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Frontiers in Urban Mobility
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Frontiers in Urban Mobility

A special issue of Sustainability (ISSN 2071-1050). This special issue belongs to the section "Sustainable Urban and Rural Development".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 April 2023) | Viewed by 9981

Special Issue Editor

Prof. Dr. John Zacharias

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
College of Architecture and Landscape, Peking University, Beijing, China
Interests: behavior–environment relationships

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The city has come under renewed scrutiny since the onset of environmental and health crises, and various scenarios for its future form and purpose have already been proposed. The cumulative results of a large body of research on sustainable urban transport has investigated operations, systems, and their interactions with activities, changes in the structure of activity, and daily life, all pointing to elements of a better future but not yet forming a coherent picture of the whole. These positive directions for a collective urban future evoke sometimes radical future scenarios or could be scaled up for broad effect. Physical transport remains the lifeblood of the city, and attained peak flow levels in cities in 2019 just before the onset of the pandemic. That transport within cities will doubtlessly return and grow but it might grow back differently, with different purposes, and with new dominant transport systems, all supporting changes in daily life. This Special Issue will focus on those future scenarios as an outcome of an analysis of research trends, accumulated empirical evidence, exemplary case studies with global significance, cross-sectional studies, and activity surveys. All urban scales should be included in our consideration, given the evidence that intervention at various scales is relevant and productive. Global reach is also needed, given that the problems for an urban future are global, even when the short-range solutions may be local in nature. Forward-looking reviews, field investigations, city comparisons, local area studies and comparisons, transport system investigations of all kinds, among other types of work, are typical of the sources of new urban mobility futures. This Issue will call on researchers across these urban mobility domains to focus their work on the meaning of research findings for our urban futures. In this way, we hope to address the important scientific needs to translate focused research findings into directions for the city, approaches to policy change, or concrete physical modifications. The innovation here is to explicitly invite such interpretations of empirical research to complement the strict reporting rules for empirical research in top-ranked journals on urban mobility.

Prof. Dr. John Zacharias
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • green transport
  • zero-carbon development
  • mobility
  • transportation systems
  • human–system interactions

Published Papers (5 papers)

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Research

23 pages, 6286 KiB  
Article
The Influence of Passenger Car Banning Policies on Modal Shifts: Rotterdam’s Case Study
by Maha Attia, Taslim Alade and Shady Attia
Sustainability 2023, 15(9), 7443; https://doi.org/10.3390/su15097443 - 30 Apr 2023
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1899
Abstract
Low-emission zones (LEZs), incentivizing electric cars, park-and-ride systems, and other traffic reduction schemes, are all single measures aimed at achieving low-/zero-emission mobility. This paper aims to investigate the impact of LEZs’ passenger car banning and argues that such single measures cannot achieve significant [...] Read more.
Low-emission zones (LEZs), incentivizing electric cars, park-and-ride systems, and other traffic reduction schemes, are all single measures aimed at achieving low-/zero-emission mobility. This paper aims to investigate the impact of LEZs’ passenger car banning and argues that such single measures cannot achieve significant traffic or emission reduction levels without being integrated into a well-designed policy package that ensures the sufficient provision of mobility alternatives. Featuring Rotterdam as a single case study, this paper follows a mixed methodology consisting of (1) quantitative real-time data on transport usage that mirror the users’ behavior and (2) qualitative data acquired from in-depth interviews and documents that explain the government’s intention and the users’ behavior. The results show that between 2016 and 2020, after applying the LEZ policy for restricting passenger cars and vans of Euro 3 and lower, there was a 50% decrease in the number of polluting passenger cars and vans entering Rotterdam. However, this decrease is insignificant, since the number of vehicles targeted by the policy was less than 2% of the overall vehicles that entered the LEZ area. The results also shed light on the role of systematic policy packaging in ensuring a change in user behavior. Among other initiatives, a successful LEZ implantation should be supported by inner-city parking reduction, electric vehicle charging facilities, incentive schemes, and alternative sustainable mobility options. Above all, the number of restricted vehicles must be significant. The conclusion and discussion develop a well-structured, educational, evaluative framework and recommend a comprehensive package of policy measures for cities seeking low-emission mobility. The research, however, did not consider the impact of different land-use distributions on the application of the LEZ, which can be an interesting angle for future researchers. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Frontiers in Urban Mobility)
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13 pages, 2929 KiB  
Article
Bicycle Accessibility GIS Analysis for Bike Master Planning with a Consideration of Level of Traffic Stress (LTS) and Energy Consumption
by Devin McNally, Rachel Tillinghast and Hiroyuki Iseki
Sustainability 2023, 15(1), 42; https://doi.org/10.3390/su15010042 - 20 Dec 2022
Viewed by 2167
Abstract
Measuring the impact of bicycle infrastructure and other mobility improvements has been a challenge in the practice of transportation planning. Transportation planners are increasingly required to conduct complex analyses to provide supporting evidence for proposed plans and communicate well with both decision makers [...] Read more.
Measuring the impact of bicycle infrastructure and other mobility improvements has been a challenge in the practice of transportation planning. Transportation planners are increasingly required to conduct complex analyses to provide supporting evidence for proposed plans and communicate well with both decision makers and the public. Cyclists experience two important factors on roads: (a) travel stress related to the built environment along with the traffic conditions and (b) changes in physical burden due to topography. This study develops a method that integrates an energy consumption calculation and “bicycling stress” score to take into account external conditions that influence cyclists substantially. In this method, the level of traffic stress (LTS) is used to select street segments appropriate for different comfort levels among cyclists and is combined with biking energy consumption, in addition to distance, which is used as travel impedance to consider the effects of slopes and street intersections. The integrated Geographic Information System (GIS) analysis methods are used to evaluate bicycle infrastructure improvements in the coming years in Montgomery County, MD, USA. The analysis results demonstrated that the infrastructure improvements in the county’s bike master plan are well-targeted to improve bicycling accessibility. Furthermore, the use of energy as opposed to distance to generate bikeshed areas results in smaller bikesheds compared to distance-generated bikesheds. The method presented herein allows planners to characterize and quantify the impact of bicycle infrastructure and prioritize locations for improvements. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Frontiers in Urban Mobility)
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16 pages, 6250 KiB  
Article
Development of a Neighborhood Mobility Index for Assessing Mobility Disparities in Developing Countries with Application to the Greater Cairo Area, Egypt
by Wael M. ElDessouki
Sustainability 2022, 14(23), 15846; https://doi.org/10.3390/su142315846 - 28 Nov 2022
Viewed by 2070
Abstract
Most urban planners emphasize sustainability’s environmental and economic aspects and overlook the social equity dimension. Assessment of the current mobility situation is a prerequisite for developing socially sustainable urban mobility plans. However, current metrics for mobility assessment are data intensive and sometimes require [...] Read more.
Most urban planners emphasize sustainability’s environmental and economic aspects and overlook the social equity dimension. Assessment of the current mobility situation is a prerequisite for developing socially sustainable urban mobility plans. However, current metrics for mobility assessment are data intensive and sometimes require the development of a detailed transportation model for the urban area, which is difficult to achieve in developing nations. In this study, we have created an index for assessing mobility for neighborhoods in a metropolitan area that requires minimal land-use information and utilizes online third-party travel-time data. The proposed index merges the fundamental principles of the traditional transportation planning process and congestion metrics to assess the mobility status of different neighborhoods in an urban area for a single mode of transportation. The developed neighborhood mobility index (NMI) was evaluated in the Greater Cairo Area (GCA), and the results were validated by conducting a one-dimensional ANOVA. The validation results showed that the results obtained using the developed NMI were reliable with a good degree of confidence. The case study demonstrated the capabilities of the NMI in detecting disparities between neighborhoods in a city and showed how planners and decision-makers could use it in preparing sustainable mobility plans. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Frontiers in Urban Mobility)
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18 pages, 1897 KiB  
Article
The Role of the Access Environment in Metro Commute Travel Satisfaction
by John Zacharias and Xinyi Liu
Sustainability 2022, 14(22), 15322; https://doi.org/10.3390/su142215322 - 18 Nov 2022
Cited by 4 | Viewed by 1525
Abstract
The contributions of the access and egress portions of public transport trips to overall travel satisfaction merit more attention. This study collected responses from intercepted regular urban rail travelers at three metro stations with distinct built-form and land-use characteristics. Local conditions of access [...] Read more.
The contributions of the access and egress portions of public transport trips to overall travel satisfaction merit more attention. This study collected responses from intercepted regular urban rail travelers at three metro stations with distinct built-form and land-use characteristics. Local conditions of access on foot, by bicycle, or on a bus were evaluated retrospectively on a five-point satisfaction scale and compared with an independent survey of the same access routes. Three-factor theory and dummy variable regression methods were used to identify the factor structure of environmental attributes under different access means. In the results, access and egress satisfaction were more important than metro trip satisfaction in overall trip satisfaction for walking and cycling modes. Access distance was not significant for walking and marginally negative for cycling satisfaction. For pedestrians, street connectivity, pathway directness, shade, greenery, and crossing safety were all significant (p < 0.05), explaining 51% of the variance in expressed satisfaction. For bicyclists, directness, distance, service, and parking facilities were significant in satisfaction, accounting for 62% of variance. In the bus access model, we found that bus stop location is very important, with passengers also very concerned about the walk experience to the bus stop. Satisfaction with access and egress environments is important in overall satisfaction with travel by public transport. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Frontiers in Urban Mobility)
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17 pages, 1339 KiB  
Article
Case Study: Assessing The COVID-19 Pandemic’s Potential for a More Climate-Friendly Work-Related Mobility
by Dennis Wilke, Henriette Rau and Joachim W. Härtling
Sustainability 2022, 14(19), 12708; https://doi.org/10.3390/su141912708 - 06 Oct 2022
Viewed by 1227
Abstract
The switch from working in-office to working from home in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic had a significant impact on people’s mobility behavior. In view of the need for action arising from the ongoing challenge of climate change, these changes should be [...] Read more.
The switch from working in-office to working from home in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic had a significant impact on people’s mobility behavior. In view of the need for action arising from the ongoing challenge of climate change, these changes should be seen as an opportunity to reduce emissions in the traffic sector. The aim of this study was to analyze changes in work-related mobility that occurred during the COVID-19 pandemic using the case of a multinational medium-sized retail chain situated in semi-rural Germany. The case study allowed us to examine those changes in connection with individual attitudes and perspectives of the company and its employees. Thus, we quantitatively recorded the mobility behavior of the company’s employees, followed by an expert interview to ascertain the company’s perspective. We found a reduction in the frequency of commuting and business trips made by employees, which seemed to continue beyond the COVID-19 crisis. However, according to our findings these changes were not based on individual motivation to act in a climate-aware manner but are subject to the framework conditions created by employers for the adoption of climate-friendly behavior. The results of this work could be used by companies and policymakers to create such favorable framework conditions. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Frontiers in Urban Mobility)
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