Congestion, contagion, and cars: how Covid-19 could finally help us reduce traffic for goodCovid-19 has transformed our lifestyles, not least in the way we travel. Yet among the negative effects of the lockdown and social distancing, it has massively reduced traffic, improving air quality and given us a shot at decarbonising transport. But how can we maintain these positive changes beyond the crisis, without harming our transport system or our economy?

Shuttered shops, empty offices, and eerily quiet streets: the first few weeks of lockdown were unforgettable. Almost overnight, the whole nation became part of an unanticipated social experiment, whose outcomes were uncertain. Yet while the negative effects of lockdown were obvious, there were also some silver linings. As the traffic vanished and road usage plummeted, the air became clearer - and along with it, so did one especially positive consequence of the lockdown. Less traffic means less air pollution, benefitting our immediate health and the long-term future of the entire planet. But lockdown won’t last forever, and already traffic is growing. So how can we capitalise on this unexpected clean air boon, and transform the way we travel for good?

The absence of traffic was one of the most notable corollaries of Covid-19. Yet it had two key outcomes. The first is to do with local air quality, which improved in tandem with the reduction in carbon emissions. Air pollution has been linked to premature deaths – Public Health England has estimated that up to 36,000 deaths per year in the UK can be attributed to long-term exposure to poor air quality - as well as cognitive decline and a range of debilitating diseases, curtailing both the length and quality of life.

Given that the air pollution in our major cities exceeds the legal limits set by the EU, and that its impairment of respiration increases the risks associated with Covid-19, it’s clear that the problem is very urgent and needs addressing immediately. Thankfully, clean air zones are growing in number and size, and the political willpower to introduce traffic controls is becoming more evident.

However, the second consequence of pollution is even harder to grapple with. Carbon dioxide emissions contribute to the greenhouse effect, gradually raising temperatures and destabilising the delicate balance of the Earth’s climate. And although the carbon footprint of business and residential is improving, transport is proving harder to solve. Data from BEIS shows that the amount of carbon contributed by traffic isn’t dropping. The Department of Transport’s ‘Decarbonising Transport: Setting the Challenge’ has boldly suggested radical solutions, endorsing initiatives ranging from hydrogen-powered vehicles to new propulsion technologies, but it has also admitted a fundamental truth that has until now been hard to state: we must simply use our cars less.

Of carbon and CovidThat’s where Covid-19 could play an important role. For the first time, the government has limited the public’s ability to travel freely, forcing all of us to consider ‘Is this journey really necessary?’ This behaviour, which could simply be described as ‘non-travel’, can be an important component of Britain’s decarbonisation strategy. It goes hand in hand with the rise in walking and cycling for local journeys. As well as benefiting the nation’s health, re-establishing cycling and walking as the go-to option for shorter trips can have powerful long-term effects: fewer cars on the road, less crowding on public transport, and cleaner air.

If we are to maintain these habits, we must entrench some associated social behaviours. For instance, most businesses have replaced face-to-face meetings with video calling technologies. Should the majority of these meetings can remain in cyberspace beyond the lockdown, the knock-on effect on the roads will be significant. Business can still happen, but without such a burden on our transport system - or our air, or our planet. We also have the opportunity to reimagine how we travel for shopping, leisure, holidays and meeting with friends.

International travel restrictions could mean a potential boom in staycations this summer, but how do we support the long-term vitality of UK tourism, and how can we promote sustainable travel to, from and within leisure destinations?

For those who still need to get to work, digital tools can have a positive impact. We can use data and digital techniques to empower users to time their journeys more intelligently. If commuters know when it is best to use public transport, their behaviour can help to reduce crowding by staggering transport usage. Right now, people are avoiding public

transport, but this can’t go on forever. Eventually it will re-emerge, especially if we want to prevent people from turning to private cars instead. To maintain safety, we must consider the protocols. How could social distancing work in a train station, reducing dwell time and creating physical and social structures to maintain its safety? Adapting technology and infrastructure can give the public confidence to continue using public transport, avoiding a dangerous backslide to private motor vehicles while minimising infection rates.

As the traffic vanished and road usage plummeted, the air became clearer - and along with it, so did one especially positive consequence of the lockdown - less air pollution.

Think different? Travel differentMore important is the associated cultural change. We’ve had digital tools such as video calling for many years, yet it is only with the push from Covid-19 that businesses have really begun to embrace them. Whereas many organisations were reluctant to promote remote working, favouring face-to-face interactions over digital, the culture is shifting. Businesses have realised the value of video calling and are empowering employees to work more creatively from home. Already, many organisations have stated that more remote working is here to stay. This will have significant implications for productivity and business strategy, giving birth to new industries and requiring the re-purposing of office space. These structural effects could create profound consequences for travel demand and congestion in urban areas. If most people no longer need to be close to their offices, the reduction in commuting - and its associated problems - could be dramatic.

This behavioural shift brings an enormous opportunity to improve social organisation. A lot of travel involves moving from where you live to a facility you need: shops, a leisure facility, or a hub of some sort. Social distancing and the encouragement of non-travel are recalibrating the balance between transport and the physical infrastructure of the built environment. People are beginning to rethink their relationship to their neighbourhoods: the discouragement on long-distance travel has forced them to find local solutions, reducing the need for transport. The challenge is to maintain the benefits of this behaviour as we reopen from the lockdown, recovering and reimagining our future transport system.

Re-imagining the system

To maximise this, we must think holistically, considering our localities in the round. Regional planning must consider the interactions between where people live, work, and socialise, and how people interact between them. Understanding these relationships is vital to reshaping people’s behaviour. If we can ensure that nearly everything a person could need is within 15 minutes of their front door, we can permanently alter their transport habits. But we can only achieve this by thinking about all the elements together: transport, the environment, and communication, coexisting as a sustainable system.

If we get this right, the implications are vast. The decisions made during the next four months will influence the direction our country takes for the next decade and beyond: how we work, how we move about, and our attitude towards public and private transport and goods. Covid-19 has exposed our current systems’ lack of resilience: despite the National Strategic Risk Assessment, we were too dependent on behaviours that could not stand the test of the pandemic. It’s forcing us to ask how we will become more resilient and healthier as a society, in transport modes and beyond.

We’ve had digital tools such as video calling for many years, yet it is only with the push from Covid-19 that businesses have really begun to embrace them.

Covid-19 has exposed our current systems’ lack of resilience: despite the National Strategic Risk Assessment, we were too dependent on behaviours that could not stand the test of the pandemic.

This is a pivotal moment and an opportunity for the move to net zero, so we can’t afford to ‘waste a good crisis’.

Big crisis, better placesIt’s not about belt-tightening. It’s about reimagining how our places work and how they are connected, so that they’re more fit for human activity and ultimately flourishing in the long-term for our population as a whole. That means they must be sustainable, smart, and inclusive. If we replace in-person meetings with digital tools, it’s vital that everyone has access to them. If public transport is more tightly regulated because of Covid-19, then we must do it sensitively, so that those who must use public transport can do so safely and without prejudice. And if we restrict car use in cities, we should allow its citizens to shape the space vacated by private vehicles.

This is a pivotal moment and an opportunity for the move to net zero, so we can’t afford to ‘waste a good crisis’. Plus we now have the benefit of intelligent data analytics to understand what’s happened during Covid-19 and the potential changes that could happen as we move out of lockdown, into reopening, recovery and eventual reimagining of our transport system. Safer streets, cleaner air, lower carbon and a fairer, more liveable city for all - the Covid-19 cloud could have a magical silver lining. But we must plan now to make the benefits last.