The inaugural lecture was held at the Association of Municipalities and Development Authorities (AMDA) in Delhi. BI Singal, Director General of Institute of Urban Transport (IUT), introduced Gorton to the diverse audience, which included transportation experts, researchers and students from Delhi and NCR.

During his talk, Gorton focused specifically on India, commenting that “India is at a turning point in its history – as it develops, it needs focus on how transportation technology can complement other initiatives, like improved mass transit. The decisions made in the next few years will set the course for the next hundred years.”

Gorton also spoke about how parking regulations and policies can be used to discourage automobile use. He noted that “measures like slow speed zones, parking restrictions, and metered parking should be encouraged at the local level to discourage car travel into downtowns.”

Gorton emphasized that India can avoid at the experience of other cities around the world and shift its behavior towards more sustainable transportation. Gorton concluded his talk with a comment on how sustainable transport doesn’t only positively affect the environment, but that a more people-centric design can increase happiness as well.

“A recent study in the US shows that people living on a street with a heavy traffic flow have less social interaction than people living on street with a light traffic flow. Walkable streets and connected neighborhoods facilitate social interaction and overall happiness.”

Over the next week, Mark Gorton will travel to Chennai and Ahmedabad as well as participate in cycle rally in Delhi.

“These cities are setting the example of working on various fronts - giving people opportunities through high quality transport options,” said Walter Hook, chief executive officer of the Institute for Transportation and Development Policy. 

Image: An advertisement for SF Park

San Francisco is using parking reform to great effect. The new ‘SFpark’ variable-rate, demand-responsive parking management system, provides real-time parking availability information online, via text and smartphone apps. The city’s ‘Pavement to Parks’ program reclaims parking spaces for public space and has created 20 new and dynamic parklets with more on the way. The city started to upgrade and expand its bike network, setting an ambitious target of 20 percent of all trips made by bicycle by 2020.

Image: A transformed Medellin street.

Medellin, Colombia and its metropolitan area is being recognized for its public space improvements, providing multiple options to its citizens, such as its existing cable car and metro systems and the recently inaugurated BRT project, known as Metroplús, and integrating those services.  The city created 1.6 million square meters of new park space through 25 parks and 11 urban promenades. The city also made progress with a new public bicycle program, “EnCicla,” that integrates universities and mass transit with popular city destinations; improved pedestrian crossings; and a ridesharing program, “Comparte tu carro;” as well as vehicle exhaust emissions controls and sulfur content improvements.

Image: Metrobus pulls into its first station in Buenos Aires

Buenos Aires, Argentina, received an honorable mention for opening the country’s first BRT system (Metrobús) and its comprehensive investment in cycling. 

Image: Cape Town’s at-level station boarding.

Cape Town, South Africa, also received an honorable mention for opening the first BRT system in Africa to integrate cycling. 

For more information on this year’s honorees please visit: www.st-award.org

Buenos Aires, Argentina is a 2012 nominee for the implementation of the first BRT, Metrobus, and Bike Sharing System, Mejor en Bici, in the country.

Metrobus, launched in May 2011, is the first bus rapid transit system in the city and in Argentina. With an initial corridor length of 12km and 21 stations, it has already shown to be reducing passenger travel time and growing in ridership. Metrobús runs along the busy Avenue Juan B. Justo, the system includes gold-standard features of BRT design, including physically separated lanes that run in the middle of the street, elevated station platforms and countdown clocks.  The city expects the system to grow in ridership as it expands.

Buenos Aires also launched a bike sharing system in 2010 and has spent 2011 growing the bike network and the system itself. The system started with 72 bikes, 3 stations, and average of 110 bike trips per day. By October 2011, the system has 700 bikes, 20 stations, an average of 2500 daily bike trips, 260000 overall trips, and 25000 users.

San Francisco is a 2012 Sustainable Transport Award nominee for its implementation of SFPark, an innovative new parking and traffic demand management system, and its “Pavement to Parks” program that reclaims street and parking spaces for public spaces.

SFPark is a a demand-pricing based approach to parking management in commercial districts around the city. Over the past year, the city tested its new parking management system at 7,000 of San Francisco’s 28,800 metered spaces and 12,250 spaces in 15 of 20 city-owned parking garages. Despite much initial concern, the program has been well received in its test neighborhoods, helping local businesses and making the streets more pleasant for the huge populations of transit riders and people on foot and bicycle.

The Pavement to Parks program has created new street plazas and many new parklets (sidewalk platforms that replace car parking spaces) by reclaiming street space in partnerships with businesses and other community groups around the city. The parklets program has captured international attention, prompting a host of other cities to begin their own programs, from New York City to Vancouver.

In addition to these programs, San Francisco has also begun upgrading and expanding its bike network to attract riders of all ages, setting an ambitious target of 20% of all trips by bicycle by 2020. The city is also implementing slow speed zones around all city schools, and is in the process of figuring out how to expand its popular Sunday Streets program to meet the demand for a weekly program.

Cape Town, South Africa is a 2012 nominee for the opening of its first BRT corridor and its integration with cycling as a first step in using transportation to increase inclusivity and accessibility. The My CiTi system opened, in an area of the city without much mass transit investment, with a 16 km corridor and plans to expand. Parallel to the BRT corridor, Cape Town has also opened the longest continuous bike way in Africa that spans the entire 16 km bus corridor. The city has also invested in other bike infrastructure; namely covered and secure bike parking at rail stations and bike storage on buses.

Travel time along the corridor has been reduced by about 50%, reducing trip time from an hour to an hour and a half to 35 minutes. The city has also introduced Euro IV buses to Cape Town, helping reducing the particulate matter in the air improve population health.

Cape Town’s achievements over the past year will serve as a model for the rest of the continent.

Medellín, Colombia is a 2012 nominee for its efforts to improve public transport, create better public spaces, and improve road safety in the city. These efforts include the development of a bus rapid system, MetroPlús, which is fully integrated with their mass transit system - currently made up of an underground metro and cable car systems. It is the only city in its region to feature full bus rapid transit and metro integration. This year the city has extended its mobility options to include a bicycle share program, EnCicla, which provides 145 bicycles for public use.

Medellín has also begun to recuperate its public spaces through pedestrian connection improvements, urban promenades, and the creation of environmental parks. The city has built 1.6 million square meters of new public space, including 25 new parks and 11 new promenades. This has brought direct benefits to 800,000 people, in the form of increased and safer access to public transport. The Intelligent Mobility System (SIMM), aimed at improving mobility and road safety for all users, has reduced response time to road side accidents from 40 minutes (2008) to 18 minutes (2011). Medellín has also implemented vehicle emissions controls to reduce the sulfur content of diesel fuels and improve air quality.

ITDP was present for the entirety of the meeting and hosted and participated in numerous side events with its ‘Bridging the Gap’ partners that focused on legally binding agreements for the transport sector in the post-2012 process (COP-17, Rio +20, EST Forum). Land Transport was not just a topic of discussion for those actively working in the sector, but was an important topic within groups not directly involved in transport as well, such as the World Health Organization or country delegations like Germany. The prominence and focus of transport shows the growin importance of transportation-related issues as well as the considerable effort of the “Bridging the Gap Initiative: Pathways for transport in the post 2012 process”(BtG) initiative. 

For the last four years, the BtG initiative has been very active in the UNFCCC process with the goal of educating stakeholders about the importance of mitigating emissions from the transport sector. Its success is seen in the number of countries that are including transport in the Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Action (NAMAs), the official plans to combat the effects of climate change.

During COP17, ITDP, as a core member of the BtG and the Partnership for Sustainable Low Carbon Transport (SLoCaT), hosted two side events during COP-17.
On December 1st, ITDP, together with the BtG initiative organized an official UNFCCC side event.  This event brought together leading transport experts to discuss current issues in international climate policy and its repercussions for the transport sector. ITDP made a presentation on methodologies and models used to measure emission reductions from the transport sector, showcasing ITDP’s Transportation Emissions Evaluation Model for Projects (TEEMP). Other presentations, made by EMBARQ, GIZ and TRL, focused on how to make land transport part of national climate change action plans and how it can be incorporated into NAMA development. A panel with government representatives from Colombia, Indonesia and South Africa followed the presentations, along with a considerable participation of the audience with a Q&A session.

Its second event, done in partnership with the Ministry of Transport of the Republic of South Africa, facilitated a dialogue and best practice sharing between countries that are proactively engaged in the development of transport-related mitigation activities and multilateral development organizations that are developing strategies to finance low-carbon transport initiatives. The event included senior representatives of the major regional development banks and the ministries of transport from South Africa, Colombia, and Indonesia.

After two weeks of intense negotiations, the outcomes of COP17 in Durban can be grouped in four main elements: the second commitment period under the Kyoto Protocol, the design of a Green Climate Fund, a mandate to get all countries by 2015 to sign a legally binding agreement to cut GHG emissions no later than 2020 and a work plan for this coming year in a process detailed by the “Durban Platform for Enhanced Action”.  From these elements, the transport sector should monitor closely the development of the Green Climate Fund that is posed to channel up to $100 billion USD a year by 2020 for mitigation and adaptation action in the developing world. ITDP will stay tuned in the development of this fund and is being considered to become an official observer to the UN Climate Investment Funds for the next two years.

To view the presentations from the side events see Global Climate Policy resources.

For more information on ITDP’s Road to Rio, see Transport for Sustainable Development

The award was conferred on the basis of integration of the Janmarg buses and control room through GPS to gain information on speed of the buses and stoppage time of buses at stations. Janmarg will also implement a smart card system for fare collection soon.

The Ministry of Urban Development gives various categories of “Best Practice” awards to urban transport systems. Janmarg had applied in two categories, including Best Public Private Partnership and Best Intelligent Transport System Project.

Five years in the making, the Janmarg BRT system opened on October 14, 2009 after three months of free trial run in the city. At present, the Janmarg network covers more than 45 km and carries more than 140,000 passengers per day. ITDP worked with the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation and CEPT University during the planning and implementation phases of the project, providing technical assistance and advisory support.

National and international awards for Janmarg:
1. Best Mass Rapid Transit System from the Ministry of Urban Development, Government of India, 2010
2. Sustainable Transport Award, 2010
3. Outstanding innovation in Public Transport from the International Transport Forum and International Association of Public Transport, 2010
4. New Technological Innovations from the Ministry of Urban Development, Government of India 2010
5. Daring Ambition Award and Knowledge and Research Award from the International Association of Public Transport, 2011
6. Best Intelligent Transport System from the Ministry of Urban Development, Government of India 2011