Good day my good friends.

It is days like the last few where I am reminded that the best in transport can literally save lives. Both Deustche Dahn and OeBB are offering free travel for Ukrainian refugees. Its the same for PKP in Poland and MÁV in Hungary. Its the same with FlixBus too, and too many more travel companies to mention. This is what helping people is all about.

If you have any suggestions for interesting news items or bits of research to include in this newsletter, you can email me.

James

In some places, a not-insignificant number of people in road traffic collisions are homeless

This report from the Portland Bureau of Transportation did something that is very rare: it surprised me. 70% of pedestrian deaths in the area were ‘houseless community members,’ more commonly known as the homeless. While a third of all traffic deaths involved members of the same community. That’s…astounding.

But the emerging research in this area shows that this is not an isolated occurrence. There is a positive trend between homelessness rates and the total pedestrian crash rate according to data from Texas. It needs more work, and the issues faced by this community are many and wide-ranging. But by improving road safety, could we be making life better for those who are homeless? I never saw that connection before.

How we define disadvantaged communities is tougher than we think

In the UK, the Equality Act 2010 there are 9 protected characteristics that it is illegal to discriminate on the basis of. This sets a legal definition for what needs protection, and some may argue a basis for disadvantage. But disadvantaged communities is a multi-faceted term, including things that are objectively measured (e.g. demographics) and subjectively experienced.

From March of this year, I hope to dedicate more of my time, and this newsletter, to exploring these issues more fully. In the meantime, this excellent article in Grist covers a debate in New York about how environmental justice campaigners have struggled with defining just this. It is worth your time reading.

Really bad weather really disrupts people, and location data can help us understand it

I’ve just started to write this, and I’ve just realised that I need to be over at my mother-in-law’s to celebrate her 70th birthday in 15 minutes. So I am going to let the abstract do the heavy lifting on this research paper into using geolocation data to track people’s movements during a typhoon:

The study reveals that urban flow patterns varied substantially before, during, and after the typhoon. Specifically, urban flows were found to have reduced by 39% during the disruption. Conversely, 56% of flows increased immediately after the disruption. In terms of functional variation, the assessment reveals that fundamental urban functions, such as industrial (work) and institutional – (education) related trips experienced less disruption, whereas the typhoon event appears to have a relatively larger negative influence on recreational related trips.

Random things

These links are meant to make you think about the things that affect our world in transport, and not just think about transport itself. I hope they do just that.

• Cash of the future (BIS)

• What Would Happen If All Young People Gave Up ‘Luxuries’ to Buy a House? (Vice)

• The End of Trust (The Atlantic)

• Future cities could be 3D printed – using concrete made with recycled glass (The Conversation)

• Uber’s Proposal for Portable Benefits Is a Poison Pill (Jacobin)

Something interesting

Money for transport in the UK. Because life carries on, sometimes.

If you do nothing else today, then do this

Read the latest IPCC Report on Climate Change 2022: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability. Then start doing stuff.