Helsinki
Helsinki is actually a quite large region
that includes both urban and rural areas. At the heart of the region lies Helsinki itself
surrounded by three smaller cities. Together they form the Helsinki Metropolitan Area.
Additionally, included in the modelled area is a relatively large surrounding region with
smaller cities and towns as subcenters. There are clear signs of segregation of the
population in different residential areas according to income.
The Metropolitan Area is expected to be
faced with a rapid population growth from the present 920000 to 1.1 million inhabitants by
the year 2020. This increases the pressure to urban sprawl as well as the use of the
natural areas within the existing structure. It is expected that Helsinki can only
accommodate less than one-fourth of the forecast growth, the rest being directed to the
other cities of the Metropolitan Area.
It is predicted that mobility will increase
more than the population. One reason for this is the decentralising land use, but also the
number of trips is expected to grow. The share of public transport has been significantly
reduced during the past few decades, but this decline is now anticipated to have reached
its low. If policies favouring public transport will be pursued, it is forecast that the
share of collective transport will start slightly rising again. The speeds of vehicle
traffic in the Metropolitan Area will continue their slight decrease unless the increase
in the use of the private car can be curbed. The growing traffic will increase the noise
nuisance experienced by the inhabitants. It has been estimated that the population living
in areas where the daily average noise level exceeds 55 dB(A) will increase by about 15%
to more than 200 000 people by 2020.
Presently, the concentrations of nitrogen
dioxide and particulate matter exceed the guidelines annually. The levels of nitrogen
dioxide are expected to fall because of the technical development of the vehicle fleet,
but high particulate concentrations are still expected in the busiest traffic
environments. The air quality in general is improved by the atmospheric conditions created
by the vicinity of the sea. Acidifying fallout exceeds the critical load because of
transboundary emissions.
Policies that are relevant for Helsinki
Metropolitan Area are likely to include especially different kinds of pricing and
investment policies. Pricing schemes have already been tested with good results, and the
transport infrastructure of the Metropolitan Area is continually subject to intense
planning and debate. One problem of the region has been to agree on common goals and ways
of development. This is because of the number of municipalities involved but also because
of the uncertainty of the effects of planned and new policies, as well as the distribution
of these effects. The Client-Partners expect PROPOLIS to produce convincing evidence on
this and better tools to communicate with the public.
The Model
The land use / transport model has been
developed in several phases and covers now an area within 100 km radius from the centre.
The model has 88 zones and 16,000 links in the networks (road, railway, slow modes) and is
capable to handle public and private person traffic and goods transports. The model has
been successfully used in several projects for local authorities, Ministry of Transport
etc.
Dortmund
Dortmund (population of 600,000) is the most
eastern of the cities of the largest industrial region of Germany. It used to be one of
the major centres of coal mining and steel manufacturing in the country but with the
decline of the mining and steel industries it has been reduced to being the
administrative, service and retail centre for a large metropolitan area.
The study area comprises the commuter
catchment area of Dortmund containing the city itself and eighteen neighbouring
communities. The region is relatively compact; most of its settlements lie within the
30-minute travel-time isochrone by car from the central city. The study area has a
population of approximately 2.3 million.
It is expected that the population loss of
the Dortmund will continue in future, partly because of natural population development,
partly because of ongoing suburbanisation. The employment loss of the traditional
industries of the city will continue in future. Whereas the last coal mine was closed some
ten years ago, the two remaining steel mills will be shut down probably within a few years
having severe consequences for related industries. This employment loss can hardly be
substituted by new jobs in other economic sectors. Already today, the unemployment rate of
Dortmund belongs to the highest rates in the country. The city is also competing with its
suburbs for attracting new enterprises or even for preventing existing firms to move to
the hinterland.
Although there have been large investments
in local and regional public transport systems, particularly in light rail developments,
the share of car users in the modal split is high above national average. Congestion
problems and transport related environmental problems such as air pollution and noise are
the side-effects of the car oriented mobility patterns.
The main urban development strategies of
Dortmund comprise the development of high-quality housing areas at affordable price levels
to reduce the outmigration process; the development of technology parks and other business
location as base for the creation of modern jobs and to enhance the economic structural
change; further investments in public transport systems but also into the local and
regional road network to enhance accessibility for all modes. Another focus is on the
improvement of the environmental quality by developing a regional green belt system and
through the regeneration of derelict land formerly used by the coal and steel industries.
The Model
The model used to be used in this study is a
model of intraregional location and mobility decisions in a metropolitan area. It receives
its spatial dimension by the subdivision of the study area into zones. The current
implementation has 30 zones, but it is planned to substantially increase the number of
zones for this project. The zones are connected with each other by transport networks
containing the most important links of the public transport and road networks coded as an
integrated, multimodal network including walking and cycling and past and future network
changes. The model receives its temporal dimension by the subdivision of time into fifteen
time periods of three years' duration.
Inverness and
the Inner Moray Firth
Inverness is the capital of the
Highland region of Scotland, and its largest community. It grew originally as a port and
market centre, and owes its prominence to its strategic position in the geography and
transport system of the Highlands, where the Great Glen and the Moray Firth converge.
Today it is well served by road, rail and air (with its own airport) as well as by sea,
and acts as the gateway to the Highlands for international tourism. At the same time it is
a major regional focus for retail, business and education.
The Highland region and the smaller
settlements in the hinterland of Inverness have their problems, arising from the rugged
terrain, the extreme dispersal of the population, an inadequate communications
infrastructure, and the seasonal nature of the tourism business. There is a constant
danger of losing jobs and retail services to the larger Scottish cities to the south.
Despite this, the region has gained population in recent years and is expected to grow
from 204 000 to 218 000 by 2011. Over a similar period the city of Inverness is
projected to grow from 65 000 to 72 000.
The challenge for the planners of the
Highland Council is to channel this growth so as to sustain the vitality both of Inverness
itself and its remote satellite communities. Growth must be accommodated without
prejudicing the beauty of Inverness and the region, which is its principal asset in
attracting tourists. The Council hopes to attract new information and high-technology
businesses and retain them with high-quality services and housing. There are particular
challenges in moving trips from road to public transport, given the extreme low density of
much of the population; but new light rail services linking settlements in linear patterns
along the coast seem to provide one potential solution.
The model
An integrated land-use/ transport model has
been built of the Inner Moray Firth region using the TRANUS software, with some 150 zones
and 800 transport links. This is presently being calibrated. Four versions are planned:
24-hour traffic and peak-hour traffic; and low season and high season for the tourist
business. A series of land-use, traffic management and public transport investment
policies are to be investigated, with special emphasis on the use of fossil fuels and
associated emissions. A large database of land uses and the building stock has been
assembled, and an innovative floorspace sub-model has been developed which represents the
property market in some detail. This makes it possible to measure energy use associated
with land uses, and to evaluate the effects of planning policies on the character of the
urban building stock.
Naples
Naples, located on the sea, is the largest
city of the southern part of Italy and the capital of the region. The study area results
in nearly a hundred municipalities; a total of more than three million inhabitants; and a
land area of more than 1,250 km2. It covers the metropolitan region and
virtually includes all commuting flows to and from the city.
Most of the land in the study area is
devoted to agriculture. Part of the industrial activities are concentrated in Naples
(freight port, oil refineries etc.) while some others are spread across the province
(shipbuilding, car industries, electronic components, etc.). A huge steel plant, one of
the largest of the country, was located within Naples and was closed in the early 1990s. A
rehabilitation plan is being implemented and the area is expected to be radically
transformed in the next years. The population density is remarkably high in the whole area
(the provincial average is 2 575 inhabitants/m2 with peaks of more than 15 000
in some of neighbouring towns) and the average household size in City 6 is 3.2 persons
which is the highest figure among the largest cities of the country.
The city suffers from road traffic
congestion, even though the rail network in the study area is quite dense, and air quality
is not very good. Traffic noise is a real issue (values are above the average for the 100
largest cities of the country), also because of the canyon effect due to the
typical shape of the buildings in the oldest parts of the area.
The local economy suffers from the general
problems of this part of the country; namely, high unemployment rates, crime, and
inefficiencies of the public administration. During the last years, the Municipality has
been trying to encourage private investments from other regions of Italy as well as from
abroad with the aim to boost the local economy, with a special emphasis on tourist
volumes. As a consequence, many efforts of the Administration have been devoted to a
general improvement of the quality of the urban environment.
Important initiatives have been conducted by
the Urban Planning Department - which put forward different proposals for the upgrading of
peripheral and central areas of the city - and by the Transport Department which launched
the Transport Plan of the metropolitan area. Long term strategies favoured by the local
transport Department would be strongly orientated toward a better use of the existing
dense rail transport network (through the operating and fare integration and the
construction of new interchange nodes and Park&ride schemes), a more efficient use of
resources in the public transport sector (for example the city is testing a new system of
collective-taxi), the introduction of regulatory policies (park pricing), etc.
The Model
The integrated transport/land-use model was
implemented as quantitative support to the Master Transport Plan and the metropolitan
area. The production/consumption matrix, at the base of the economic land-use model (39
land use zones), was divided into seven sectors: agriculture, heavy industry, light
industry, wholesale, retail sale, education, public and private services, banking and
insurance. The population was split into five household categories by the socio-economic
characteristics of the household head and the supply of area for residential use was
divided into public and private housing.
The transport model (180 transport zones)
includes a very detailed multimodal network of the urban area and a more aggregate network
of the metropolitan area (still including an accurate description of the railway network
of the whole province). The transport demand provided five types of journeys: work (high
and low-income); study; shopping; and other purposes and five transport modes: walking;
two-wheels; car; bus; and rail/underground (including park&ride).
Vicenza
Vicenza, located in the in the north-east
part of Italy, is a small city which because of its rich architectural heritage has a high
amenity value. It is typical of the rich historic cities of the country that are
attractive for people to live and to visit as tourists. The municipality (some 100.000
inhabitants) is the main town of a very dynamic industrial area of 650.000 inhabitants, in
the core of one of the richest regions of the country. The city is located along the
east-west multimodal corridor which connects two important metropolitan areas : a highly
congested motorway and a railway line (also congested) whose capacity will be doubled in
the next future (the line is part of the planned high speed network).
While the total population of the city was
almost stable in the last years, households have moved from the historical centre to the
peripheral areas. A similar negative trend has been observed for industry and retail
employees in the historical centre, counter-balanced by a higher growth in the service
sector.
Vicenza is under substantial development and
traffic pressures, which threaten its sensitive environment. Private car is the main mode
of transport (44% of the internal trips and 64% of trips entering in the city), while
public transport accounts for 12% of urban trips and 36% of trips entering from the
surrounding area. A significant role is then played by cycles and motorbikes (31% of the
internal trips), but their share is subject to variations according to the season and the
weather conditions and surveys confirm that their alternative mode is car and not public
transport. Road congestion mainly occurs along the main road corridors that access to the
city and on the urban ring. In general terms the public transport network offer a good
level of service for passengers entering to the city centre, including also a
park&ride service with minibuses
Specific attention is paid by the local
authorities to tourist flows, which are very important for the economy of Vicenza.
Tourists are attracted by the city, as well as by the surrounding areas and the city is
only at 60 kilometres from the sea.
The objectives of long term strategies of
the Administration include the construction of a light rail system across the historic
centre (it was designed in the Transport Plan, but has never been definitely approved by
the Administration), the reduction of emissions from transport and other sources, the
reduction of free car-park spaces, the reorganisation of circulation schemes in the
historic centre in order to discourage the private car transit traffic, the improvement of
the cycling network (with the creation of lanes to separate cycles for road traffic)
together with traffic calming measures, etc.
The Model
The integrated land use-transport model was
applied for the Master Traffic Plan of the city and refers to the whole province for a
total of 27 land use zones and 115 transport zones.
The model represents the location of 3
household types (i.e. managerial and professional, non-manual and manual), 8 types of
economic activities (i.e. agriculture, industry, construction, trade, primary and
secondary school education, public administration, public and private services) and 4
types land/floorspace (agricultural, industrial, business-shopping and residential). The
interaction between all these factors is represented by variable input-output
coefficients. The transport model simulates the effects of detailed transport design on
the urban road network and also deals with local parking supply. It is able to reproduce
demand reaction to regulatory/pricing policies and provision of park and ride facilities
for minibuses in the central area.
Bilbao
Bilbao Metropolitan Area includes 16
municipalities with a total of 1.000.000 inhabitants. Up to the 70's, Bilbao was a city of
a high level economic activity, related basically to the heavy industry (iron mines, steel
industry, shipyard, etc...). During the crisis of the iron and steel industry Bilbao was
involved in a serious decline process, from which it is emerging thanks to a set of long
term strategies, with a wide ranging economic, social environmental and urban scope.
Within the economic field, Bilbao has two
major objectives: to reconvert its industrial sector on one hand, and on the other, to
turn to a regional service centre. The action undertaken for enhancing the creation of new
industries and a more efficient use of resources improving competitiveness and employment
is concentrated basically on the development of innovative industrial areas. Within the
services, the biggest efforts are taking place in the transport field (enlargement of the
Port, new Airport, Intermodal Centres for passenger and freights) as well as in the
Culture (Museum, Conferences Centre). In the social field, the major problem which the
city is facing concerns the lack of employment, with an unemployment rate of 35% in the
areas most affected by the industrial crisis. The incorporation of this ceasing labour
force into the emerging economic sectors is slowly taking place, due to an ambitious
professional training plan, which affects the redefinition of the medium education and the
special plans of retraining of the long time unemployees.
Up to the 70's the industrial development
had great priority over environmental issues which were strongly neglected. At the
present, the city faces serious soil, water and air pollution; therefore public
administrations are nowadays seriously concerned about supporting environment and energy
polices for meeting European environmental objectives. In this sense, there are several
plans running aimed at reducing mobile and fixed emission sources, with different levels
of efficiency, and for the restoration of natural and artificial degraded zones. A
convincing evidence that turning the former industrial city into an Eco-city is a great
challenge that policymakers are facing.
The urban problems are strictly related to
the before mentioned features. Amongst others, the following action plans incorporated to
the planning instruments could be mentioned: to incorporate industrial abandoned soils to
the urban structure, to increase the present urban quality, to enhance urban expanding
zones by improving their accessibility, to reduce the negative effects of private
transport furthering the public transport an the intermodality. Most of the above
mentioned long term strategies will be analysed and evaluated during this project.
The Model
The integrated transport /land-use model
comprises 56 internal zones and 7 external zones, which cover the metropolitan area. The
metropolitan activities are described using the following factors: 6 factors for activity
sectors, 4 factors for socio-economic groups, land use factors and trip factors. The
transport model includes a very detailed multimodal network of the urban area including
the public transport lines, road and rail network, airport, port etc. The transport demand
comprises different types of journeys by car ownership, freight and the following five
transport modes: walking, car (including park&ride), bus, rail/underground, trucks.
The model has been applied for several land
use studies. The most recent transport studies are related to the new underground line,
the evaluation of the Metropolitan Road Plan and the Intermodal Station.
Brussels
Brussels is a metropolitan
area of about 2.7 million inhabitants. Its central part, called « the
Region », is an important administrative capital, grouping a little less than 1
million inhabitants. The Region has lost population for 30 years, while economic
activities – with a rather stable total number of jobs - were undergoing an important
mutation: strong decline of industrial and heavy tertiary activities and strong growth of
administrative functions. The result of this evolution is an increase of the number of
daily commuters and traffic congestion.
The spatial structure of
Brussels is quite typical. An old industrial axis along a canal surrounded by poor
neighbourhoods of different ethnic communities with very few green spaces makes its way
through the whole city, cutting it in two parts. Neglected during decades this area slowly
begins to be renovated. On the other hand, the strong increase of administrative functions
introduced a speculative pressure on higher status neighbourhoods making the cost of
living increase. Outmigration of middle class families to the suburbs encouraged urban
sprawl, commuting by car and congestion. The decline of the population of the region and
the lowering of its average income increases the scarcity of the resources essentially
based on income taxes of residents while a lot of public works must be done to adapt the
Region to its new important administrative functions.
One of the major goals of
the local Development Plan is to reinforce the residential attractivity of the capital by
all means. Since the efficiency of the Public transport networks is too low, the
authorities have decided to put in operation what could be called a « regional
metro » on the existing railway tracks, linking the suburbs to the central part of
the metropolitan area.
Several transport policies
have been already tested to explore the possibilities of counterbalancing the accelerating
effect of the regional metro on the outmigration of households. Several important policies
should still be tested and the optimal policy cocktail found, with particular emphasis
given to environmental and residential attractivity criteria. Furthermore the exploration
of these new policy impacts will help negotiations with the surrounding Regions for the
financing of the future regional metro. The Client Partner in the present project is
expecting a demonstration of the adequacy of a complex long-term strategy to reach the
basic development goals.
The Model
A land-use/transport
model has been built with 134 zones, covering the entire metropolitan area. The model is
devoted to public (train, metro, bus) and private person traffic. It has been used in
several studies for federal, regional and local transport authorities for the purpose of
policy testing. The model has been designed to assess the major impacts of the future
regional metro on households and induced activities migrations and on modal choice of
people.
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