Transport Strategies for Net-Zero Systems by Design
Efforts that primarily focus on incremental change in systems that are unsustainable by design are one of the main barriers to scaling up climate action. This report applies the OECD well-being lens process to the transport sector. It builds on the report Accelerating Climate Action and encourages countries to focus climate action on delivering systems that - by design - improve well-being while requiring less energy and materials, and thus producing less emissions. The report identifies three dynamics at the source of car dependency and high emissions: induced demand, urban sprawl and the erosion of active and shared transport modes. The report also provides policy recommendations to reverse such dynamics and reduce emissions while improving well-being, from radical street redesign, to spatial planning aimed at increasing proximity, and policies to mainstream shared mobility. Analysis also shows why the effectiveness and public acceptability of carbon pricing and policies incentivising vehicle electrification can significantly increase after policy reprioritisation towards systems redesign.
Glossary
Accessibility refers to the possibility of accessing places with ease, and is the interaction of mobility and proximity (Silva and Larson, 2018[1]). The notion of accessibility implies that people’s well‑being does not ultimately depend on how much and how far they can travel, but on the possibility to meet their needs with ease, including by not having to travel long distances, or to travel at all. The creation of proximity is a key objective of accessibility-oriented policies. Accessibility can be measured in a number of ways. Contour‑based accessibility measures are one of the most commonly used (and simpler) types of accessibility indicators. They can measure the number of opportunities (e.g. jobs, green spaces, transport stations) which can be reached within a given travel time, distance or cost; or the time/cost (average) required to gain access to a fixed number of opportunities from a given location (ITF, 2017[2]). In some contexts, “connectivity” is used to describe what in this report we define as accessibility, whereas the word “accessibility” is used to describe the ease of access of the population with mobility impairments specifically.
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