the organisation of the network and promote the peer-to-peer sharing of ideas.

After 3 years, taking into account the evolution of Pro’Mobilité and the success of the CMC meetings, we realized that ADEME alone (which means actually only 1 person for the whole IDF region) would not have the means to deliver what was expected by the companies.

But it was crucial to go on with this network’s dynamic in order to disseminate all the information and experience to all the 900,000 companies located in IDF.

That is why now our next step is to encourage the development of local networks to disseminate tools and know-how and propose an expertise tailored to each territory. These networks will succeed the regional one to support firms in the implementation of operational measures and in the promotion of comprehensive WTP.

To develop and pilot these local networks, we support the development of Mobility Advisors dedicated to WTP.

RIF and ADEME propose financial incentives and with the other Pro’Mobilité partners, we are developing a training programme for mobility managers.

So our new challenge now is to manage the successful transition to the local partners while keeping alive the regional dynamic.

The role of the regional network will be now more focused on the structure of the mobility advisors network and setting up complementary tools, especially for monitoring and evaluation.

[email protected]



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European web database for evaluation data and benchmarking of mobility management projects

Pernilla Hyllenius, Trivector, SWEDEN

Summary MaxEva is a European interactive web database for the evaluation data of mobility management (MM) projects. MaxEva helps the user to evaluate MM projects and makes it possible to benchmark results from different MM projects.

In the future the data gathered in MaxEva can be used for predictions of estimated effects of different MM measures.

Background and objectives For anybody carrying out or funding MM initiatives, it is of primary interest to demonstrate that the MM intervention has been successful and justifies the money invested. For all the benefits of evaluations, many projects are not evaluated at all. One reason is the lack of a common evaluation tool. To overbridge this two evaluation tools were developed in the EU project MAX (2006-2009); MaxSumo and MaxEva. MaxSumo is a guide for planning, monitoring and evaluation of mobility projects. MaxEva is a database for evaluation data of MM projects, build on MaxSumo. SUMO, the precursor of MaxSumo, has become the standard evaluation tool for MM projects in Sweden. MaxEva can be used for both single measures and plans or programs including a combination of several single measures, aiming at a shift in travel mode or fewer trips. Both tools are supported by EPOMM with the objective to achieve a widely accepted evaluation standard and to obtain data on the impact of MM projects, so that experiences on effects can be spread between different countries.

MaxEva


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A lot of functions in one single tool In MaxEva the users can add their own results into the database during the planning process, the implementation process or when having completed a Mobility Management project. In short term MaxEva helps the users to: Collect data and evaluate MM projects Calculate the environmental effects of MM project Learn from the results obtained Compare the results obtained with similar projects Benchmark different projects with each other In the future the data gathered in MaxEva can be used for predictions of estimated effects of different MM measures. The indata in MaxEva consists of a measure description, performed activities, data on attitudes, travel behaviour etc. The output describes the performed activities, how many people that have been reached by the activities, effects on attitudes, effects on modal split, and effects on mileage and environmental impact (tonnes of CO2). Conclusions MaxEva and MaxSumo are important milestones in the field of evaluation of mobility management efforts in Europe, exactly as the similar tools SUMO and the database SARA already are in Sweden. Common tools for evaluation will become more and more important as evidence for the effectiveness of mobility management compared to other measures will become more important in the future. The interest from other countries is large. MaxSumo and MaxEva have now been introduced in several European countries and the acceptance for the tools seems to be very high. MaxEva can be found at www.epomm.eu/MaxMM-tools [email protected]


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Transhub is an

award winning suite

of Internet based

software modules

for managing

mobility plans at

workplaces, schools,

public institutions

and residential

developments.

Dan Blanchet, iBase Systems Ltd

The display area at ECOMM in Graz

Local authorities are under more pressure than ever before to optimise existing transport infrastructure by promoting sustainable and active travel methods, and especially in major conurbation areas, reducing pollution from vehicles.

Both the public and private sector have responded to this challenge by implementing Mobility plans on a voluntary basis, or as part of a planning approval process.

Transhub is an award winning suite of Internet based software modules for managing mobility plans at workplaces, schools, public institutions and residential developments. Each module has essential tools for mobility plan site management, surveying, performance reporting, mapping and customer relationship management. Modules within Transhub include iTRACE (workplace, schools, hospitals and universities) and Residential Mobility Planning. Future modules include Destination Mobility Planning to address mobility plans for attractions & transport nodes.

Since 2005, iTRACE has provided a standardised methodology to local authority mobility planning to help track performance and facilitate the implementation of behavioural and physical initiatives. iTRACE has been implemented at over 60 UK Authorities and offers results driven justification for mobility plan related investment. In 2008 iTRACE won the Act Travelwise Innovation of the year with nominations from its users such as "iTRACE has taken the guess work out of travel planning and is a significant innovative achievement that should be recognised by the industry without delay." Graham Simpkins, Sustainable Transport Manager Milton Keynes Council.

Transhub


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I have long supported Act Travelwise and recently attended the Spring Conference (London 8th June) where I was privileged to be elected to its board of Directors. I took this opportunity to catch up with a few of our users to see what they had to say about the iTRACE. I asked Jane Lupson, a Policy Officer for Smarter Travel, Freight & Development at Transport for London (TfL) about what iTRACE has to offer. Jane’s role is to provide TfL’s perspective on mobility plans for the biggest new developments across London. Jane commented “We store a lot of mobility plan related data in iTRACE and there are quite a few reports, on a daily basis I use iTRACE to get specific information about a borough, region or site. If I need to know the modal split of trips in Croyden then I go straight to iTRACE and run a quick report”.

“It enables me to see how businesses are adopting various sustainable transport initiatives, how different projects perform in each borough and across the city. iTRACE is a vital resource of information, particularly mode shift results for London as a whole.”

Engaging with business in the capital has been vital in TfL’s effort to increase the adoption of sustainable travel modes and reduce the number of single occupancy vehicle journeys. A great deal of effort is put into surveying the staff and visitors at businesses across the city. “With iTRACE we can offer a range of monitoring options at a low cost to us and free to business in our area, the new CO2 calculator looks interesting too” continued Jane.

A general theme in conversations with industry professionals seems to be that iTRACE gives value to the work undertaken by Planning & Development Control Units in securing the Mobility plans by helping to ensure they meet their objectives through effective data collection, monitoring and review processes. Historically, securing, approving, monitoring and enforcing Mobility plans has resulted in a missed opportunity to quantify their undoubted benefits, thus restricting the funding and development opportunities for the sector as a whole.


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The Gateshead Millennium Bridge is a pedestrian and cyclist tilt bridge spanning the River Tyne in England between Gateshead's Quays arts quarter on the south bank, and the Quayside of Newcastle upon Tyne on the north bank.

Another recently elected Act Travelwise board Director is Sally Herbert, a Mobility plan Officer with Newcastle City Council. Sally’s role is to manage development and monitoring of mobility plans across Newcastle. Sally has been using iTRACE since the 5 authorities of Tyne and Wear adopted the system in 2008. “My day to day usage of iTRACE is focused on reporting the modal shift and modal split for trips in organisations across Newcastle, this allows me to effectively monitor their progress. I also run monthly reports of the number of mobility plans we have in place”.

“It allows me to monitor the effectiveness of my role and the projects I run. With the statistics to hand, we find we get a better uptake of initiatives and we are more able to deliver sustainable development across the city. iTRACE helps me confirm the ability of my role to make a significant change to peoples understanding of the effectiveness of mobility plans”.

“I wish I had had iTRACE from day one, it was difficult during my first year in post to get a clear understanding of what we had in place and whether or not it was effective. We had no single system, there was very little standardisation. I feel that not having a standard way of doing things or a single place to store all our data jeopardised our ability to implement sustainability initiatives or convince stakeholders of their validity. It was difficult to answer the simple question: Is this [initiative] effective? With iTRACE we can say yes and prove it”.

iTRACE has been developed to give authorities a detailed and accurate picture of Mobility plans at a local or regional level, and the effects that behavioural and physical initiatives have on reducing car use, and on encouraging the use of sustainable travel methods. My goal is to ensure iTRACE is a useful tool, helping transform the management of Mobility plans, it’s standard methodology allows mobility plan targets and achievements to be directly comparable from one organisation to another, from one local authority to another. As Graham Simpkins, Sustainable Transport Manager for Milton Keynes Council puts it “For the 1st time in 7 years I know exactly where mobility planning is delivering modal shift.” [email protected]


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In 2003 the Stockholm

region faced the fact that

they needed a solution on

how to coordinate Mobility

Management (MM)

measures within the

region. Five years later in

2008 ResSmart was up and

running as the

coordinating body.

ResSmart is the regional platform for MM in the Stockholm region and the owners are the Swedish Transport Administration, the County Administrative Board of Stockholm, the City of Stockholm and the Stockholm Public Transport Company.

In 2003 the region had a series of workshops to see how the regional environmental targets could be met. During this process it was clear that MM definitely would have a part in reaching the targets. There were several organisations working with MM on very different levels of ambition and quality. So, everybody agreed that there was a huge need of coordination to reach the estimated effects of MM measures.

Therefore the largest actors in the regional transport system started a three year project called Sustainable Travel and Transport. The result of this project was ResSmart, the Regional Platform on Mobility Management. In ResSmart the owners have the possibility to coordinate their MM measures with other organisations to, for example, increase the effects with decreasing costs.

So, how did EU project money help this particular development? I would like to say that it played a decisive role in the development of ResSmart within the timeframe of the project. By the time the project were about to start we received an invitation to take part in an EU project application on a project called PIMMS. The aim of PIMMS was to develop MM on a regional scale by the exchange of experience and spreading good examples. From PIMMS we would get 75 % financing of study trips, regional conferences, web page, database and to create a network within MM in Europe. This was perfect for our project and we agreed to participate. During our project we used the study trips to visit different networks and organisations, especially TRAVELWISE (UK), IVM (Germany) and KpVV (Netherlands), that could give us good ideas how to create this platform. The regional conference and the web page were and still are very important tools for the platform. Probably we would have created ResSmart without PIMMS but it would have been a much longer and harder process.

Jesper Johansson, ResSmart secretariat/WSP

[email protected]

ResSmart



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In a new regional approach,

companies in the Utrecht

region are invited district by

district to promote smarter

travel amongst their

employees. Companies and

governments commit

themselves to a joint local

effort to achieve regional

accessibility goals. A theme

based approach will be added

to the district based method.

The Utrecht region is the busiest region in The Netherlands with a lot of congestion. Therefore, the joint governments have chosen to combine their forces and budgets and invest it mainly in the accessibility of the thirteen economically most important districts, thus optimizing the effect of investments. 3,1 billion Euros will be invested in infrastructure in the coming years. But less car use during rush hours is also needed. Companies within the thirteen districts are encouraged to let their employees travel smarter, with alternative modes or not to travel at all. The region prefers a positive approach to negative pressure. Participating companies are rewarded with investments in alternative modes within their district. The higher the number of participating companies, the higher the investments. In this way, companies and governments want to reduce car use in rush hours by at least 5 percent.

Since 2009, 150 companies, together representing 100.000 employees, have been involved. In each district companies and governments set local goals for less car use, each from their own motivation.

• Governments:regional accessibility. • Companies: people (good employership,

health), planet (sustainability) and profit (cost reduction, profitability).

Governments and companies jointly set up local action plans. The focus is on learning from each other and creating win-win situations. All parties are enthusiastic. In practise companies’ ambitions often are better than a 5% reduction in car use. And through the common approach all local and regional governments can work efficiently and share experiences.

Smarter Travel in Utrecht


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The goal is to grow to 500 active companies. A theme based approach will be added to the successful district based approach.

Companies from all districts that for instance want to introduce teleworking, come together to learn from experts and each other. They will get practical knowledge to implement in their own company.

A positive, district based approach can contribute well to regional accessibility goals. Even though the motivation for companies is different than for governments, they can find each other in a common goal to get cars out of the rush hours. An open mind assures that parties learn from each other’s actions and knowledge. The Utrecht approach shows that it is essential to find the intrinsic motivation of a company to come into action. “Improving accessibility” is too abstract for companies. Their individual influence on this goal is limited and they will perceive few direct benefits from their efforts. Therefore the gain should lie close to the company, something they can directly influence: people, planet and profit. The regional approach assures that in all districts the same higher goals are strived for. Moreover a regional coordination gives local governments easy access to state of the art knowledge.

Mark Degenkamp, Advisor Mobility Policy, City of Utrecht [email protected]



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– the London European Partnership for Transport

London South Bank University played host to the third London European Partnership for Transport (LEPT) annual conference on Monday 29 March 2010. More than 80 delegates attended, including representatives from London boroughs, regional partnerships, Transport for London, European project partners, UK and EU based non-governmental organisations, private consultancies and university research students.

London Councils’ Corporate Director of Services, Nick Lester outlined the role LEPT plays and the importance of linking the transport agenda in the UK to European counterparts and their relevant funding programmes. He also said LEPT’s move from the London Borough of Bromley to London Councils will help to raise its profile.

The format of the day was different to previous years in that the day was split into a series of workshops centred around a plenary session focusing on Carbon Emission Reduction. This was chaired led by Ian Catlow, Head of London’s European office. The lively debate was led by panel of speakers from WSP Environment and Energy, Loughborough University, Living Streets and The Campaign for Better Transport.

The workshop themes were Shared Space, Borough Promotion, Electric Vehicles, Travel Plans, Freight, and several on EU Funding from the perspective of EU programme officers, consultants and borough officers.

Feedback from the evaluation forms highlighted the EU Funding, Shared Space and Electric Vehicles sessions as being particularly useful and interesting; the latter two offering a European perspective on major themes that are now becoming a big part of mobility schemes and important programmes across London.

The funding workshops offered an insight into what is required to develop an EU project from scratch, and how much mobility management is required to actually deliver the project once the funding has been secured. Mark Frost (LB Hounslow) delivered an enthusiastic presentation on his role in putting together the successful SEGMENT Project.

LEPT Annual Conference 2010


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The closing session concentrated on the results of LEPT for 2009/10, with the key message being that we had successfully managed to engage 32 out of 33 Boroughs in at least one of our many activities.

There was also a brief look ahead to the challenges in the new financial year, especially the issue of funding. LEPT’s priority in the coming year will continue to be linking boroughs to European funding opportunities. We will also be concentrating on providing a more tailored service for the boroughs. For example, promoting boroughs, training and mentoring sessions and encouraging sub-regional cooperation.

Overall, the message was that London is a great city and we need to promote the excellence that comes out of it!

Jim McGeever, European Projects Manager LEPT

More information on the Conference can be found at the LEPT website: www.lept-eu.org or by contacting Alex Beckingsale, Communications and Support Officer, LEPT [email protected]


http://www.lept-eu.org/�


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“In Hounslow we’ve long been aware that a one-size fits all approach to the

marketing of sustainable transport to our residents is often not an effective use of resources. SEGMENT aims to develop

much needed techniques to help professionals to better understand the

possible motivators for behaviour change amongst our residents – and trial the

possible initiatives which can assist them in moving towards that change.”

Mark Frost, Senior Transport Planner, LB Hounslow The London Borough of Hounslow is the lead partner in this new project, funded under the Intelligent Energy Europe programme.

Segmented Marketing for Energy-efficient Transport

The SEGMENT project will:

• Test the use of Market Segmentation in persuading people to change their behaviour and adopt more energy efficient forms of transport

• Focus on the use of life change ‘trigger points’

SEGMENT addresses market barriers to sustainable and energy-efficient mobility that are common to all urban areas in EU.

Research in the UK has demonstrated that “change moments” offer some of the best opportunities for fostering behaviour change. As people change jobs, move home or undergo other major change, they reflect on their habits and often make significant changes. It is at these points that marketing campaigns may be particularly effective in promoting more sustainable travel habits.

SEGMENT will work to develop techniques to 'smarten up’ the marketing of sustainable transport through effective use of consumer segmentation data.

This will be undertaken in 2 ways: 1) Targeting consumers undergoing 'life events' forcing them to question whether their travel behaviour should make more effective use of resources. 2) Clustering groups of residents into relatively homogenous groups (in terms of their attitudes towards car use, cycling, electric vehicles or wider issues such as climate change and health etc) and then devising bespoke campaigns.

SEGMENT


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Major Outputs and Results

• A transferable market segmentation model

• Targeted marketing campaigns in partner cities

• Building up competence and capacity to increase and accelerate take up and

transfer of best practice in Europe for travel marketing campaigns

Partners in the project are: London Borough of Hounslow Local Energy Management Agency of Almada Municipality of Athens Development Agency Sofia Municipality City of Utrecht City of Gdynia City of Munich EPOMM- European Platform on Mobility Management

The Centre for Transport Research at Aberdeen University, the expert partner, is a lead international expert in the field of attitudes and behaviour to transport, with a speciality in market segmentation and analysis. SEGMENT aims to:

• promote less car-dependent lifestyles; • build on tried-and-tested strategies and methodologies and aim at achieving

energy savings by removing the non technological market barriers; • achieve measurable changes in transport behaviour; • contribute to the wider dissemination and use of proven, transferable strategies

and methodologies; • help end-users to take informed decisions and increase public acceptance of

more energy-efficient transport use; • train practitioners and officials whose daily work has an impact on take-up of

energy-efficient transport strategies and schemes via training workshops and through exchanges of staff;

• tackle sustainable mobility more effectively through appropriate consultation and involvement of a broad range of stakeholders;

• Increase the integration of strategies to help to steer the behaviour and decisions of transport users, authorities and operators; and

• Communicate the quality and attractiveness of collective transport and promote its use.

Project Secretariat: Global to Local Ltd www.globaltolocal.com Further information: [email protected]



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In the built environment, the public space is owned by everyone. It’s like the

weather or the air; we are all in it and share it.

Pieter de Haan, Shared Space Institute The (old) economic ideas told us that the air and space is free and has no economic value, but now we know better. As (clean) air and public space is restricted and to be used by people and all other organisms, it has an economic value that must and will be shared. Thus regulation about how to share was introduced. The public space is heavily regulated by traffic rules. Streets are cluttered with signs, lights, markings and people are separated just because of their different modes of mobility. And different human functions/activities are separated, living, working and recreation.

The result of all this separated functions is the need for being mobile. Mobility is mostly seen as traffic, dominated by cars. It defines the public space and separates communities. Villages are split by main roads and people loose contacts with others in the street. The research of Appleyard1

, already done in 1969 in San Francisco, reveals the diminishing amount of contacts in streets with more and more traffic.

Haren The Netherlands. A main road splits a village.

1 Appleyard, D. 1981 Livable Streets Berkeley; University of California Press.

Shared Space – respect instead of rules


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Fig. 1. Lines between houses represent friendships or acquaintances among neighbors.

Living Streets confirmed these results for the UK. (www.driventoexcess.org)


http://www.driventoexcess.org/�

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In the interviews, people in the street reported “really very bad air pollution” and in the UK study from early 2008 they found “dramatic deterioration in the community life of streets with heavy motor vehicle traffic.”

Because of the enormous growth of (motorized) traffic, regulation became important.

More and more need for signs, roads, lights and separation and as a consequence more enforcement of the rules.

Sometimes it seems as if the growth of regulation in the public realm has gone far beyond the needs for a smooth and safe traffic system, the cognitive possibilities of road users and a lawful enforcement.

This last point highlights the problem - it is not possible to put a policeman beside every tree. And everyone knows that a rule for speeding is only respected when a fine is likely. Beating the system by contravening the rules without being noted will lead to more offending.

The system of traffic is therefore, apart from a lot of other, more environmental aspects, not sustainable.

In short how did we cope with the system?

Rules and regulating

Separation of cars, cyclists and pedestrians

More legislation

More signs

More education

More examination and testing

More control

More police (radar guns!)

New radar detectors.

More severe fines and penalties

Where does this end?


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Shared Space is a concept,

applied in the built and non built environment, which relies on human

behavior.

The concept was described in the first European funded project (2004-2008) as follows:

“Shared Space is a way of thinking and a way of working, which helps improving the quality of public space. It includes a philosophy and set of principles for the design, management and maintenance of public spaces, based on the integration of various forms of human activity. It involves the entire process of planning, designing, decision-making and maintenance of public space, but also the related topics of deregulation, taking responsibilities and empowerment. Shared Space relies on and encourages durable alliances between researchers, teachers, students, practitioners, politicians from various work fields, who together with citizens and entrepreneurs to discover the pleasure and the added value of working in such networks and maintaining them. “

Or in short:

Is a place to go to and be.

Is a place to meet and stay.

Is a place to shop and look around.

Is the “living room” for public life.

Is growing in a natural way.

Is livable and recognizable.

Is “owned” by the people.

Is characterized by history and future.

Is safer

Is sustainable.


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To date, field studies2

have revealed that the concept looks promising and it looks as if it works. But the explanation, already claimed by the founder of the concept, Hans Monderman, that it works because of the communication between people behaving in the built environment and in the physical and social context provided by that environment, has not yet been proved by scientific research.

When there is only traffic, moving from A to B and the road or space has only the function to accommodate this, shared space is out of the question. In all other situations it’s worth trying.

So far, we know that it works. Drachten, a junction with 18.000 vehicles per day, more than 10 years ago, with traditional traffic lights, signs and lines, has now over 22.000 vehicles per day, without any signs.

All traffic is flowing smoothly, no congestion and there were no more serious accidents. Some minor accidents, only with little material damage.

2 Het Laweiplein Drachten, Evaluatie van de herinrichting tot plein met rotonde. 2006 Noordelijke Hogeschool Leeuwarden. Het hernieuwde Vischmarktplein in Sneek, Een evaluatie van de herinrichting tot plein met rotonde 2008 Noordelijke Hogeschool Leeuwarden


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Why is Shared Space sustainable? Although not yet fully investigated, we believe that there will be less carbon dioxide pollution (and other exhaust gases), just because of the smooth traffic flow and the low speeds. The old situation with traffic lights, stop and go, cars speeding up must have more effect on the environment than the new situation.

It is also sustainable because people take responsibility for the decisions they make in junctions designed with shared space. Rules before and respect now. Enforcement is much less necessary and therefore the rules (not the traffic rules but more social rules and norms) will apply.

Sustainability can also be claimed because the space has more than one function, there is a better, more efficient use of the space and new functions can even be added instead of more traffic regulating and separating.

Shared Space as a process. The Shared Space Project, funded under Interreg IV, was developed and pilots were done in different countries around the North Sea. During this project the importance of involving people was made clear. Without that, projects couldn’t be realized. The report stated:

“Every shared space project aims to realize a dual quality – spatial and democratic quality. The spatial quality is achieved by joining knowledge and experience from a range of working areas; mutual consultation produces a result that could not have been achieved without this co-operation. Democratic quality means that throughout the process there is widespread commitment, responsibility, active involvement, and co-operation from all stakeholders – including residents, users and other stakeholders such as schools or businesses. Both qualities play a crucial role in respect of the final result. They enhance each other and supplement each other. The willingness of all parties to communicate openly and learn is equally essential.3

”

Noordlaren The Netherlands, The schoolyard is now over the road. Together with the parents and the kids. The road is gone. Car drivers are guests.

3 Interreg IIIB Project “Shared Space”, Room for everyone, “A new vision for public spaces”. (June 2005)


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A nice example of this was also the project done in Sigerswâld in the province of Fryslân. There was a very traditional and dangerous crossing of two 80 km/h main roads. The junction was in a rural area with a few buildings and parts of the village Sigerswâld were at a distance of 500 meters.

Siegerswoude. Before and as projected. The new situation can be seen on the webcam. www.arob.hadaro.nl.

Shared Space for everyone? Traffic rules, signs etc, are generally not used. Shared space road users have to rely on their own judgments, decide on their own responsibility and communicate with others instead of with the road administration. In shared Space, people are equal and all have the same rights. Their right of way depends not on the way of moving, on the type of vehicle. It depends on social negotiation and communication.

This equality is the starting point for the shared space concept. “A car is a person!” and a person like everyone else in that situation.

There are concerns that the weaker road users, impaired, blind, very young or old will have problems in locations with shared space design. Certainly in the UK the Guide Dogs for the Blind strongly object to shared space as a leading principle for the design of public space. More specially, they address shared space as shared surface. Of course, shared space is much more than shared surface. In the years of experience we have in the Netherlands, we have found very few problems with shared space. The main rule is that everyone should look after others and especially for the so called “weaker” groups of road users. This “looking after” is in law mentioned as responsibility ie the car driver is responsible for an accident with a cyclist or a pedestrian and a cyclist is held responsible for an accident with a pedestrian. This makes the “stronger” road user more attentive in the shard space situation where everyone is equal and where are no other rules than stick to the right and give way to the right. (left in the UK) .


http://www.arob.hadaro.nl/�

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Designing of shared space is already done together with the experts from the blind. This gives very useful input. In the town of Haren, an important institute for Blind people is adjacent to a major shared space location.

Haren after reconstruction

PhD research is being undertaken and the results are promising - in that there is not a strong and total objection against the concept but the recommendation to work together for the best solutions. For wheelchairs an even surface is a benefit and streets with lines in a different texture are useful for blind people. For dogs an idea is to use scented bricks. We learned from blind people that for them, not just the curbs are important, but also the walls of buildings and other objects to give enough audible resonance to find the way.

But what is essential for people in a shared public domain is that there are no “weak road users”. Everyone is equal in rights and possibilities in the public realm and it is a social norm to respect those who are so strong that they manage and dare to move in the modern traffic, notwithstanding a handicap.

Pieter de Haan ([email protected])

Shared Space Institute www.sharedspace.eu

Drachten

The Netherlands



http://www.sharedspace.eu/�

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A ‘transformational’ solution was required to break down the ring

and re-stitch the fabric of the town together again, creating new

streets and squares with active frontages. The intention would be

that the new streets become destinations in their own right, attractive places for people to

visit, live and shop.

Theresa Trussell - Project Champion: Kent County Council

The need for change Following the 2003 Government’s Sustainable Communities Plan, Ashford was identified as one of the major future growth areas in the South East. The plans were for the town’s population of 55,000 to double over the next 25 years, with an extra 31,000 homes together with 28,000 jobs being provided by 2031.

Extensive masterplanning consultation took place over the following years, and three main requirements emerged.

The first policy that emerged was to ‘mend before extend’ in other words, improve and consolidate the town centre before developing the outer green field sites. The second was to break down the constricting inner ring-road that had been built in the 1970s. The third policy element was to ensure quality in all projects, in order to attract the kind of high end development that Ashford so needs and deserves.

(Bank Street before the changes)

Ashford rings the changes

“Shifting the balance from a ring road to a network of quality streets and spaces that connect the town centre with surrounding neighbourhoods.” - The Ashford Masterplan Vision.


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“The fact remains that that most of

our streets are not civilised, enjoyable places to be.” - CABE Space.

The ring road Although the ring road was popular with motorists as journey times were short and congestion light, pedestrians felt disadvantaged by the barrier it created between them and their town centre. Its location, tight into the historic core, meant that new development would be cut off from the centre, limiting the cohesive growth of the retail sector.

Cousens Elnwick Road

A ‘transformational’ solution was required to break down the ring and re-stitch the fabric of the town together again, creating new streets and squares with active frontages. The intention would be that the new streets become destinations in their own right, attractive places for people to visit, live and shop. Clearly there was a major challenge to ensure that those new streets still fulfilled an important traffic function; needing to accommodate in excess of 10,000 vehicles per day.

As a wider objective it was judged that by reconfiguring the ring road the whole town centre could be regenerated, fulfilling the desire to ‘mend before extend’. The creation of an attractive public realm of high quality, demonstrating the Pubic Authority commitment to the area, was a key part of the vision.


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The Idea Ashford provided a rare opportunity to challenge the norms of road design and to explore a new way of thinking about public realm, how it may be used, and who needs to use it.

In order to ‘steer’ the design process in this innovative project a small discussion group was set up to challenge conventional thinking, champion quality urban design, and resolve conflicts that arose as the design proceeded.

The group, or Champions as they became known, established a number of basic principles:

• The need for low speed

• Greater priority for pedestrians

• Quality environment for new development

• Clean, clutter free spaces

• Platform for arts, both temporary and permanent

In 2005 designers/landscape architects Whitelaw Turkington were appointed to the project. This practice was already well versed in the idea of ‘shared space’ and a presentation from shared space advocate Ben Hamilton-Baillie crystallised many of these new ideas, impressing the client group by the logic of what he had to say. He introduced the philosophy of ‘shared space’ and described how well it was working in Holland and Denmark, although still in its infancy in the UK. The concept was that road space could be more equally shared by drivers and pedestrians, provided that the ‘mental maps’ that drivers had in their heads when driving through the space could be changed.

The concept of shared space is explored by Professor John Adams of UCL, who talks about a “safety paradox” being essential to the understanding of why ‘shared space’ principles work. The hypothesis is that users of conventional and highly engineered road space fail to concentrate to the degree that they do when the visual clues have been removed. This effect is clearly demonstrated by many schemes in the Netherlands and Denmark, but also closer to hand in Kensington High Street where many restrictions to pedestrians, and the usual driver clues, have been removed. The result is that the safety record has improved significantly in Kensington High Street over the last 4 years.

In Ashford, shared space was clearly only going to be an option for part of the old ring road. The whole route is about 2.5 kilometres long, and carries varying amounts of motorised traffic and pedestrians. The chosen segment has comparatively light flows (10,000vpd) and reasonably high pedestrian usage.


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Proposals for the remainder of the ring road remain at the concept stage, but two further approaches are envisaged, with a boulevard concept for the northernmost section and a ‘commercial quarter’ approach for the eastern section. It was considered important that the route should be broken down into separate character areas that would reflect both the buildings and the functions.

Whitelaw Turkington’s designs involved removing signs and lines, drastically narrowing the 3 lane one way driving space to a conventional 6m two way carriageway. Many of the usual visual clues were omitted, ensuring that drivers’ attention was very much focused on their immediate environment, and that they kept their wits about them. David Engwicht, an Australian sociologist, had proposed the necessity for three

“mental speed humps” in any ‘shared space’ scheme - intrigue, uncertainty and humour, and this provided just the right framework to change these “mental maps”.

However, there were, and still are, a number of cynics. This necessitated a range of investigations of future and present traffic flows, design studies, considerations for the disabled, and a visit for Council Members and Officers to schemes in Holland. Here we met the accepted ‘leader’ in the philosophy, the late Hans Monderman, an eminent Dutch traffic engineer. The outcome was positive, and ‘shared space’ was adopted as our fundamental design philosophy.

At this stage an approach was made to CABE Space to see if they would like to be involved in the project. They agreed and subsequently advised on aspects of the project such as public art and how that could help to create distinctive public realm. It was a promising area to pursue and it could provide us with some of the “mental speed humps” that David Engwicht proposed. Thus the concept of “art in engineering” was born, which led to the appointment of Public Art Consultants, RKL to assist in the appointing and managing of artists.

They proposed the appointment of three artists – Lead Artist John Atkin, lighting strategy artist, Nyan Kulkani, Simeon Nelson to work on an individual ‘waymarking’ piece and Michael Pinsky as Director of Temporary Artworks. Their role was to raise the cultural agenda in Ashford, and to prepare the public for the sight of contemporary artwork on their street scene.


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CLIENT TEAM(S)

CHAMPIONS GROUP SCHEME PROGRESS GROUP

PROJECT MANAGER

INTEGRATED DESIGN TEAM

ENGINEERING

TRAFFIC

URBAN DESIGN

LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE

LEAD ARTIST

VISION

IDENTITY / BRANDING

PUBLIC ART STRATEGY

SHARED SPACE CONCEPTS

PUBLIC REALM STRATEGY

SITE ACCESS STRATEGY

MOVEMENT STRATEGY

ADVOCACY

MEDIA & MARKETING

GROUP

PUBLIC RELATIONS

PRESS RELATIONS

MARKETING

TEMPORARY ARTWORKS

Forming the Integrated Design Team ( IDT) With the skilled team in place there was then the need to get them all working together to produce a single integrated design. The main requisite of the team would be to challenge conventional wisdom, and a joint willingness to “try something different”. Along with artists and designers there were urban designers, highway engineers, safety auditors and other practitioners. It was vital that all members of the IDT effectively started work together on the scheme design to ensure that no entrenched positions were arrived at before others had the opportunity to participate. In the event the IDT worked very well together and the outcome of the IDT meetings was impressive. The clear extremes of the “discipline spectrum” were clear as engineers and the artists started to work together, but in the event each learnt a lot from the other.

The overall Integrated Design Team comprised of two main branches. The Design Team and the ‘Champions Team’. Whilst the design team worked on the day to day design of the project the Champions role was to overview progress to ensure that the vision remained intact and did not become eroded by reversion to conventional thinking. The work was at the “cutting edge” of the design process and the two parallel streams of the Champions Group and Project Design Group were essential to keep this on track.


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Consultation and Communication In any innovative project communication of the ideas is vitally important. This needs to cover Council Members, other officer groups, the general public, particular interest groups, stakeholders and the media. For this scheme it was decided to include in the project structure a full time Media and Marketing Group. Within the Group they worked with KCC’s Press Relations Office, the Ashford’s Future Media Team and members of the technical team.

It proved important to include other Officer Groups in the communication process. Many were unfamiliar with innovative concepts and were used to applying standard DfT guidance techniques to highway schemes. The essence of a shared space philosophy is to reduce signing and lining to a minimum and this means only applying ‘regulatory’ techniques and putting to one side ‘advisory’ or ‘guidance’ measures.

Specialist interest groups – including those with disabilities, were engaged in the design process. Early meetings were held with groups representing the disabled to discuss fundamental principles of the ‘shared space’

scheme. In the event several specific features were included such as a full textured paving ‘guide path’ to help the blind and partially sighted.

In order to gain community ownership of the residential part of the scheme, design work was undertaken with representatives of the local residential community. This was in the true spirit of the David Engwicht principle of reclaiming the streets for the community. Two very useful workshop meetings were held in local public house adjacent to the old ring road which established an agreed framework for this part of the scheme – a separated carriageway with central walkway area, a small square for community use, a viewpoint to the south, and linear planted ‘rain gardens’ providing sustainable urban drainage and a general softening of the scheme. This approach to the overall design was consistent with breaking up the old ring road into a series of different street designs each with an entirely different feel.

However, it was not all plain sailing. Less successful was the relationship with the local press who consistently sought to promote negative and critical stories. This problem was never successfully overcome and would be a key issue in any future schemes.

As a balance to this negativity the Media and Marketing Group produced regular issues of ‘Breaking Boundaries’ an illustrated leaflet on scheme progress and events.

The “Lost O” programme of temporary artworks, curated by Michael Pinsky, helped raise the profile of the cultural agenda in the town and culminated in a number of installations to coincide with the visit of the Tour de France in June 2007.


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The Shared Space scheme As an initial phase the whole of the old ring road was converted to two-way traffic flow in July 2007. Opportunities were taken to rationalise and de-clutter the whole route whilst dedicating the south west quadrant to the ‘shared space ethos. In all (1km) has been re-designed using this philosophy. This section comprises Elwick Road, West Street and Bank Street.

Bank Street leads into the town from the old ring road, and was designed as a pilot project for the later scheme. The true shared space element of the project is the conversion of Elwick Road and West Street – the former ring road.

The shared space link was designated as a ’20 mph’ zone at the outset - to promote the idea of low speeds. Unnecessary street furniture, pedestrian guard railings, road markings and traffic signals were all removed and a new civic square ‘Elwick Square’ created to mark the end of Bank Street. This was all designed to create better and more direct communication and respect between all road users.

Elwick Road runs east to west and passes through the newly built Elwick Square – a major new piece of public realm. This is true shared space as there are no kerbs or upstands, and motorists have to make way for pedestrians and cyclists crossing the open space of the square.


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“The scheme

demonstrates a high level of innovation and

originality in the planning and design of roadspace

and streetscape which has resulted in a greatly enhanced and more

civilised and sustainable urban environment: truly

mediating space and making a better place. It

provides a model that other UK towns and cities

with similar traffic problems will surely

follow.” RTPI

To the west the route passes from predominantly business / mixed use at its eastern end to residential use at the western end. Where it turns north and becomes a separated carriageway, there is a feature work of art, known as the ‘bolt’ which could be described as the central island of a roundabout. Unlike normal roundabouts there are no signs or lines indicating how it should be used. West Street now encompasses a linear park within the median strip – created from the width of the original road.

Conclusion The scheme was opened fully to traffic in November 2008, and since then no personal injury accidents have been reported to us, although the police have agreed to fast-track data to us for this scheme.

Speeds are now well into the acceptable range for a 20mph zone, with an average of 21.5mph recorded at two follow up speed monitoring exercises.

Noise and emissions appear to be significantly reduced but these are currently being monitored, and results will become available later this year.

At a cost in excess of £15m it is unlikely that a scheme of this scale could be replicated elsewhere, but the short term results have been very encouraging and there is no reason why other schemes could not employ the same principles on a lesser budget.

It is anticipated that with proven success this scheme will significantly influence thinking on the design of public realm in the UK in the future, and it has already created substantial interest amongst several other Local Authorities who are now thinking in a similar way.

A total of 10 major awards have already been presented to the scheme including the prestigious RTPI award for Regeneration.

Many conducted visits have already been given to other Authorities and organisations, and also to the Department for Transport who will be monitoring the scheme as part of a research project. It is anticipated that this scheme will be a ‘landmark’ in public realm design. Not least the scheme will make a real and lasting difference to the community.


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PIMMS TRANSFER is one of the most challenging and exciting projects currently funded by the INTERREG IVC programme. Working with 15 partners, the project aims to deepen and extend knowledge of Mobility Management (MM) through a range of shared, interactive work packages.

There are 15 partners, with 14 of these representing different regions/cities from 14 different countries and they are split into 7 progression and 7 initiation partners. The other partner - Erasmus University in Rotterdam – has a smaller role within the project running a set of three intensive Masterclasses within the project lifespan. The project will also deliver a range of other cooperative activities including:

• A Mobility Management best practice database • Stakeholder study visits for officers, politicians and other organisations • An EU review of Sustainable Urban Transport Plans • Regional, thematic and school conferences • Schools Challenge – linking schools to CO2 reduction • Mentoring Workshops – based on partner specific themes • Master Class courses • European Mobility Week events • 14 innovative pilot projects – including personalised carbon trading schemes

Running from 2008 to 2011 the project is led by the London European Partnership of Transport (LEPT) and is now at the half way point of its delivery with many different London Boroughs and borough officers engaged in a hive of activity over the last six months in London.

Capacity building of initiation regions One of the main aims of this project is to increase the knowledge capacity and capability of partner regions in the field of MM and transport planning.

Study trips Study trips are highly specialised master classes for our initiation partners in a host progression city, the main aim to understand how the host has achieved best practice and the Critical Success Factors that can be transferred in their municipalities. In the last six months LEPT and London has hosted several study trips enabling this. The most recent ones have been:

February 2010 – attended by officers, teachers and politicians from Serres (Greece) and Stockholm (Sweden) LEPT hosted a study trip on school travel planning projects. Sessions from Transport for London, Sustrans, Living Streets and visits to the London boroughs of Sutton and Tower Hamlets provided a welcomed overview of school initiatives being delivered in London.

The PIMMS TRANSFER project


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May 2010 – attended by officers, public transport operators and consultants from Frankfurt (Germany) and Klaipeda (Lithuania) LEPT hosted a study trip on public transport organisation. A particular highlight of the trip was a visit to Arriva London to understand the operator’s perspective of running buses in London.

(Planned) July 2010 – Poland and Ukraine will play host the Euro 2012 football championships and our partner Gdansk, a host city for the championships, will be coming to London in July to find about best practice in travel demand and stadium transport management. LEPT have already secured visits to the Olympic Delivery Authority with the aim to build up good between the two major sporting event hosts of 2012.

Mentoring workshops and master classes Mentoring workshops and master classes form another integral part of the project, taking the form of more intensive learning sessions for partner regions.

Mentoring workshops: Mentoring workshops held in Bratislava (Slovakia) and Sofia (Bulgaria) have both been attended by London officers presenting on School Travel Planning and the London Congestion Charge. Notably, the Sofia workshop was attended by seven politicians, unprecedented for this type of event.

Master Class: In April 2010 the second annual PIMMS TRANSFER master class was held in Stockholm (Sweden). Focusing on travel plan delivery, monitoring and evaluation the three day intensive course was attended by over 40 people including politicians form several partner regions. LEPT and Smarter Travel Richmond presented several workshops to delegates promoting the good practice in London.

Pilot action 1: personal carbon trading The personal carbon trading pilot has generated much interest in the London boroughs and rightly so as we see it as being the first of its kind working with municipal and public authorities – something that will fit in well to the whole idea of the transferability of PIMMS TRANSFER pilot projects to our project partners.

The main aim is to test how a trading scheme can be delivered by municipalities and whether it can influence behaviour with LEPT using WSP Environment and Energy’s PACT tool to deliver the pilot in five London boroughs: Camden, Ealing, Haringey, Hounslow and Lambeth.

PACT is a scheme that allows individuals to track over a year their carbon emissions for home energy consumption, commuting, car travel and leisure travel using an online tool. A personal carbon allowance is set (e.g. each individual is allowed to emit 4.5 tonnes of CO2) and those whose emissions at the end of the year are below the threshold receive a reward dependent on the difference from the allowance. WSP have successfully implemented this scheme internally for the last two years and operate a penalty scheme for those who exceed. London boroughs will not implement a penalty scheme.


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Pilot action 2: travel plans for hotels and tourism The second pilot project LEPT are delivering in London aims to test out how travel plans can be successfully applied to hotels and the tourism industry. LEPT are working in partnership with the London Borough of Camden and WestTrans, the sub-regional transport partnership for the west London boroughs. Working with these two partners provides an interesting mix between an inner London region and an outer London area.

One of the most interesting projects being delivered within this pilot action is the Oystercard provision research project. Working with hotels in both the Bloomsbury area of Camden, which will be the media accommodation centre for 2012 Games and hotels near to Heathrow airport, this project will pilot the provision of Oystercard services and facilities inside hotels.

The scope of this project does not stop here though and we are working closely with our partners to implement measures to promote walking and cycling in our test hotels. This includes the provision of bespoke travel information and initiatives such as ‘Try-Cycling’, where individuals get the chance to receive a bicycle on trial for three months.

Schools Challenge The schools challenge will recruit schools to promote awareness, change attitudes and behaviour with regards to school travel with European benchmarking for CO2 emissions. LEPT will deliver an awareness campaign in schools and are working closely with the London Borough of Sutton to devise this. LEPT are also aiming to link in with the London Borough of Camden’s travelfootprint website (www.travelfootprint.org.uk) to deliver an online portal for the exchange of stories and results between schools in partner regions. This will be an exciting opportunity to deliver a pan-EU portal.

For more information on the PIMMS TRANSFER project please contact Adrian Webb at LEPT, [email protected].


http://www.travelfootprint.org.uk/�


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The SARTRE Project

Safe Road Trains for the Environment, funded by the European Commission under the Framework 7 programme, aims to develop strategies and technologies to allow vehicle platoons to operate on normal public highways with significant environmental, safety and comfort benefits.

The ambitious aim is to cut CO2 emissions by 20% while freeing up room on Europe’s motorways.

The idea is to join up to eight vehicles by wireless sensors in so called road trains. Each train would be controlled by a professional, such as a long distance lorry driver, in the front vehicle. This would free up the seven drivers behind to have a nap or read, resuming control of their vehicle to leave the train wherever they wish. There could be a small charge for the service, but savings on fuel would make up for it.

Trials of the system are scheduled to hit test tracks around Europe by 2011.

Sartre is led by Ricardo UK Ltd and comprimises a collaboration between the following additional participating companies: Idiada and Robotiker-Tecnalia of Spain, Institut for Kraftfahrwesen Aachen (IKA) of Germany, SP Technical Research Institute of Sweden, Volvo Car Corporation and Volvo Technology of Sweden. http://sartre-project.eu/en/Sidor/default.aspx

Smartway

Smartway, Japan’s cooperative vehicle-highway system issues a warning when the driver gets too close to the vehicle in front, when vehicles are converging from the side and when there is congestion ahead. Some new vehicles from Nissan and Toyota are already equipped to use Smartway. Older cars can access the system if their receivers and satnav displays are upgraded. http://www.nilim.go.jp/japanese/its/3paper/pdf/060131trb.pdf

Driving in convoy


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The jury is still out on

biofuels with many people alarmed that the increase in biofuel crops

is putting the world’s food supply at risk.

Will the second generation of biofuels

solve the problem?

eg editor, Anne Finnane reports on 2nd generation biofuels

The Deepwater Horizon disaster in the Gulf of Mexico should raise the stakes on developing a viable alternative to oil.

A study for the International SCOPE Biofuels Project argues that current crops grown for biofuels are 'problematic', and others proposed for future biofuels, which are supposed to avoid harming food security or the environment, require land, water, nutrients, and other inputs, and therefore compete with food crops and lead to deforestation.

Scientists warn that any guidelines for sustainable biofuel production cannot be based only on product life-cycle and farming standards 'as these cannot address the difficult issue of indirect land use resulting from growing demand'. 4

An International Energy Agency report

5

In this article, I explore the evidence of the progress being made to produce a new generation of biofuels, which have the potential to replace oil without compromising the world’s food supply.

published in 2008, looked at the technical challenges facing 2nd-generation biofuels, evaluated their costs and examined related current policies to support their development and deployment. The potential for production of more advanced biofuels was also discussed. Although significant progress continues to be made to overcome the technical and economic challenges, the study argued that 2nd-generation biofuels still face major constraints to their commercial deployment.

4 The International SCOPE Biofuels Project: http://cip.cornell.edu/DPubS?service=UI&version=1.0&verb=Display&handle=scope 5 From 1st to 2nd Generation Biofuel Technologies: http://www.iea.org/papers/2008/2nd_Biofuel_Gen.pdf

Next generation biofuels


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http://www.iea.org/papers/2008/2nd_Biofuel_Gen.pdf�

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How much progress has been made?

In 2009, the World Economic Forum produced a report: Green Investing - Towards a Clean Energy Infrastructure (http://www.weforum.org/pdf/climate/Green.pdf ). The report identified eight emerging large-scale clean energy sectors:

“The four-year surge in investment activity in clean energy has spanned all sectors, all geographies and all asset classes. What has begun to emerge as a result is the overall shape of the new lower-carbon energy infrastructure. No one can describe with certainty what the world’s energy system will look like in 2050. A substantial proportion of our energy will undoubtedly still be supplied by fossil fuels, but we can now be fairly certain that a future low-carbon energy system will include a meaningful contribution from the following eight renewable energy sources:

1. Onshore Wind 2. Offshore Wind 3. Solar Photovoltaic (PV) 4. Solar Thermal Electricity Generation (STEG) 5. Municipal Solid Waste-to-Energy (MSW) 6. Sugar-based Ethanol 7. Cellulosic and Next Generation Biofuels 8. Geothermal Power

The report goes on to say: “Investors have been looking for winners among the next generation of technologies, from cellulosic and algaebased biofuels – which bypass the conflict between food and fuel – through to energy storage and digital energy management.”

The cost of producing biofuels from agricultural waste through cellulosic conversion and algae is coming down rapidly, and the future fuel system is likely to include a proportion of fuels from these sources.

As well as using byproducts of other crops, such as wheat straw, sugar cane leaves and forestry waste, crops are being grown specifically to produce biofuels, including jatropha (being trialled in India), miscanthus, and switchgrass. These crops have the added advantage of being able to grow in areas considered marginal for arable use, such as desert areas (jatropha) and very wetland (miscanthus). New technologies have been developed to cope with these more varied feedstocks, including enzymatic hydrolysis and gasification.


http://www.weforum.org/pdf/climate/Green.pdf�

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Global production of next generation biofuels is currently small – around 10 mLpa, compared to 69,900 mLpa of sugar-based ethanol – accounting for just 0.02% of global bioethanol production. However, this is expected to rise as new feedstocks are grown, technologies proven and scaled up, and the cost of production falls. Early stage investment in second generation biofuels overtook first generation investment in the second and third quarters of 2008.

Policy Status and Gaps Policies supporting next generation biofuels are essentially the same as those relating to sugar-based ethanol (see above), including blending mandates, tax breaks, biofuel producers subsidies and feedstock. However,

policy is starting to differentiate between first and next generation biofuels, in favour of the latter. In the US, for example, there is a mandate within the renewable fuel standard for a specific proportion of next generation biofuels.6

A roadmap for biofuels in Europe The February 2010 issue of the journal Biomass and Bioenergy is devoted to the potential role of biofuels in the EU transport sector, covering such issues as the sustainable use of cultivated land; strategies for second generation biofuels in the EU; and the socio-economic aspects of different biofuel development pathways. The main conclusions are that Europe could produce domestically the proposed 10 per cent EU biofuel target by 2030, and the development of second-generation biofuels is essential for the long-term sustainability of biofuels.

Biofuel Cities, a European partnership, has published guidance for public authorities and other actors intending to purchase and use sustainable biofuels for transport. 7

“Most actors in the biofuels industry agree that the long-term success of biofuels will depend on the development of second generation biofuels. Although no set definition of second generation biofuels exists, in general terms these are biofuels that have a high greenhouse gas emission reduction potential and have no adverse effects on food prices, biodiversity and labour circumstances. For example, these biofuels are made from non-food cellulose feedstock such as waste wood, straw and cellulose based waste.

It highlights the current discussion on sustainable biofuels and provides advice for other challenges related to implementing biofuelled transport. Some of the ambitious criteria for sustainable biofuel procurement are inspired by practical experiences from cities such as Stockholm, Rotterdam, Lille and Graz.

6 Green Investing - Towards a Clean Energy Infrastructure, World Economic Forum 2009 7 http://www.biofuel-cities.eu/fileadmin/template/projects/biofuels/files/Publications/Procurement_Guide.pdf


http://www.biofuel-cities.eu/fileadmin/template/projects/biofuels/files/Publications/Procurement_Guide.pdf�

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Second generation biofuels are among others produced by gasification of biomass for production of synthesis gas. The synthesis gas can be turned into synthetic diesel (Fisher-Tropsch-diesel), methanol, ethanol, DME (DiMethyl Ether) and hydrogen. The whole process is called Biomass-to-liquids (BTL). The second generation of ethanol can also be made from chemical treatment of cellulose to extract sugar to make ethanol. Hydrated biooils, for instance, is a new product that can replace diesel. It is based on different types of vegetable oil and waste animal fat. Production has already started in Finland and Sweden. It is difficult to say when second generation biofuels will be broadly available at a competitive price. BTL and cellulose-based ethanol can be expected to enter the large-scale market sometime after 2015.” 8

Biofuels in China

While the development of biofuels has been widely encouraged in the US and other countries such as Brazil, China has been cautious about encouraging ethanol production in particular, because of the possible negative impact on food supplies and food prices. 9

The Chinese government still sees potential benefits from biofuel energy development, provided that this development is based on production from non-food stocks. Given the country's requirements for alternative energy sources to feed its rapid economic growth, and the global need to reduce the negative impact of industrial activities on climate, in 2007 the government put in place a national goal

of having biofuel, which now only accounts for 2% of fuel consumption, account for 15% of fuel used by 2020. In addition, the authorities have also pledged as part of the Copenhagen agreements to cut carbon emissions by 40-45% compared to 2005 levels. This commitment translates into an investment of at least 1% of GDP (RMB 240bn) into China's clean energy sector in the next five years.

8 Biofuel Cities guidance 9 http://rightsite.asia/en/article/china-biofuel-industry-provides-opportunities-agribusiness


http://rightsite.asia/en/article/china-biofuel-industry-provides-opportunities-agribusiness�

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China's push on biofuel will be focused on production made from non-food feedstocks such as waste oil, vegetable oil and jatropha. As a country that has a population of more than 1.3 billion, stable food supply is the primary concern of the Chinese government. This emphasis on balancing the development of biofuels against

preserving the nation's foodstocks could be seen as early as 2006 when the government restricted the use of grain products like corn and sweet potatoes for biofuel production. The development of the biofuel industry, to a large extent, depends on the ratio of raw material prices to the biofuel price and the strengths of government subsidies available. Investors in China are also lured by the growth potential of the market. Already, in terms of market size, China is the third largest bio-fuel market in the world, after only the U.S and Brazil. NEW TECHNOLOGIES

In March 2009, Scientific America reported: “..eyes are on a handful of high-tech labs around the U.S. that are perfecting ways to make the equivalent of gasoline and diesel from the lowest life-forms on the totem pole: yeast, algae and bacteria. The challenge is to make enough of these fuels economically and in a form compatible with today’s vehicles.”

AFEX Cellulose in plants must be broken down into fermentable sugars before they can be turned into biofuel.

The AFEX (ammonia fiber expansion) pre-treatment process, developed by Bruce Dale, Michigan State University Distinguished Professor of chemical engineering and materials science, uses ammonia to make the breakdown of cellulose and hemicellulose in plants 75 percent more efficient than when conventional enzymes alone are used. 10

He has shown that it's possible to use AFEX to pretreat corn stover (cobs, stalks and leaves) and then hydrolyze and ferment it to commercially relevant levels of ethanol without adding nutrients to the stover.

The university has licensed the technology to a company called MBI in Lansing, Michigan, which plans to build a pilot plant which will be able to process a tonne of plant material per day. It hopes to have a commercial plant running by early 2012, processing 250 tonnes of biomass per day and generating approx 27 million litre of biofuel each year.

10 http://news.msu.edu/story/5847/


http://news.msu.edu/story/5847/�

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Zeachem

ZeaChem Inc. has developed a cellulose-based biorefinery platform capable of producing advanced ethanol, fuels and chemicals. ZeaChem claim that their patented process offers the highest yield, at the lowest cost, with the lowest fossil carbon footprint of any known biorefining method. 11

Cellulosic ethanol is a biofuel produced from wood, grasses, or the non-edible parts of plants. Cellulose is contained in nearly every natural, free-growing plant, tree, and bush all over the world. Because of this diversity, cellulosic ethanol production has the advantage of abundant and diverse raw materials compared to ethanol processes that use corn and cane sugars.

Cellulosic biomass is made up of cellulose and hemicellulose along with lignin and ash (minerals). The energy content of most biomass resources is roughly split 2/3 in the fermentable cellulose and hemicellulose fractions and 1/3 in the non-fermentable lignin and other fractions.

ZeaChem’s hybrid process fully utilizes all of the available carbon from the cellulose and hemicellulose in the biochemical (fermentation) process, while producing hydrogen from the lignin fraction through the thermochemical process. Thus, the energy from all fractions of the biomass are utilized and create the highest net conversion efficiency of any known cellulosic ethanol process. ZeaChem claims to achieve the highest yield of 135 gallons per bone dry ton (gal/BDT) of feedstock compared to 60-100 gal/BDT from other cellulosic processes.

MICROBIOGEN

MBG in New South Wales, Australia, claim a competitive advantage in the unique features of their enhanced non-GM yeasts that convert plant biomass into ethanol and protein. They use dilute sulphuric acid to break down the plant cell wall and produce a sugar called xylose. Around one third of the yeast grown on the xylose is used in fermentation to produce biofuel and the remaining two-thirds can be used in animal and human food production. 12

11

http://www.zeachem.com/ 12 http://www.microbiogen.com/


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OXFORD CATALYSTS - XTL award winner 201O A Fischer Tropsch (FT) microchannel reactor developed by Velocys, Inc. combined with a new highly active FT catalyst developed by Oxford Catalysts has been named as the winner of the CWC World XTL award 2010.

The reactor, which can achieve productivities that are orders of magnitude greater than for conventional FT reactors, can operate economically at outputs as low as 500 barrels per day while achieving productivities that are orders of magnitude greater than for conventional FT reactors.

The technology makes it possible to produce liquid biofuels from a wide variety of waste feedstocks, including municipal waste in situ, thus avoiding the need to transport large volumes of waste to central processing facilities. A demonstration biofuels plant, which includes the FT microchannel reactor and uses gasified woodchips as a feedstock, is currently being commissioned in Güssing, Austria. 13

AQUAFLOW Aquaflow 14

Components of the green crude mixture fall into three general categories; petroleum type materials, diesel / jet fuel type materials and other

takes harvested algal biomass and breaks down the algae structure to basic chemical compounds. They call the resulting mixture Green Crude™ as it has many similarities to crude oil recovered from traditional geological oil deposits in the earth’s crust. Black crude is the result of applying heat and pressure to algal biomass on a geological time frame (millions of years). Green Crude™ is the result of applying heat and pressure to algal biomass over the space of a few hours.

fine chemicals.

In conjunction with the world’s leading refiners, Aquaflow is investigating the optimal means to separate and refine these outputs for high specification end use products.

Aquaflow operates a pilot plant in Nelson, New Zealand which is able to produce Green CrudeTM. Their Nelson facility chemistry programme researches the end product fuels and fine chemicals in a laboratory environment. Two years of research has resulted in a very deep understanding of the chemicals present in the green crude and their potential applications.

Aquaflow is looking for clients who wish to work towards progressive displacement of their current fossil based feedstocks and materials. We seek clients who are prepared to take a stake in developing and securing these future technologies. Their next

13 http://www.alphagalileo.org/ViewItem.aspx?ItemId=75755&CultureCode=en 14 http://www.aquaflowgroup.com/


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milestones are to construct appropriate refining equipment and produce sufficient end use “drop in” fuels for full vehicle testing trials.

Aquaflow will be working with Honeywell’s UOP on a United States Department of Energy cooperative agreement project to demonstrate technology to capture carbon dioxide and cultivate algae for use in biofuel and energy production. 15

The funding will be used for the design of a demonstration system that will capture carbon dioxide from exhaust stacks at Honeywell’s manufacturing facility in Hopewell, Virginia. The project, will realize further environmental benefit because wastewater from the manufacturing facility will be used in the algae cultivation system, allowing the algae to consume nitrogen in the wastewater.

Algal oil can then be extracted from the algae for conversion to biofuels, and the algae residual can be converted to pyrolysis oil, which can be burned to generate renewable electricity.

“This project will demonstrate integrated concepts and technologies that can help reduce greenhouse gas emissions while showing the viability of new sources of energy,” said Jennifer Holmgren, vice president and general manager of UOP’s Renewable Energy and Chemicals unit, which develops and licenses process technology for the production of biofuels.

CONCLUSION

The race is on to produce big-scale 2nd generation biofuels. As oil prices threaten to rise in years to come, China's drive to create a biofuel industry that does not include use of foodstocks is attracting foreign investors. The combined capacity of the world's bio-fuel industry (including both ethanol and biodiesel segments) reached 80 million tonnes by 2008 and is expected to increase to 120 million tonnes by 2015. 16

There is a clear economic case, as well as an environmental one for new biofuels. In the end, it is the economic case that is likely to be the determining factor in driving their development.

At the moment, the US, Brazil, Europe and Canada contribute nearly 90% of the global bio-fuel production, however, as petroleum prices soar and environmental concerns grow, many experts believe that emerging countries such as China and India will invest

more actively in the biofuel industry, further hastening the development of biofuel technologies. Already, according to a market report published by Fuji Keizai USA, the global biodiesel market is estimated to reach 37 billion gallons by 2016, growing at an average annual rate of 42%.

15 http://www.uop.com/pr/releases/DOE%20Hopewell%20Grant%20PR%20-%20FINAL.pdf 16 http://rightsite.asia/en/article/china-biofuel-industry-provides-opportunities-agribusiness


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CABE Sustainable Cities aims to

cut through the complexities of

the climate change debate to

provide expert advice, offer

clear priorities for action and

describe good practice in

sustainable urban design and

management.

Does high density development make travel more sustainable? Two experts on transport planning, Peter Headicar and Marcial Echenique give their views about the role of spatial planning in encouraging more sustainable travel.

Peter Headicar and Marcial Echenique.

The experts tackled two questions. Can land use planning make travel more sustainable and does high density, mixed use development encourage sustainable travel? This is the first debate that has been hosted on CABE Sustainable Cities website - read the views of Marcial and Peter, make up your mind and have your say.

Peter Headicar is reader in transport planning at Oxford Brookes University and Marcial Echenique is head of architecture and professor of land use and transport studies at the University of Cambridge. The article summarises the discussion at a debate which took place in January 2010.

YES: We should use spatial planning to make travel more environmentally sustainable by concentrating growth in and around major urban settlements with higher density development. Peter Headicar

No: Concentrating growth in urban centres damages economic growth and quality of life. High density cities are overcrowded and expensive. Because there is more travel by car in the same space (as there is double the population) there is more congestion, more energy use and more CO2 emissions. Marcial Echenique

Visit the website to read the full article and post a comment.

http://www.cabe.org.uk/sustainable-cities/

Spatial Planning and Sustainable Travel


http://www.cabe.org.uk/sustainable-cities/updates/encouraging-sustainable-travel?utm_medium=email&utm_source=CampaignMonitor&utm_content=1074836584&utm_campaign=SustainableCities-June2010update&utm_term=firstSustainableCitiesdebate�

http://www.cabe.org.uk/sustainable-cities/�

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News

A selection of news items from the eg website database: www. egemagazine.com Click on a category link

• Biodiversity

• Climate Change

• Education

• Energy

• Environment

• Europe & International

• Private Sector

• Sustainable

Development

• Transport



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Biodiversity & Natural Environment Climate Change Social assessment of conservation initiatives: A review of rapid methodologies

Areas of land and sea are increasingly being marked out for protection in response to various demands: to tackle biodiversity loss, to prevent deforestation as a climate change mitigation strategy, and to restore declining fisheries.

Amongst those promoting biodiversity conservation, the impacts of protected areas on resident or neighbouring communities have generated much debate, and this debate is raging further as new protection schemes emerge, such as Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD). Despite concerns about some of the negative implications of protected areas, and growing pressures to ensure that they fulfill social as well as ecological objectives, no standard methods exist to assess social impacts. The International Institute for Environment and Development has published a report which aims to provide some. Some 30 tools and methods for assessing social impacts in protected areas and elsewhere are reviewed, with a view to understanding how different researchers have tackled the various challenges associated with impact assessment. This experience is used to inform a framework for a standardised process that can guide the design of locally appropriate assessment methodologies. http://www.iied.org/pubs/pdfs/14859IIED.pdf

Climate action 2009/2010 Climate Action, produced by Sustainable Development International in partnership with the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), was launched in 2007 to encourage businesses and organisations to reduce their carbon footprint, highlighting that environmentally responsible operations can also be profitable. Produced to coincide with the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP) held in December of each year, the launch edition was distributed in Bali in 2007, the second edition in Poznan in 2008, and the third edition of Climate Action was released at COP 15 in Copenhagen, Denmark on December 7-18 2009. This book and supporting website feature a range of articles that encourage the sharing of best practice and the development of new technologies and initiatives, and illustrates the opportunities for business and governments to reduce costs and increase profits while tackling climate change.

EU Emission Trading Scheme The 2009 emission trading data are now available through the EEA's EU Emission Trading Scheme (ETS) data viewer. The EU ETS is one of the main and most prominent measures introduced by the EU to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions and reach its target under the Kyoto Protocol. The main

source of information on the scheme at EU level is the Community Independent Transaction Log (CITL), run by the European Commission. The EU ETS data viewer is a tool to help exploring the information contained in the CITL, aimed to support governments, market players and other stakeholders in their assessment of the EU ETS.

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Education Engaging environmental education: Learning, culture and agency ISBN 9789460911590 35 euro As more attention is devoted to the increasing and complex socio-ecological issues facing the planet, new insights and new ways of thinking are being sought about the learning and agency of children and adults in relation to these environmental concerns.

The contributors to this book address the critically important dual challenge of making environmental education engaging while engaging individuals, institutions and communities. Rather than treating students and citizens as passive recipients of other people’s knowledge, the book highlights the importance of engaging learners as active agents in thinking about and constructing a more sustainable and equitable quality of life.

The case studies emphasize socio-cultural approaches to environmental learning within and outside formal education in a diverse range of international contexts, including Canada, Denmark, Korea, the Netherlands, South Africa, Sweden, the United Kingdom and the United States. The authors not only illuminate the challenges and complexity of engaging youth and adults in meaningful learning, as well as informed action, on complex environmental issues, but also document and offer important insights into promising ways in which these challenges might be addressed.

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Energy 21st Century Living Project The 21st Century Living Project, carried out by the Eden Project and Homebase as part of Eden's Climate Revolution programme, explores ways of reducing climate change and adapting to the changes that are already taking place.

This unique project has given 100 households an opportunity to get involved and help explore the challenges and opportunities facing us all when adapting our homes, behaviour and lifestyle to 21st century living.

Participants received as survey of their home and lifestyle and a tailored report with information specific to each home; advice and assistance on energy, water, waste and their lifestyles; and cash to spend on eco products or services.

A report has recently been published, pulling together two years of work and presenting conclusions. http://21stcenturyliving.edenproject.com/news.htm


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Environment Listing over 350 green accounting tools, the Environment Tools Directory is the largest up-to-date, independent database of environmental software tools anywhere on the web. New tools can be listed and their details kept up to date for free. Users can rate and comment on any tools listed. The concept behind the directory is to bring together the increasing number of people needing to do some form of environmental assessment (and particularly quantification) with people that have developed tools to do these assessments and calculations.

These tools vary in format - documents, spreadsheets, websites and other software programmes. The directory will be a free resource for users and practitioners in business, Government, other organisations and the general public.

The Directory was originally designed to act as a focal point for searching for tools used to estimate air emissions (air pollution and greenhouse gases) but is already expanding to cover other environmental impacts e.g. adaptation, water pollution and waste minimisation as well as ecological footprinting and life cycle assessment. The directory provides a categorisation of the tools so that similar tools can be researched by different user groups. This categorisation will be further developed shortly to cope with the large number of tools now on the site.

http://www.environmenttools.co.uk/

Europe and international Directive of the European Parliament and of the Council on the energy performance of buildings The European Parliament has approved the new energy efficiency directive for buildings. The directive sets out rules for the energy performance of both new and existing buildings.

Member States will have to take measures to achieve these requirements at "cost-optimal levels". The new directive will require Member States to update their building codes so that all new buildings constructed from the end of 2020 meet high energy-saving standards. Existing buildings will have to be upgraded where possible. All buildings put up from the end of 2020 must have high energy-saving standards and, to a large extent, use renewable energy.

The recast of the directive means public buildings have an exemplary role to play by ensuring that all new buildings they own or occupy meet the nearly zero energy standards two years earlier. Where technically and economically feasible, the energy performance of existing buildings will have to be improved during major renovations. http://www.europarl.europa.eu/meetdocs/2009_2014/documents/cls/cons_cons(2010)05386(rev3)_/cons_cons(2010)05386(rev3)_en.pdf

Joint Programme Initiative The European Commission proposes more strategic cooperation between EU Member States on research and development to address major societal challenges. One way to do this is a new 'joint programming' approach. Joint programming involves Member States engaging in defining, developing and implementing strategic research agendas. Agriculture, food security and climate change has been proposed for a joint programming initiative. The Commission’s recommendations can be found in an accompanying document at: http://register.consilium.europa.eu/pdf/en/10/st09/st09585.en10.pdf


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Private Sector The Corporate Ecosystem Services Review The World Business Council for Sustainable Development has published a report which provides corporate managers with a proactive approach to making the connection between ecosystem change and their business goals.

It introduces the Corporate Ecosystem Services Review—a structured methodology to help businesses develop strategies for managing risks and opportunities arising from their dependence and impact on ecosystems. It is a tool for corporate strategy development and can augment existing environmental management systems.

This publication describes the five steps for performing an Ecosystem Services Review, and also provides an analytical framework, case examples, and helpful suggestions for each step.

It concludes by highlighting a number of resources managers can use when conducting an Ecosystem Services Review, including a “dependence and impact assessment” spreadsheet, scientific reports, economic valuation approaches, and other issue-specific tools. http://www.wbcsd.org/DocRoot/R3HpfX53CixLEiQsBRpJ/Corporate_Ecosystem_Services_Review.pdf

Sustainable Development Sustainable Development Insights is a series of short policy essays supporting the Sustainable Development Knowledge Partnership and edited by Boston University’s Frederick S. Pardee Center for the study of the Longer-Range Future. The series seeks to promote a broad interdisciplinary dialogue on how to accelerate sustainable development at all levels. Two papers have recently been published:

Global environmental governance: The challenge of accountability http://www.bu.edu/pardee/files/2010/04/UNsdkp005fsingle.pdf

This issue argues that accountability – or lack thereof- is a fundamental challenge in confronting improved global environmental governance (GEG) and that success must be measured not simply by the vitality of the negotiation process but by the robustness of implementation. States as well as institutions must be judged not by their statements of good intentions but by measurable implementation of their commitments and achievement of goals. The authors provide five reasons for GEG’s culture of unaccountability and seven related ideas for GEG reform.

The role of cities in sustainable development http://www.bu.edu/pardee/files/2010/04/UNsdkp004fsingle.pdf

This brief will argue that with the right innovation and incentives in place, cities can allow high living standards to be combined with resource consumption that is much lower than the norm in most cities today. This is achieved not with an over-extended optimism on what new technologies can bring but through a wider-application of what already has been shown to work by the more innovative and accountable city and municipal governments and their partnerships with civil society groups.


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Transport Transport and social inclusion: Have we made the connections in our cities? Pteg, which represents the six Passenger Transport Executives (PTEs) in England, has published a report which provides a ‘stock-take’ of progress on using transport to promote social inclusion, seven years on from publication of the influential ‘Making the Connections’ report on this subject by the Social Exclusion Unit.

The report provides an overview of some of the key issues for transport and social inclusion, sets out the areas that need to be addressed before further progress can be made and suggests ways in which the Department for Transport might provide a clearer framework for partners like the PTEs in pursuit of what is now one of the five drivers of national transport policy. http://www.pteg.net/NR/rdonlyres/570FF969-98D6-4C06-B9DB-9837A732E835/0/ptegTransportandSocialInclusionreportMay10.pdf

LINK: European Forum on Intermodal Passenger Travel LINK is the European Forum on Intermodal Passenger Travel, a project funded by the European Commission (DG Energy and Transport). Although the funding period has now expired, much valuable material will remain available via the project's website. This includes the LINK Best Practice Database which consists of 68 entries of interesting good examples in the field of passenger intermodality. http://www.linkforum.eu/

Intelligent Transport Systems http://www.unece.org/trans/theme_its.html Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS), defined as systems that integrate information and communication technology into transportation infrastructures and vehicles themselves, offer opportunities to manage travel demand and can help reduce the need for new infrastructure.

It enables information to be collected and shared in order to help people make more informed travel choices, make journeys more efficient and help to reduce the impact of transport on the environment. The ITS applications can play an important role for transport, especially in big cities, particularly with respect to: improving traffic flow; improving road safety; improving security and reducing crime; improving public transport; improving freight efficiency; and improving the environment.

The Transport Division of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe is aiming at improving high level information concerning Intelligent Transport Systems available and their meaningful integration into the work of several bodies.

On 26 May 2010 UNECE hosted a workshop on the future deployment of Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS) at the International Transport Forum, held in Leipzig. The workshop addressed how governments, international organizations, and UNECE in particular, can promote the deployment of ITS, and what key policies and actions are required to achieve this.

Information on the International Transport Forum, held on 26-28 May 2010, covering issues such as: innovation in transport; supply chains; and the future of air transport can be obtained at: http://www.internationaltransportforum.org/2010/ForumOutput.html


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