Transportist: July 2025
“An idea left idle is a dream that dies in silence.” — Source unknown
Welcome to the latest issue of The Transportist, especially to our new readers. As always you can follow on Mastodon, or RSS. A BlueSky feed is also available.
I will be in China (Xi’an, and then Shenzhen) at the end of June and beginning of July for the 3rd Symposium on Cities and Sustainable Transport, and then Shenzhen. Let me know if you want to connect.
Follow-Up: TRB
Beyond TRB
The Zephyr Foundation is sponsoring a more narrowly focused conference - Modeling Mobility September 14-17, in Minneapolis.
Links
Transit
Micromobility
Electrification
Automation
Logistics
Navigation
Poll: Can Americans get around without GPS? (Men and women in heterosexual relationships agree men are better at navigating.)
Sydney’s Beck-style Railway Maps (London Reconnections)
Politics
Equity
Free Pubic Transport
A transport planning expert, Professor David Levinson from Sydney University, told ST that free or near-free public transport could lure additional passengers who “might then stick around as the fares climb back up”.
He said the extra passengers caused little additional expense on networks that were not full as the operating costs are fixed.
Charging a small amount – such as 50 Australian cents in Queensland – was a good way to ensure that public transport attracts only passengers who need to travel, he added.
“Covid lowered ridership and Australian governments have tried to maintain services,” he said. “To bring ridership up, you can add a sweetener to attract more people.”
Canberra, the national capital, had free travel on its buses and light rail from September to November 2024 and now offers free travel on Fridays.
Western Australia offered free travel in the city of Perth and regional areas during the eight weeks to Feb 5 – at a cost of A$14 million – to encourage public transport use during the slower summer period. A similar scheme during the previous summer led to a 42 per cent increase in public transport use compared with the summer before.
A public transport expert, Dr Abraham Leung from Griffith University in Brisbane, told ST that assessing the cost of the Queensland scheme should consider broader benefits, such as lower pollution, reducing the need for road infrastructure and the associated costs, and the health benefits from increased walking.
But he said the authorities should also focus on other improvements, particularly increasing the frequency of services. In Australia, a vast country with a population that is largely spread across sprawling cities, governments tend to focus on providing wide coverage of transport services rather than improving frequency and capacity along main routes.
“Transport in Australia is seen as a social safety net to ensure there is good geographic coverage,” he said. “If resources are limited, we should focus on trunk routes and make sure they are more frequent, and that services are not overloaded and there are enough seats.”
Prof Levinson said Sydney, the most populous city, had a good coverage of buses that ensured people had decent methods of accessing major train and transport hubs, but cities with smaller populations had fewer first- and last-mile options.
He added: “In Sydney, we lean towards providing coverage rather than frequency, particularly in outer suburbs.”
Your Regular Reminder: Cars are weapons & Scooters are shields
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Scooters Too:
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