Good day my good friend.

Friday was a good day. A lovely trip down to Bristol to see some good friends (thanks for popping along Amber, Anna, and Liz), and make plans for Mobility Camp with some excellent people (thank you for joining remotely Jenny, Sarah, and Stephen). And we got to see our wonderful venue – The Engine Shed. I am so excited for our event on 29th September now. It is going to be amazing!

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

You should also join a lot of like-minded people at Mobility Camp in Bristol in September. Get your tickets now.

James

Public transport in a time of protest

As well as being the subject of protest themselves, public transport can often play an understated role in protests. Notably through the safe movement of a lot of people when they take place. But it is a role rarely studied. That is why this study of the role of public transport in anti-extradition protests in Hong Kong is important. Moreover, it goes further by estimating the impact on demand of planned protests, as some people use the system more, and some are discouraged from using it. The results may not shock you…

It is found that, across metro stations, political orientation (percentage of votes to pro-democracy camp in the 2019 Election of District Councils), law enforcement (permission from the police to protest), land use type (especially for commercial and open space), population age and income, as well as transit/road network characteristics and intermodal connectivity, significantly influence the ridership of metro stations during protest days.

Lots of ideas on how to manage local freight trips. Not much being done, mind.

I like where this study is getting at. It attempts to provide a useful framework for linking household consumption patterns (for which data can be amazingly detailed) with estimates of freight trips. And consequently developing policy initiatives and projects to tackle it. Plus the statistic that the average neighbourhood in Belgium is crossed by 3.6 freight trips per day amazed me in not being amazing, if that makes sense.

Its good, but it doesn’t solve a fundamental couple of issues. First, the freight networks are fragmented with a lot of competing companies with their own optimised freight operations. The second, is that there is no votes in sorting out freight unless its ‘get HGVs out of the village.’ Which is often a blunt tool. Suggestions on how to overcome these issues are much welcomed!

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 that you enjoy them.

• The Lost Glamour of the Department-Store Restaurant (Atlas Obscura)

• Davos Was a Case Study in How Not to Talk About Climate Change (Undark)

• The Dutch Farmers’ Protest and the War on Food (Off Guardian)

• As Silicon Valley fantasizes about Web3, India leaps ahead on payments (Yahoo)

• To cap it all … a £2 limit (Bus and Train User)

Something interesting

Wow, the Amazon truly is a major barrier to road transport across South America. And the network in the North West of the continent is incredibly dense.

If you do nothing else today, then do this.

These two amazing publications have recommended Mobility Matters in the last week or so (hello to any new subscribers from each). And both Along for the Ride by Sarah Barnes and Transportist by David Levinson are amazing in their own right. You should subscribe to them.

Transportist

A newsletter on transport by David Levinson

By David Levinson