Transport planning trends : the Hobart experience

Transport planning has been under criticism, and has changed in nature and approach since the 1960's. This thesis attempts to describe these changes and relate the Hobart experience to them. The thesis is arranged in three chapters. Chapter 1, the Introduction, documents the increasing recognition of the interactions between the transport system and other elements of the urban environment, a recognition that is reflected in the changes in transport planning described in Chapters 2 and 3. In Chapter 2 the view is documented that the engineering dominated transportation study approach has recently been replaced by a more comprehensive approach to transport planning. The demand orientation has been (or is in the process of being) replaced by an approach that recognises supply limitations and the environmental and social implications of transport decisions. It is proposed that transport planning should be concerned with environmental and social goals rather than impacts, and four planning themes are introduced. These are: 1. Optimum accessibility to opportunity and resources for all sections of society while promoting a land use configuration consistent with these and other community aims. 2. A transport system that does not impinge upon the perceived positive aspects of the urban environment and is instrumental towards enhancing them. 3. The means for all sections of society to satisfy their transport needs whether or not they have the use of a private motor vehicle. 4. A transport system that makes good use of existing resources and can adapt to meet demands imposed by changing resource availabilities. Chapter 3 is concerned with the Hobart experience, and after reviewing the relevant publications five watersheds in the development of transport planning in Hobart are identified: - The Hobart Area\Transportation Study 1964. - The Hobart Transportation Revision 1970. - The Review of Northside Freeway 1972. - The considerations of the Traffic Management Conunittee 1977. - The Derwent Region Transportation Study 1978-79. The 1964 study was typical of the transportation study genre and one of the first to be conducted in Australia. The 1970 Revision recognised the existence of associated issues: the cracks were beginning to appear in the functional approach. The Northside Freeway Review contained investigations of environmental and social impacts of freeway alternatives. The organisation of low cost changes to the transport system within the current policy framework termed Transportation Systems Management was illustrated in Hobart by the considerations and recommendations of the Traffic Management Committee1977 although admittedly this was only in response to a particular conceived problem (traffic congestion after the reopening of·the Tasman Bridge). Since the Derwent Region Transportation Study has not yet been completed it is impossible to comment on anything other than the study specification. This indicates a complete change in approach and the themes proposed in Chapter 2 are shown to be represented in the Derwent Region Transportation Study. It may well be that as it was in 1964 in 1979 transport planning in Hobart will be at the forefront of the development of transport planning in Australia. Thus the material presented in Chapter 3 including evidence of the effect of accessibility on residential development of the destruction of low cost housing of the ignored implications of generating and meeting parking demand is an illustration that the evolution of transport planning in Hobart has been a reflection of the trends described in Chapter 2. The explicit adoption of the four themes is proposed as a recognition of the role of transport planning in environmental management."