TENSE · Trends in City Expansion and Transport: the Non-Sustainability of Exurbia

Trends in City Expansion and Transport: the Non-Sustainability of Exurbia

The original project definition was based on the following: “The objectives of this research exercise are to gain a measure of the extent that the current outward expansion of cities, their transport intensity and environmental footprint. These are to be measured in terms of population, transport movement, energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions.” In 1998 an international study was published that rigorously compared the transport systems and travel of four world cities, London, New York, Paris and Tokyo . Using the same geographical definitions, fifteen years later, the TENSE project has undertaken a further analysis focusing on Greater London, the rest of the South East of England, the Four New York Boroughs and Hudson County in New Jersey and the rest of the Tri-State Area. The original project proposal aimed to go further than the “World Cities Transport Study”. It was stated that it will: • “update the figures of population and employment in the concentric rings identified in each of the four cities, • update the figures of transport movement and car ownership in each of the four cities, and • estimate total transport energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions. The methodology described above will provide trend data for the exurbanisation of cities. This data will then be related to their detected outward expansion with energy and emission sustainability figures. Furthermore, estimates will also be made of the carbon footprint of the transportation element of the expanding exurban habitation”. The TENSE study has shown that car travel and associated CO2 emissions per capita in London’s outer region are more than double than the ones of its metropolitan area. In New York’s outer region car travel is four times per capita than what it is in its urban area. The comparative analyses are based on the UK National Travel Survey and the US National Household Travel Survey. The population outside Greater London’ Green Belt and New York’s periphery has been growing relentlessly since the 1950s. The transport structure of the South East of England and the New York Tri-State area has been largely shaped around the private car. Measures that aim to meet CO2 emission targets will need address the nature of the car-dependent developments of London’s and New York’s growing outer fringe. The study uncovered that unlike in what was stated in the proposal, and was widely expected, the four world cities were no longer expanding outwards and instead growth was pronounced in the urban core. The study concentrated on London and New York largely due to the impossibility of securing reliable partnerships in Paris and Tokyo. The study initially undertook a literature review of the planning history and policy for the exurbias of these two world cities to the current travel structure that is nearly exclusively moulded around the motorcar. Although London and New York’s peripheries display some commonalities in their transport systems, New York’s exurbia is overall more car-dependent than London’s. Whilst outside London there are some densely built areas clustered around cities and towns with a public transport service of rail and bus, outside metropolitan New York, the picture is that of the type of sprawl that characterises the fringe of most North American cities.

Текст от CORDIS, на английски · Данни: CORDIS, © Европейски съюз