National sustainable transport planning – governance with MCDA?

National sustainable transport planning – governance with MCDA?Anders Vestergaard Jensen1, Steen Leleur1 and Joe Zietsman2

1Technical University of Denmark2Texas A&M University

09-04-2023Anders Vestergaard Jensen2 DTU Transport, Technical University of Denmark

Agenda• Research context

– SUSTAIN research project– Sustainability and sustainable planning– Sustainability assessment

• Sustainability and transport planning– Two ‘national’ approaches (The UK and Switzerland)

• Case example– Railway corridor in the Baltic region


SUSTAINABILITY


SUSTAIN project

• Research objectives:

• How can the concept of sustainability be operationalised and transformed into strategic performance measures for national transport planning?

• How can these types of knowledge about organisational forms and planning processes contribute to the achievement of such sustainability measures?

• And how can these new types of knowledge be built into new model-based planning tools that can help advance the strategic planning in the desired sustainable direction?


Deliberate, knowledge-based and strategic endeavours to integrate sustainability principles, criteria and goals in the development, management, regulation and assessment of nationally significant transport systems and services

Three interlinked dimensions:* Normative* Analytic* Governance

National sustainable transport planning


Transition towards sustainability – three dimensions

Dimensions Generic meaning National transport planning context

Normative The fundamental ethical principles and value-orientations of sustainability

What sustainable transport is, what the pillars and principles imply in transport and which goals to pursue

Analytic Determine whether an action is sustainable or not

Knowledge on consequences for sustainability of possible interventions, e.g. infrastructure and transport service projects

Governance The system of governance that should promote and implement changes towards sustainability

Organisational forms in the transport sector, the set-up of government institutions and transport planning and implementation procedures to promote sustainability


The use of MCDA to governThe quality of policy processes and policy outcomes comprises multiple attributes: not only efficiency and effectiveness, but also:

– Legitimacy– Democratic character– Fairness– Transparency– Accountability

and other values come into play, and may even conflict with each other (Thissen and Walker, 2013).

MCDA to support this?


Sustainability• Wide acceptance of the importance of sustainability

– However, less agreement on how to measure and assess it– Also differences in how sustainability is defined

Congestion

Traffic safety


Sustainability:Multiple objectives

• Weak/strong sustainability: Trade-offs, minimum requirements• Governance has been suggested to be added as the fourth

dimension

SocialEconomic

Environmental

Sustainability


Sustainability assessment (SA) and MCDA• Indicator based comparativ sustainability assessment

– By the use of MCDA and planning workshops (engagement of stakeholders)

• The goal for some assessmenst (e.g. EIA) has been to ensure conditions were not made worse because of a development.

– For SA the focused is on the principles of sustainability, ensuring developments provide maximum benefits

– Thresholds for indicators to be implemented and managed by MCDA

• SA should focus (in theory) on the longer term.– In practice, however, short term imperatives are driven by powerfull

economic and political interests and difficult to resist– A challenge for MCDA – stakeholders representing the future

generations?


MCDA and sustainability assessment

MCDA

”One goal – one instrument” is inadequate

Increasing sustainable consideration


SUSTAINABILITY, MCDA AND TRANSPORT PLANNING


Transport and sustainability (Banister 2012)

Established convention – Unsustainable Transport Low carbon mobility – Sustainable Transport

Premised on abundant supplies of energy that can be reduced through greater efficiency in use

Premised on need to reduce all resource consumption in transport – particularly oil

Technological solutions to low carbon mobility Technology important, but societal change needed

Market mechanisms can lead to low carbon futures High transport costs politically difficult to implement

Car ownership is still seen as desirable – and should be accommodated in cities and more widely

New forms of ownership required – sharing, leasing, renting – parking space reduced in cities

Accepts high levels of mobility and the quantity of travel, as measured by speed and distance travelled

Focus on accessibility and the quality of travel – need to reduce travel speeds and distances

Segregation of space between motorised traffic and other use of street space

Street space seen as a common resource that should be used flexibly for many different purposes

Concerns over the main mode of transport rather than the total journey

Concern over door-to-door travel, and the entire journey experience

Travel time seen as ‘wasted’ time – to be minimised Travel time as having a positive value

Travel decisions seen as choices – rationality Travel decisions as complex assemblages

Accepts trends – transport as a short term issue Vision about the desired city over the longer term

Plans and constructs forecasts of likely demand Pathways towards low carbon mobility and needs

Social and environmental costs valued at less than economic costs

All three pillars of sustainability important – also political and public acceptability

Transport instrumental in regeneration and growth Transport not instrumental – but supportive


National transport planning & MCDA• UK: New Approach to Appraisal (NATA)

– The cost-benefit analysis is complemented by assessments of impacts that are described qualitatively or that can be quantified, but not monetised


Examples of national sustainable planning:Switzerland• Switzerland

– Sustainable development strategies since 1997– Currently the fourth: 2012-2015– Transport infrastructure projects are subject systematically to a

sustainability assessment while still at the planning stage


Presentation of results


An example of CBA and MCDA used by the Swiss government

Applicability of major assessment methods

Assessment method Description ApplicationComparative value analysis (CVA)

Example of MCDA

Impacts are scores (e.g. -3 to +3). No weighting or aggregation

Complex cases where unquantifiable or difficult quantify values are of importance

Utility analysis (UA)

Example of MCDA

Indicators values (impacts) are rated on a uniform scale (e.g. 0-100), impacts are weigthed, points totals and weightings are combined into a single utility value.

In complex decision-making situations where unquantifiable or difficult quantify values are of importance and weighting is useful.

Cost-impact analysis (CIA)Cost-effective analysis (CEA)

Impacts are related to costs (how much ”impact” per monetary unit). No aggregation, weighting or monetarization.

All impacts can be measured. No indification of efficiency. Applied where monetarization of utility components is not possible/desirable.

Cost-benefit analysis (CBA) Monetary values for target measures fulfil the weighting function (no weighting and determination of utility values), different impacts can be compared directly (macro/microeconomic).

Not suitable as sole method for complex multidimensional assessment processes such as sustainability assessmensts (rather as supplement). Information value of monetized values may be limited

Swiss government (2004) Sustainability assessment


RAIL BALTICA CASE STUDY


SUSTAIN Appraisal Framework (SAF)Example of use



Two scenarios

Business as usual Sustainable developmentImproved rail lines will result in more efficient land-bound connections between the Baltic and the Nordic countries (particularly Finland) and in the long run potentially further to Central Asia. Improved rail links will benefit the environment, contribute to alleviate congestion on the European road network, increase the accessibility of the Baltic States and potentially improve conditions for accelerated regional development in the countries involved. A good and cost-effective transport system is a pre-condition for maintaining high economic growth and improving the European integration. There exists a common belief that a transition to ‘sustainable’ transport modes is possible, while at the same time meeting the indicated stated by transport forecasts.

The world’s natural resources are limited, and there is a realisation that alternative energy sources cannot replace the fossil fuels to maintain the same standards as we have previously known. This means that both individual and freight transport must be based on more resource efficient modes. Concerning private transportation, mobility is now more of a luxurious good than a matter of course. Instead planning is striving for accessibility to the necessary facilities. The big cities are becoming polycentric and more medium-sized cities are emerging. Due to the changed transportation pattern, there is a need to include and connect as many as possible of these cities in the sustainable transport corridors.


Total scores – two scenarios

Alt. 1

Alt. 2

Alt. 3

Alt. 4

0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7

0.64

0.12

0.11

0.13

0.30

0.20

0.18

0.32

SDBAU

Total score


Sensitivity of criteria weights

0.1 0.15 0.2 0.25 0.3 0.35 0.4 0.450

0.05

0.1

0.15

0.2

0.25

0.3

0.35

0.4

0.45

0.5Sustainable development

Alt. 1

Alt. 2

Alt. 3

Alt. 4

Total score

Rela

tive f

requency


Presenting the results• Impacts on the three dimensions of sustainability must be clearly

apparent

• Uncertainties and risks should be clearly expressed

• Qualitative information must remain recognizable and receive equal emphasis as quantitative information

• The most important conflicting goals between individual criteria must be apparent. An aggregate presentation cannot replace a presentation at level of individual criteria

• Optimization opportunities should be presented and comparison of variants should be possible

• The appropriateness of the criteria set used in relation to the project should be critically examined


Strengths and difficulties of MCDA for governance

Strenghts Difficulties

Learning process, stimulates discussions, common understanding

Openness to divergent values and opinions

Capability to tackle qualitative and intangible factors

Accountability (sytematic, transparent)

Conflict resolution – political compromise

Broad stakeholder participation

Helps legitimise decision makers’ behaviour

Preferences revealed in a more direct and practical way

Technical complexity, e.g. elicitation of parameters

Choice of stakeholders and timing of their participation

Difficult inter-comparison of case studies

Decisions on the degree of simplification of the decision content

Potentially time consuming process

Experts’ reluctance to share their knowledge/power

On a higher decision level, experts are more suspicious of new instruments

Information bias from certain stakeholder groups to strenghten their power.

Gamper CD and Turcanu C (2007) On the governmental use of multi-criteria analysis. Ecological Economics 62(2): 298-307.


An appraisal framework in progress…

• ”One goal – one instrument” is inadequate

• Well developed indicator systems to be used

• Challenges:

• Decide on a national understanding of sustainability

• Increased integration between systems and sectors

• Sustainability of transport is difficult to measure precisely due to the interconnectedness between transport and other systems

• How to represent the future generation in evaluation?

• Which MCDA methods are most usefull?

• Research will continue to develop and apply a framework for sustainable appraisal in the context of national transport planning


Thank you…www.transport.dtu.dk/sustain