Blog | 26 August 2015
Subsidies in Aviation: The elusive flight towards fair competition
Subsidies in aviation are almost as old as air transport itself. Most countries
have provided public funding to some parts of their
aviation value chains.
In a new blog post, ITF aviation expert
Alain Lumbroso explores the issue and proposes
three measures to tackle subsidies and move towards fair competition.
Statistics Brief | 20 July 2015
Investment in Inland Transport Infrastructure at Record Low
The
latest ITF Statistics Brief shows that the continued
economic crisis has had an impact on transport
infrastructure investment:
- Investment in inland transport infrastructure, as
a share of GDP, has declined from a peak in 2009 to
a record low (0.8%) in the OECD while the volume of
investment has fallen back to 1995 levels.
- Investment levels in Central and Eastern European
countries have nearly halved since 2009 in real
terms, accounting for 1.0% of GDP in 2013 (compared
with 1.9% in 2009).
- Western European and North American economies invest increasingly in rail while in Central and Eastern European countries the focus continues to be on roads.
Aviation | 2 July 2015
ITF review finds UK Airports Commission’s scenarios for future airport expansion robust
The forecasts and scenarios for future growth of air passenger demand developed by the UK Airports Commission with regard to the expansion of Heathrow or Gatwick airports are appropriate and robust. This is the key finding of the new study “Forecasting Airport Demand: Review of UK Airports Commission Forecasts and Scenarios” produced by the International Transport Forum (ITF). The Airports Commission had asked the ITF for an external view on its forecasting models and scenarios in preparation for its final report. The Commission’s final report, published on 1 July, recommends a third runway at Heathrow airport as the best option for expanding airport capacity within the London area. The ITF review finds the approach followed by the Airports Commission to estimate future demand to
be “the best available” and “very well adapted” to modelling the London airports system.
Aviation | 25 June 2015
ICAO and ITF sign co-operation agreement
The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) and the International Transport Forum (ITF) at the OECD will collaborate in working towards the sustainable development of air transport. A framework to engage in joint research and events as well as exchange of information and of staff was signed by both organisations on 23 June in Montreal.
The agreement identifies topics such as international air transport liberalisation, security and facilitation of travellers, or aviation infrastructure investment as areas for co-operation between ICAO and ITF.
Building on existing co-operation to better forecast air passenger flows and their impacts, both organisations will work together on statistics methodology and data aggregation, data analysis and forecasting and economic studies on the development of air transport. Other potential areas for joint initiatives are crisis management, sustainable development and climate change mitigation as well as the promotion of compatible regulatory approaches towards international air transport among states. ICAO and ITF will accord each other observer status at their meetings. The collaboration will extend over an initial period of three years.
“This collaboration will provide added value for both organisations and for their member countries”, said ITF Secretary-General José Viegas. “It will help strengthen ITF’s understanding of the aviation sector. And it will help us provide ICAO with additional policy perspectives that can also include lessons from other transport modes.”
Photo: José Viegas, ITF Secretary-General and ICAO
Council President Dr. Olumuyiwa Benard Aliu sign the
agreement at ICAO Headquarters in Montreal, Canada
on 23 June 2015.
Road Transport | 22 June 2015
Transport ministers approve Quality Charter for road freight
A Quality Charter for international road haulage operations has been approved by the transport ministers of the
ITF European member countries.
The Quality Charter establishes qualification standards for companies, managers and drivers and will enter into force on 1 January 2016. It applies to pan-European road haulage operations under the Multilateral Quota system established in 1974 by the European Conference of Ministers of Transport (ECMT), which evolved into the International Transport Forum (ITF) in 2006.
In a statement issued with the approval of the Quality Charter, ministers of the European member countries of the International Transport Forum “commit to engage their efforts towards having the provisions of the Charter applied to all international transport operations carried under the ECMT Multilateral Quota as of 1 January 2018.”
José Viegas, Secretary-General of the International Transport Forum, which manages the Multilateral Quota system, said: “The approval of the Quality Charter is a major step towards harmonisation of conditions in the pan-European road freight transport market. The Charter, alongside the incitation mechanisms already in place for adoption of the most technologically advanced trucks, will establish the Multilateral Quota system as a symbol of quality, safety and environmental standards in road transport.”
The approval of the Quality Charter completes longstanding work by the ITF on defining and promoting the highest standards for freight transport operators, managers and drivers at Pan-European level.
The ITF will monitor the implementation of the provisions of the Quality Charter by the member countries through its European Road Transport Group. It will also define follow-up actions for the further development of the Multilateral Quota system.
Annual Summit | 02 June 2015
Argentina, Israel and Morocco join ITF
The International Transport Forum at the OECD has three new member countries. Argentina, Israel and Morocco were unanimously accepted into the organisation by its top decision-making body, the Council of Ministers of Transport, at the ITF Summit in Germany on 28 May. The decision takes the number of ITF member countries to 57.
Morocco is the ITF’s first full member on the African continent. Previously, Morocco was an observer country since the creation of ITF in 2006. “Morocco’s accession will be a plus for the Forum. It is also a positive development for Morocco”, said Mohamed Najib Boulif, Morocco’s Deputy Minister of Transport (pictured, right). “The geostrategic position of Morocco in the Mediterranean, in Africa, in the MENA region: these are all strategic assets for Morocco’s participation.”
Israel joins the ITF after becoming a member of the Organisation of Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) in 2010. “Israel is keen to contribute to the work of the ITF, and to be inspired by it”, said Moshe Kamhi of Israel’s delegation to the OECD on occasion of Israel’s accession.
Argentina is the second ITF member country from South America, following the accession of Chile in 2012. Argentina has been actively involved with the ITF’s permanent working group on road safety (known as IRTAD) since 2009. It has been a leading force in establishing the Ibero-American Road Safety Observatory (OISEVI), for which IRTAD operates a Spanish-language database with road crash information.
The Hon. Simon Bridges (pictured, centre), minister of transport of New Zealand, the 2015 ITF presidency country, said: “New Zealand welcomes Morocco, Argentina and Israel to the International Transport Forum. The expanded membership of the ITF promises the opportunity to promote an increasingly global outlook for the work of the ITF.”
Corporate Partnership
Board Report | 23 April 2015
How shared self-driving cars could change city
traffic
What if all trips in a city were carried out by a fleet of self-driving cars shared by users? This study explores the potential outcomes of such a radical upgrade in an urban mobility system. It concludes that up to 9 out of 10 conventional cars could become redundant under certain circumstances. Vast amounts of public space would be freed for other uses in such a scenario. However, the total volume of travel increases in most scenarios and the net benefit of such an urban mobility system upgrade decisively depends on the choice of vehicle type, the level of penetration and the availability of high-capacity public transport to complement the shared self-driving car fleet.
Roundtable | 08 April 2015
Mexican Logistics Roundtable Focuses on Performance Measurement
An ITF Roundtable on Logistics Development Strategies and Performance Measurement brought together international experts on 9-10 March in Queretaro, Mexico, to debate how best to improve the efficiency of logistics systems. The focus was on collecting data and developing performance indicators to support regulatory reform and achieve policy objectives.
Video presentations from the Roundtable are now available. A draft summary document is in preparation for release in
May 2015.
Annual Summit | 24
February 2015
Registration opens for 2015 Summit on "Transport, Trade and Tourism"
Invitations have been issued to decision makers in government and business, research and civil society for the International Transport Forum’s 2015 Summit on 27-29 May. More than 1000 key players from the transport, trade and tourism sectors are expected to join transport ministers from ITF’s 54 member countries for their Annual Summit in Leipzig, Germany.
Under the headline "Transport, Trade and Tourism: Mobility for a connected world" the Summit will debate policy issues linked to the interconnected nature of transport, trade and tourism: How should transport respond to shifting global trade flows? How can it prepare for shocks to supply chains, caused for instance by increasingly extreme weather as a result of climate change? How can the growth in global tourism be balanced with sustainability? And what can be done to improve the transport experience for tourists?
Taking place halfway between the UN Climate Change Summit in New York in September 2014 and the COP21 Conference on Climate Change in Paris at the end of November 2015, the ITF Summit will provide an important opportunity to align views on contributions of transport, trade and tourism to climate change mitigation in the run-up to COP21.
If you would like to receive an invitation to the International Transport Forum’s 2015 Summit,
please request it here.
Annual Summit | 12
February 2015
ITF holds annual Consultation Day with International Organisations
30
international transport stakeholder organisations
met at OECD headquarters in Paris on 12 February for the ITF's annual consultation day. This annual process is an important component of the preparations at ITF for the 2015 Summit on
"Transport, Trade and Tourism". The 2015 Summit will take place from 27-29 May in Leipzig, Germany, under the Presidency of New Zealand.
The consultation provided a concerted opportunity for stakeholders to provide input for the preparation of Summit sessions. Four break-out sessions focused on specific aspects regarding transport's role in facilitating global trade and international tourism, with a view to aligning an agenda that stakeholders want to bring to ministers in May.
The consultation also provided an opportunity
for partner organisations and the ITF secretariat
for an initial scoping of the 2016 Summit theme,
"Green and Inclusive Transport".
ITF Transport Outlook 2015
| 27 January 2015
Global trade: International freight transport to quadruple by 2050
Shifting trade patterns increase transport distances by 12%, North Pacific surpasses North Atlantic as main trading route.
In the face of shifting global trade patterns, international freight transport volumes will grow more than fourfold (factor 4.3) by 2050. Average transport distance across all modes will increase 12%.
- As a result, CO2 emissions from freight transport will grow by 290% by 2050. Freight will replace passenger traffic as main source of
CO2 emissions from surface transport.
- The North Pacific route will surpass the North Atlantic as the world’s most busy trading corridor in terms of freight volume (in tonne-km), growing 100 percentage points faster than the North Atlantic. The Indian Ocean corridor will see large growth, with freight volume quadrupling.
- Intra-African (+715%) and intra-Asian (+403%) freight volumes will see particularly strong growth to 2050. Road transport will dominate here due to lack of other modes.
- The share of domestic transport of international freight flows, identified here for the first time, accounts for 10% of trade-related international freight, but 30% of
CO2 emissions. This is important: Domestic transport is shaped by national policies, less by international agreements.
These are some of the key findings of the ITF Transport Outlook 2015, presented
on 27 January 2015 at the OECD headquarters in Paris, France.
“The foreseeable increase in global freight represents an unprecedented challenge for the world’s transport systems“, said ITF Secretary-General José Viegas at the launch. “Increasing capacity constraints in transport can act as a brake on economic growth.”
Freight | 13 January 2015
ITF Researchers Win Award for New Modelling Tool
The
Best Paper Award in Freight Modelling has been
awarded to a paper written by three ITF experts by
the U.S. Transportation Research Board (TRB). Two of
the paper's authors, Jari Kauppila and Luis Martinez
received the award at the TRB's annual conference in
Washington, D.C. on 12 January.
The award-winning paper sets out a new modelling
tool which for the first time takes into account
location, changes in value/weight ratio for products
over time and reduction in "fixed costs" with
distance for projections for freight flows. The
model also allows estimation of the domestic link
for cargo from ports to economic centres including
freight performed by road or rail between ports and
consumption/production centres. According to the
scenarios based on the ITF freight model,
international freight volumes and CO2
emissions could grow by a factor of four by 2050.
Photo (l-r): Bruce Wang (Texas A&M University), Jari
Kauppila (ITF), Luis Martinez (ITF), Katie Turnbull
(Texas A&M Transportation Institute).
Aviation| 18
December 2014
Impacts of Expanding Airport Capacity on Competition and Connectivity
The
Airports Commission was set up by the Government of
the United Kingdom in 2012 to take an independent
look at the UK’s future airport capacity needs. It
has been tasked with setting out the nature, scale,
and timing of steps needed to maintain the UK’s
status as an international hub for aviation,
alongside recommendations for making better use of
the UK’s existing runway capacity by the end of 2013
and setting out recommendations on how to meet any
need for additional airport capacity in the longer
term by the summer of 2015.
In December 2013 the Commission published its Interim Report, which included a shortlist of three options for increasing the UK’s aviation capacity in the long term: two at Heathrow and one at Gatwick. To determine which alternative would provide the largest benefits to passengers, freight businesses and the UK economy overall it is important to understand how airlines are likely to respond to increased runway capacity.
This report summarises a quantitative analysis of the likely responses from airlines in all segments of the market building on a companion report that identifies the main drivers of airline behaviour and considers the possible influence of changes to existing business models and the introduction of new types of aircraft, such as the Boeing Dreamliner and Airbus A350.
Four sets of airline responses are modelled, two following expansion of Gatwick and two following expansion of Heathrow, to test outcomes under a range of scenarios for the overall development of the global aviation market. The analysis quantifies impacts on connectivity and potential benefits to the consumer through airline competition and relieving congestion at airports and reducing the associated economic rents.
This report is part of the International Transport Forum’s Country-Specific Policy Analysis (CSPA) series. These are topical studies on specific transport policy issues of concern to a country carried out by ITF on request.
Urban Mobility | 03
December 2014
New ITF Projections for Urban Mobility in China, India, Latin America
Released
Transport in the urban centres of emerging economies is becoming a major battleground for combatting climate change. Big cities in China, India and Latin America with over 500.000 inhabitants will more than double their share of world passenger transport emissions by 2050 to 20% (2010: 9%), if current urban transport policies remain unchanged. 38% of the total growth in world surface transport passenger emissions to 2050 will come from big cities in these three regions in such a business-as-usual scenario.
These new projections, released by the International Transport Forum (ITF) at the OECD for the COP20 climate change negotiations in Lima, Peru, highlight a critical choice for policy-makers: whether to pursue urbanisation based on public transport or on private transport with cars and two wheelers. Sustained policies that promote either private or public urban transport lead to very different mobility futures, as projections for modal shares in 2050 show (see chart):
In India,
- a private transport-oriented policy for cities would lead to two thirds (67%) of urban mobility being covered by car traffic, with motorised two- and three wheelers (17%, 5%) and public transport (11%) accounting for only a third;
- with pro-public transport policies, the share of buses and other public transport forms could be almost four times as high and reach 39% - practically on par with car travel (40%). Two and three-wheelers would cover 12% and 9% respectively.
In Latin America,
- a public transport-oriented policy would result in a 50% share for public transport, 44% for cars, and 7% for two-wheelers in big cities.
- private transport oriented policies would lead to an 82% share for cars, 11% for public transport, and 6% for two-wheelers.
In China,
- an urban policy with few new roads and stringent expansion in car ownership restrictions would lead to a 44% share for cars and a 34% for public transport; with two-wheelers taking 10%.
- In absence of these measures, cars would account for 78% of urban mobility, with two wheelers representing 13% and public transport only 9% of the modal split.
These alternative scenarios have profound impacts for the contribution of urban transport to global emissions that are detailed in the 2015 ITF Transport Outlook, of which chapter 4 containing the projection for China, India and Latin America was pre-released for the COP20 Lima climate change conference.
Road Safety | 06 November 2014
“The
best in the world”: Celebrating 25 years of IRTAD road safety
data
This week, the International Transport Forum marks the 25th anniversary of IRTAD. A household name in the road safety community, the IRTAD acronym stands for both
a database and for the only permanent working group of the ITF.
For 25 years, IRTAD has worked to improve traffic safety data, to enable more effective road safety strategies and save lives. Founded with 12 member countries as a database,
IRTAD soon also brought together road safety experts and statisticians from research institutes, national administrations, international organisations,
universities, automobile associations and car manufacturers. Today, IRTAD has 70 members from 35 countries.
Among the most impactful initiatives have been twinning projects, starting in 2008, to assist non-member countries in improving their national crash data systems. A successful twinning between
Argentina and Spain led to the creation in 2011 of the Ibero-American Road Safety Observatory (OISEVI), a co-operation platform for the directors for road safety from 18 Latin American and Caribbean countries. IRTAD supports OISEVI through the new IRTAD-LAC database.
Other important IRTAD outputs include the Road Safety Annual Report and international conferences.
“Far too many people are dying or being seriously injured in road crashes in the world. We’d like to bring these numbers down”, said IRTAD group chairman Fred Wegman. “For that we need evidence and data. It is very good to see how IRTAD has developed into a world leader when it comes to road safety data. I thank all of our members,
and this is also an invitation for others to join this network.”
Colleagues from partner organisations expressed their appreciation of the work done by IRTAD:
“The IRTAD group and database are a model of a multi-country effort”, said Etienne Krug,
Director at the World Health Organization (WHO), in a video message.
”Good policy making in road safety depends critically on data”, said David Ward, Director-General of the Global New Car Assessment Programme (Global NCAP). “And the kind of crash and accident data that IRTAD had developed over the past 25 years is simply the best in the world.”
Jean Todt, President of the Fédération Internationale de l’Automobile (FIA), added: “The IRTAD group has become a unique institution. Many countries now see IRTAD membership as an important goal to achieve.”
Saul Billingsley, Director General of the FIA Foundation, said: “IRTAD has a really important role to play, not only in the traditional OECD countries, but also in helping low and middle-income countries, who are struggling with very high road injury rates, to understand what their
problems are and how to solve them.”
Corporate Partnership
Board | 28 October 2014
ITF Corporate Partnership Board Projects Highlight Ways Forward on Looming Policy Issues
The findings of the first four projects launched by the ITF Corporate Partnership Board (CPB), the organisation’s platform for engaging with the private sector, were launched in Paris yesterday. The first round of projects provide input on a range of hot-button policy issues:
CPB projects are designed to enrich policy discussion with a business perspective. They are launched in areas where CPB member companies identify an emerging issue in transport policy or an innovation challenge to the transport system.
Led by the ITF, work is carried out in a
collaborative fashion in working groups consisting
of CPB member companies, external experts and ITF
researchers.
“Among the many insights from the first round of CPB projects are real eye-openers”, said ITF Secretary-General José Viegas at the presentation. “These reports will prove extremely valuable in stimulating policy debate in many countries and in many contexts.”
The current members of the CPB are: Bombardier
Transportation, China Communications and
Construction Company (CCCC), China Ocean Shipping
Company (COSCO), HERE Global, Kapsch TrafficCom,
Meridiam, Michelin, Nissan, PTV Group, Total,
SerTrans Logistics, Uber, Volvo.
Road Safety | 01 October 2014 Towards
Zero Road Deaths
Reducing road fatalities and serious injuries by helping governments to implement a “safe system” approach in road safety is the objective of a new ITF Working Group launched on 1 October in Paris.
The “Working Group on the Implementation of a Safe System Approach” will develop actionable policy guidance for countries who aim to improve their road safety performance and in the long run eliminate road traffic as a cause of death or serious injuries.
“Vision Zero” is official policy in a number of countries, as well as in cities such as New York or San Francisco. A key element of attaining Vision Zero is creating a “Safe System” in which responsibility for safety is placed not on the road user, but on system design: The road system should be conceived in ways that are forgiving of human error.
The group’s work programme will build on a previous ITF report, “Towards Zero: Ambitious Road Safety
Targets and the Safe Systems Approach”, published in 2008. “Countries would like some further advice and guidance”, said Working Group chairman Iain Cameron (Australia) at the kick-off meeting. He said that a lot of progress had been made in the six years since the initial report, which could now be reviewed. “We can capture some of the progress [and] hear about the challenges”, Cameron said, “We can put that together and provide some support for leaders in the countries.”
(see video for full interview)
The new ITF working group comprises 28 top-level road safety experts from 23 countries and from the World Health Organisation, the World Bank, the International Road Assessment Programme (iRAP), the Global New Car Assessment Programme (Global NCAP) and the FIA Foundation.
The new working group will present an interim report in November 2015, coinciding with the half-way point of the United Nations Decade of Action on Road Safety 2010-15. The full life-cycle of the working group is two-years, and a final report will be completed by the end of 2016.
Roundtable | 23 September 2014 Improved Policy Making Tools
Reviewed by Experts at ITF
International experts at an ITF Roundtable on
transport investment assessment have recommended: - that governments use an audit approach during a
project's development and delivery, on a model
similar to that currently used in the UK; - that policy makers and the public can better
understand the economic benefits and expected
outputs of transport schemes by using case studies; - that further, more scientific, approaches to
understanding
causality should be used to appreciate the impact that
any transport scheme ultimately has.
The ITF Roundtable titled "Ex-post assessments of
transport investments and policy interventions:
Prerequisites and methodological challenges" was
held in Paris, France from 15-16 September. Chaired
by UK expert Tom Worsley, the Roundtable brought
together international experts to review practices,
examine data and review the range of tools which can
be employed. This is the first Roundtable for which
ITF offers video-on-demand recordings of
presentations as a new service. Presentations; - TPICS, TIGER and US Experience - A Focus on Case-based Ex-Ante Economic Impact Assessment
(Stephen Fitzroy, Economic Development Research Group, USA); - Permanent Observatories as Tools for Ex-Post Assessment: a French Case Study
(Alain Bonnafous, Laboratoire d'Economie des Transports, France); - The National Audit Office’s Value-for-Money Assessment of Transport Investments
(Geraldine Barker, National Audit Office, UK); - Causal Inference for Ex-Post Evaluation of Transport Interventions
(Dan Graham, Imperial College of London, UK).
Environment | 15 September 2014 ITF Gearing up for UN Climate Change Summit
World leaders will convene in New York for the UN Climate Summit 2014 next week. The summit called by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon for 23 September is intended to catalyse action for combatting climate change. One of eight action areas identified is transport; the first time the UN has targeted the sector as a climate policy player in its own right.
Building on this important development, ITF is feeding its expertise into the UN process in multiple ways. The Global Fuel
Economy Initiative (GFEI), of which ITF is a member, has been selected as an Energy Efficiency Accelerator by the UN's Sustainable Energy for All (SE4ALL) initiative. GFEI held an Accelerator Symposium in Paris on 5 September hosted by the French Ministry of Ecology, Sustainable Development and Energy, and will be present at the Climate Summit in New York in the main energy session.
In the pre-summit week, ITF Secretary-General José Viegas is at the Asian Development Bank's Transport Forum in Manila,
Philippines underlining the crucial role of the Asian economies and their transport policy choices for sustainable development.
On 22 September, Viegas will be in New York for a high-level summit side event with Michael Bloomberg, President of
the C40 Group of cities and former mayor of New York, Achim Steiner, Executive Director of the UN Environmental Programme (UNEP), and Maria van der Hoeven, Executive Director of the International Energy Agency (IEA). The focus will be on the contribution of rail to sustainable, low carbon development.
ITF is also preparing to support the work of UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon's High-Level Advisory Group on Sustainable Transport. Following the appointment of Olof Persson, CEO of Volvo Group and member of ITF's Corporate Partnership Board, as co-chair of the
Advisory Group, José Viegas met with Persson's senior staff in Paris
to discuss potential ITF input. A second meeting is planned during the Climate Summit in New York.
Event | 10 September 2014 Improving travel time reliability brings
tangible economic benefits
Reducing uncertainty for travellers about the time it will take to reach their destination
should become a policy priority for authorities. Research shows that the cost of unreliable
travel may rival that of congestion, a topic on which transport policy has traditionally
focused. This is the key message of a presentation by International Transport Forum (ITF)
senior economist Jari Kauppila at the ITS World Congress in Detroit (7-11
September, Cobo Center, Detroit MI).
Shifting the focus from reducing travel time to reducing its variability implies a move from
policies to build new infrastructure to better management of existing infrastructure, and to
information provision for the users to enable better planning of the journey.
Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS) play a key role in tapping the benefits of increased
reliability of transport systems. A study on the A6 motorway in France showed that effective
traffic management could reduce average travel time for a 20km long section by 12% and
the buffer needed to account for variability by 45%. “Reliability represents a major network
characteristic that should be recognised when considering investment options”, says
Kauppila. “Reliability should therefore be incorporated into cost-benefit assessment.”
Environment | 01 September 2014 The cost of air pollution: Health impacts of road transport
Outdoor air pollution kills more than 3.5 million people a year globally, far more than was previously estimated.
Air pollution has now become the biggest environmental cause of premature death, overtaking poor sanitation and a lack of clean drinking water. In most OECD countries, the death toll from heart and lung diseases caused by air pollution is much higher than the one from traffic accidents.
The report "The cost of air pollution: Health
impacts of road transport", presented by OECD
Secretary-General Angel Gurría at the ITF's Annual
Summit on 21 May 2014, calls for a phasing out of
tax incentives for diesel among its recommendations.
Environment | 12 August
2014 ITF pledges support to UN High-Level Advisory Group on Sustainable Transport
United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon
(photo) has announced the creation of a High-Level Advisory Group on Sustainable Transport.
Over the next three years, the Group will develop recommendations on sustainable transport for the UN Secretary-General that are actionable on
global, national, local and sector levels. The recommendations are intended to feed as transport-specific initiatives into a comprehensive sustainable
development agenda for the time after 2015, the target date for the UN’s Millennium Development Goals.
“The creation of the UN High-Level Advisory Group on Sustainable Transport constitutes an important step towards focusing on transport as a priority building block for sustainable development,” said Viegas. “More than 40 years after the first oil crisis of 1973 and more than 20 years after global warming became a household word, transport is still 97% dependent on fossil fuels and produces almost 25% of man-made carbon emissions. The time has come to end this, because it is simply unsustainable.”
Viegas also pledged support for Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon’s initiative: “The International Transport Forum, which brings together the ministers with responsibility for transport of 54 countries, is prepared to support the High-Level Advisory Group in whatever ways it can.”
The Advisory Group will
be co-chaired by Olof
Persson, President and
CEO of Sweden's Volvo
Group, a founding member
of the ITF’s Corporate
Partnership Board, and
Carolina Tohá, the mayor
of Santiago de Chile.
The 12 members are drawn
from different parts of
the transport community
including public
transport, logistics,
the automotive industry,
maritime shipping,
railways, energy and
urban planning as well
as city officials.
Photo: United Nations
Event | 18 July 2014 Putting Transport on the Latin
American Investment Agenda
ITF Secretary-General José Viegas brought a transport perspective to the OECD’s 4th Conference on Investment in Latin America and the Caribbean in Lima, Peru on 7-8 July. Themed “Bridging infrastructure gaps through smart investment”, the event - co-organised by
the OECD, the government of Peru and the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) and opened by Peruvian Prime Minister René Cornejo Diaz - explored the needs and opportunities for investment in the region, with a view to maximizing economic and development benefits generated by infrastructure investment. Mr Viegas moderated a panel on "Investment in transport – corporate strategies and regulatory challenges" (pictured) and was a discussant on the concluding panel, together with Colombian transport minister Cecilia Álvarez-Correa Glen.
In Santiago, Chile, Secretary-General Viegas met with Chilean minister of transport Andres Gomez-Lobo and Vice-Minister Cristián Bowen to discuss next steps for the implementation of the planned Logistics Observatory, for which Chile and the ITF had signed a letter of intent at the ITF Summit in Germany in May. Intensified co-operation in other areas such as ITF’s research activities and with respect to Chilean public transport projects were also discussed. In Santiago, Mr Viegas also met with board members of leading transport companies including LAN, the Chilean airline, and Ultranav (shipping and ports).
(Photo: ProInversión Perú | Flickr)
Event | 20 June 2014 Exploring Transport Options for Asian Cities
Many Asian countries are experiencing
significant urbanisation and confront
related transport challenges in their cities
due to sprawl, congestion, pollution, safety and access. A joint seminar on 24 June in Tokyo organised by Japan’s Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport (MLIT) with the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN) and the ITF explored future policy directions in the context of the ASEAN-Japan Senior Transport Officials Meeting (STOM), which brings together the region's Vice-Ministers in charge of transport. In his keynote, ITF Secretary-General José Viegas emphasised the importance of smarter modal integration and land use policies. He particularly highlighted the ongoing conceptual shift from transport as a provider of mobility to an enabler of access. Viegas also underlined ITF's commitment to intensify relations with the emerging nations of the region.
(Photo: tokyoform | Flickr cc)
Cycling | 06 June 2014 ITF Stimulates Debate on Cycling
in Canada
ITF's participation at
Canada's Go Vélo
Montréal Festival
culminated in a keynote
address by economist and
cycling expert Philippe
Crist on 28 May by
invitation of Vélo
Quebec.
ITF's Annual
Summit on "Transport for
a Changing World" was from
21-23 May.
Session summaries
including key quotes,
videos, photos are
online.
Roundtable Report |
13 May 2014 New ITF Report Reviews Global Experience in Airport Expansion
The latest ITF report "Expanding Airport Capacity in Large Urban Areas" reviews international experience in reconciling planning and environmental constraints with demand for airport capacity and the potential benefits in terms of productivity and growth from developing international airline services. Experience is compared in London, New York, Tokyo, Osaka, Sydney and in Germany's main airports with particular attention to the dynamics of airline markets and implications for airport planning in multi-airport cities.
Discussion Paper | 24 April 2014 Ensuring Safe Travel for Women
Safe
travel for all road
users is a prerequisite
for ensuring sustainable
and inclusive cities.
Providing safe transport
systems is an objective
for sustainable
transport, because risk
of injuries and deaths
from traffic crashes has
become a major public
health concern
worldwide. Safe travel
options for women in
general and specifically
low income women are
important for addressing
livelihood and poverty
issues for a significant
proportion of urban
population in low income
countries like India.
The latest ITF
Discussion Paper
presents data from the
Indian capital Delhi
(pop. 16.4 million) and
Vishakhapattanam (a
southern Indian city,
pop. 1.7 million)
comparing the travel
patterns of women and
men. The household
survey in Delhi focused
on low income
settlements, since
poverty adds another
dimension to gender
bias. The survey,
repeated after ten
years, shows that travel
patterns remained
unchanged. Women travel
shorter distances, are
dependent on lower cost
modes - walking and
public transport - and
perform multi-purpose
linked trips. In view of
the sustainability
requirements, lower
mobility of women must
be addressed by ensuring
safe accessibility to
employment opportunities
by walking, bicycles and
public transport. The
paper concludes with
possible interventions
required to ensure safe
and secure travel of
women at land use
planning level and
street design level.
Photo: Meena Kadri |
Flickr cc
Event | 16 April 2014 ITF Out in Force for Top European Transport Event
ITF Secretary-General José Viegas delivered an opening keynote speech on Innovation in Transport at the plenary session "From Research to Deployment: a Driver for Job Creation in Europe" at the 2014
Transport Research Arena
(TRA), on 14 April in Paris. TRA is the major conference on transport in Europe, bridging the gap between research and the market to improve European transport competitiveness, with over 3 000 participants expected. Mr Viegas also moderated a session on "Urban Innovation and Change: the Dynamic Nexus of Transport, Environment and Health", in the presence of Khatuna Gogaladze, Georgian Minister of Environment and Natural Resources Protection, on 14 April.
Stephen Perkins, ITF
Head of Research, spoke at the "Road Safety Economics: Highlights for Public Decision Making", on 14 April and also at the session on "International Co-operation in Transport Research" on 15 April. ITF Economist Jari Kauppila delivered a speech at the session on "Sharing Crash Modification Functions (CMF): an OECD Report Offers a World of Possibilities", also on 15 April.
ITF Head of Policy and
Summit Preparation Mary
Crass was moderator of the Gala Dinner of the
Women's Issues in Transportation Conference
on 14 April, attended by Jean Todt President of the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) and Michelle Yeoh, Global Ambassador for the Make Roads Safe campaign. Stephen Perkins
was chair of the "Bridging the Gap Among Countries" session of the conference on 16 April.
A seminar on "The Impact of Distracted Driving and Fatigue on Road Safety" organised by ITF during TRA addressed the concerns for safety linked to use of mobile and on-board information in vehicles on 15 April.
Event | 24 March 2014 Rethinking Urban Transport for a Changing World
Policy makers face both challenges and opportunities from a rapidly changing demography and the advancement of information and communication technology (ICT). Changes in demography have been most noticeable in East Asia, especially in Japan, Korea and China. And the ICT revolution is rapidly changing lifestyles in these countries and elsewhere by enabling previously unthinkable levels of information exchange and connectivity. The transport sector needs to adapt to these changes and focus on the opportunities they present. Nowhere is this more evident than in an urban context, where rapid growth of cities poses enormous challenges for transport, but increasing connectivity is already becoming part of the answer.
A joint seminar this
week in Seoul, Korea,
organised jointly by the
Korea Transport
Institute (KOTI) and the
International Transport
Forum (ITF) at the OECD,
takes a look at "Urban
Transport for a Changing
World" in an Asian
context, with a focus on
China, Japan and Korea.
Experts from the three
countries will present
best practice cases for
mutual benchmarking on
26 and 27 March,
complemented by
contributions from the
World Bank and the ITF.
The seminar’s findings
will provide important
input for ITF’s upcoming
2014 Summit of Transport
Ministers, which will
take place in Leipzig,
Germany from 21 to 23
May. "Urban Transport
for a Changing World" is the fifth seminar held jointly by KOTI and ITF since 2010, with a view to sharing knowledge and strengthen cooperation on subject areas of mutual interest. The first seminar in 2010 examined green growth in transport; in 2011, the focus was on promotion policies and critical evaluation of electric vehicles. The 2012 seminar explored seamless public transport for all, and the 2013 theme was funding transport.
Photo: tokyoform |
Flickr cc
Peer Review | 05 March 2014 Mexican Railways Peer Review Released
The performance of the Mexican freight rail industry has shown continuous improvement since the creation of the current industry structure in 1995. A peer review of the country’s railway freight commissioned by the Mexican government and released by ITF today, notes that quality of management, technical quality of railway infrastructure and rolling-stock, capital and labour productivity, traffic levels and market shares have all improved markedly. The report calls this “a transformation in industry prospects that hardly seemed possible prior to the reforms” of 1995.
Traffic has since doubled and the modal share of rail freight increased by more than a third. Mexico’s railways now carry more freight than any railway in the European Union apart from Germany, and more than those of France, Spain, Italy and Austria combined and as much general freight as Brazil. Mexico’s main rail freight concessions are the most productive freight railways (if the mining sector is excluded) in Latin America.
To build on this success, the review recommends that regulatory institutions and capacity be strengthened to address pricing and capacity issues associated with trackage rights. More systematic data should be captured to allow the regulator to make determinations on these in an informed and objective way as regards risks, costs and benefits. This also applies to system structure and potential access and tariff regulation.
ITF Head of Research
Stephen Perkins and
Economist Aimée Aguilar
Jaber presented the
review to the Trade and
Industry Development
Committee of the Senate
of Mexico on 19 February
and at a Senate hearing
with stakeholders on 5
March. The report was
produced in close
collaboration with the
Ministry of Transport.
(Photo: Jims_photos / Flickr cc)
Research Report | 18 February 2014 Every Kilometre Cycled Benefits Society
The health benefits to society from cycling outweigh negative impacts by
up to a factor of 20, according to ITF's latest research report "Cycling,
Health and Safety". The report, published at a time when many cities are seeking to increase the
share of cycling amidst concerns for safety, shows that the key to delivering
overall benefits from cycling is creating a safe system through government policy and city action.
Among the recommendations for policy makers is
the moderation of some urban road speeds to 30km/h or less, and the use of
separated cycling infrastructure to increase the number of new cyclists.
Attracting new cyclists gains the greatest health benefits through increased physical
activity, including reducing risks linked to cardiovascular disease, obesity
and Type-2 diabetes.
Summit 2014 | 04 February 2014 International organisations meet
at ITF to develop Summit 2014 themes
Each year in preparation
for its Annual Summit,
the ITF invites
international
organisations to its
consultation day to hear
priority issues related
to the Summit theme. The
2014 consultation day,
on the theme "Transport
for a Changing World",
was held on 31 January
in Paris gathering
over 35 organisations
and providing a direct
input to the content
development of the
sessions for the 2014
Summit.
Organisation | 21 January
2014 ITF Inaugurates New Platform for Co-operation with Private Sector
The International Transport Forum has opened a new chapter in its long-standing co-operation with the corporate world. Twelve
multi-national companies from seven countries met in Paris on 20 January to inaugurate the Forum's new Corporate Partnership Board (CPB)
and set a roadmap for private-sector knowledge sharing with policy makers.
The CPB will serve as the International Transport Forum's mechanism for including expert
knowledge from corporations in transport and related areas for policy analysis. CPB activities will comprise the launch of policy analysis projects,
events and publications on the basis of an annual work plan that will be agreed by members.
The CPB's founding members are Volvo (Sweden - automotive), China Communications Construction Company Group (CCCC, China - infrastructure),
COLAS (France - infrastructure), China Ocean Shipping Group Company (COSCO, China - shipping), Ekol Logistics (Turkey - logistics), Kapsch TrafficCom
(Austria - Intelligent Transport Systems), Meridiam Infrastructure (France - financial sector), Michelin (France - automotive), Nissan (Japan - automotive),
PTV Group (Germany - Intelligent Transport Systems), SerTrans (Turkey - logistics), Total (France - energy).
The inaugural CPB meeting agreed on operating guidelines and created a standing committee to govern the board's tactical business under the chairmanship of the ITF Secretary-General.
Corporate Partners will make proposals for the first round of projects by early February 2014, which will then be consolidated by the standing committee.
Work on CPB projects is slated to start in March; presentation of first results is planned for October 2014.
The CPB is expected to grow from the initial twelve members to a maximum of 50 members over three years. It supersedes the ITF Advisory Board.
The next plenary meeting of the CPB will be held during the Annual
Summit of Transport Ministers in Leipzig, Germany on 21-23 May 2014.
"I am delighted that a dozen multi-national companies have agreed to become founding members of ITF's Corporate Partnership Board", said José Viegas,
Secretary-General of the ITF. "I laud their entrepreneurial spirit and look forward to working with them. The corporate world is at the frontier of
new developments in the transport sector, and the Corporate Partnership Board will help the ITF to integrate the cutting-edge perspective of business
into our analysis even better and provide relevant evidence-based advice to policy makers."
Patrick Oliva, Senior Vice-President at Michelin said: "The CPB represents a very promising step forward in securing a confident dialogue between
the public and private sector in the field of transport innovation. Tomorrow's transport requires not only audacious technologies but also forward
looking policies, worldwide".
“I am very pleased to announce our cooperation with the CPB. This is certainly an exciting and strategically important task for us because the implementation of sustainable mobility solutions is based on a close partnership between the worlds of business and politics. We are looking forward to sharing our extensive expertise in the field of advanced intelligent transport technologies and contributing to the development of sustainable and innovative transport solutions,“
said Vincent Kobesen,
CEO of PTV Group.
Declaration | 13 January
2014 Road Safety Experts Agree Recommendations for Data Collection and Analysis
The
critical importance of better data to improve road safety has led
international road safety experts from 40 countries to issue the "Buenos
Aires Declaration on Better Safety Data for Better Road Safety Outcomes".
The Declaration recommends 12 measures for improving the collection
and analysis of road safety data as a critical tool to design effective road
safety policies. Among these are: the requirement for a minimum set of data for analysing road safety, which includes not only safety data but also
contextual data; safety data should be aggregated at national level using a
lead national agency; and the need to understand the relationship between
road safety performance and economic development.
The recommendations are a result of the ongoing road
safety work of ITF's International Road Traffic Safety Data and Analysis Group
(IRTAD) and the Ibero-American Road Safety Observatory (OISEVI), a
co-operative body of Latin American countries for the reduction of road
accidents by improvements in safety data. Better data is fundamental to achieving the
objectives of the UN Decade of Action on Road Safety; a halving the expected
level of road deaths by 2020.
Publication | 06 January
2014 Funding Urban Transport in London
In our compendium on funding urban public transport, ITF with the International Association of Public Transport (UITP) looks at how the challenges of financing urban transport systems in the face of increasing urbanisation are being met in 10 cities of ITF member countries. These case studies highlight the diversity of local situations and needs as well as the important role of national governments in supporting resilient funding architectures.
The third ITF member country city in the series, London, transformed the
challenge represented by the expected fast
growth in population and jobs in the next 20 years into an opportunity
for establishing public transport as key driver of economic development
and attractiveness of the city. This opened the way to ambitious
programmes of development and modernisation of public transport in
London. This is supported by a combination of funding sources,
involving not only users and different levels of government, but also
the beneficiaries of improved public transport in London, as well as
innovative third-party funding arrangements. The case study examines the roles of various key actors (government, transport authorities and operators), funding systems and the opportunities and challenges ahead for the
London region.
(Photo:
gmacfayden / Flickr cc)
Statistics Brief | 19 December 2013
Shifting Economic Mass to Emerging Economies Shown in Global Freight Data
The latest update of global freight data collected by
ITF through September 2013 reinforces the observation of a shift of economic mass to emerging economies:
- USA and EU27 exports increase strongly and imports decline markedly, reflecting weak domestic demand and stronger performance of emerging economies;
- EU external trade by air, considered as a lead indicator, rebounds above pre-crisis peak, indicating a potential improvement of the economic outlook;
Roundtable | 18 December 2013
First ITF Roundtable in India to Focus on High-Speed Rail
An
ITF Roundtable on "The Economics of Investment in High-Speed Rail" in New Delhi
on 18-19 December will deliberate the conditions under which investment in high-speed rail
delivers positive economic returns. Experts will examine the key factors that drive the costs of high-speed rail investment and review the economic benefits.
Papers will review experience in a range of countries that have developed large high-speed rail networks.
Experts on the economics of smaller scale high-speed
rail systems will also attend the discussions. ITF and international
experts will join Montek Singh Ahluwalia, Deputy Chairman of the
Planning Commission of the Government of India, and Mallikarjun Kharge,
Minister of Railways.
(Photo: Arnaud Lizeray
/ Flickr cc)
Publication | 10 December 2013
Policy decisions are key determinant
for more sustainable transport
The volume of global transport could double or even quadruple by 2050, according to a new study released today by the International Transport Forum (ITF), an intergovernmental organisation with 54 member states associated with the OECD.
GDP growth, freight intensity of economic activity and demographic change are important drivers of this growth. But key determinants for the level of future increases are policy choices, according to the ITF Transport Outlook, an annual report containing long-run scenarios for global transport activity and related CO2 emissions.
China and India drive transport volume growth, with traffic increases to between 4 and 9 times the present level. Across non-OECD countries, surface passenger transport volumes could be four or five times higher in 2050 than today. For the industrialised OECD area, surface passenger travel (measured in vehicle-kilometres) is projected to grow by 50-60%.
For surface freight volumes – i.e. goods transported by road and rail – ITF projections put growth at up to 430% in non-OECD emerging economies and up to 125% for the OECD area. With low GDP growth and a decoupling of economic growth and freight intensity, the growth figures there could be 100% and 40% respectively at the lower end.
Strong increases in transport volumes mean strong growth of emissions from transport. The baseline projection sees global CO2 emissions from surface transport grow by 80% by 2050. At the top and bottom end, the increase could be as high as 170% or as low as 30%.
The outcome will depend not least on choosing the best long-term strategies to support growth and protect the environment. Policy choices are particularly important in the cities of emerging regions, as exploding urbanisation shapes global transport trends.
Working Group | 12 December 2013
New ITF Working Group on Sustainable Transport launched
Many countries have developed policies and initiatives to reduce CO2 emissions from transport to combat climate change. But which of these policies will be most effective over the long term? What are possible side-effects, and how can they be managed? Are the measures cost effective and how is effectiveness best measured? And not least:
should policy makers focus more on supporting specific technological advances, for instance in fuel efficiency, or on broad policies, e.g. measures that influence modal choice and land use?
These are some of the questions that will be addressed by ITF’s new
Working Group to Assess Policies for Transition to Sustainable Transport which kicked off with its first meeting in Paris on 12/13 December 2014. The Working Group will start with a review of different national approaches to assessing climate change mitigation policies. This will also involve evaluating their coherence with policies to reduce other emissions, such as NOx, PM or noise and include a look at approaches to assessing co-benefits, for instance in relation to oil security and green growth. Another objective is to identify limitations of cost benefit analysis for assessing emission mitigation policies, and to examine what additional analytical tools might be useful to help make better policy choices.
Chaired by France, the Working Group consists of 12 experts from ten ITF member countries (Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Japan, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Sweden and the United States). For the first meeting, they were joined by 16 invited experts, including from the International Monetary Fund, the OECD Environment Directorate and OECD Centre for Tax Policy as well as various research institutions such as the London School of Economics in the UK, the Laboratoire d'Économie des Transports in France or the Swedish National Road and Transport Research Institute, among others.
Event | 05 December 2013
Mobilising Transport Investment
for Green Growth
Mobilising
investment in the land
transport sector will be
examined on 5-6 December
at the OECD 2013 Green
Growth and Sustainable
Development Forum in
co-operation with ITF.
The forum will explore
solutions to how
governments can improve
their investment policy
frameworks to reduce
risk and attract
long-term private
financing in support of
green growth.
The land transport sector is set to see significant investment in most countries as infrastructure is renewed and
adapted to growing populations and changing needs. Achieving reduction in green
house gas emissions on the scale indicated by
policy commitments will be expensive but necessary to deliver on green growth. Long-term investment in the transport
sector is foremost a public sector issue since long investment cycles and payback periods often discourage private
investment.
Incremental improvement in performance in relation to green house gases, air pollution and noise will be driven by vehicle
regulations such as CAFÉ and EURO standards. Regular tightening of fuel economy standards has made the largest
contribution to cutting CO2 emissions from the sector to date, and tax incentives (such as bonus/malus car taxes and
differentiation of truck km charges) have been deployed to accelerate progress. The pace of change set by government
regulatory time-tables will be a critical part of the policy framework for driving investment in cleaner technologies.
(Photo: VTrans Flickr cc)
Roundtable | 03 December 2013
ITF Provides Input on Urban Transport Policy for
Mayors and Ministers
As governments across the world seek a path to more resilient, inclusive and sustainable growth, cities are reforming and innovating at an unprecedented pace and scale. Cities are increasingly creative in delivering basic local services and undertaking critical investments for the future, at a time of severe financial constraints and in response to broader global trends with enormous implications for the future of cities, such as climate change, migration and population ageing. Cities’ actions contribute to growth, but they are often undermined by a lack of coherence between national and city-level policies.
Improving the co-operation between national governments and cities
to foster growth and well-being is the focus of the Fifth OECD Roundtable of Mayors and Ministers meeting in Marseille, France on 4-5 December. Building on previous Roundtables in Milan, Madrid, Paris and Chicago, this fifth iteration provides further opportunity for national ministers and city mayors to discuss ways of aligning national and local policies and help cities make the most of their potential. Discussions will focus on mobilising investment in hard and soft infrastructures, fostering innovation and strengthening environmental sustainability, financial resilience and social inclusion. ITF Secretary-General José Viegas will contribute input from ITF with respect to the critical urban transport dimension. ITF has produced a wide range of studies on urban transport issues such as congestion reduction, active mobility or regulation of Public Transport and has made the issue of urban mobility a recurrent theme at its Annual Summit of ministers of transport.
(Photo: Jan Jacob Trip
Flickr cc)
Mission | 22 November 2013
ITF Further Strengthens Relations with
Mexico
Secretary-General
José Viegas discussed
global transport trends
and policy issues with
Mexican Secretary of
Communications and
Transport Gerardo Ruiz
Esparza and
Undersecretary Carlos
Almada during a
top-level mission aimed
at strengthening ties
with the ITF member
country on 19-20
November 2013. The
strong interest from
Mexico in ITF's
research work was
highlighted during
meetings at the
transport
ministry with the Director General of Rail and Multimodal Transport, Pablo Suárez, Director General of Federal Road Transport, Federico Domínguez, Director General of Civil Aviation, Alejandro Argudín, Director General of Engagement with Civil Society Organisations, Adrián del Maz.
Road safety was at the
centre of a meeting with José San Martin,
Director General of the Mexican Institute of Transport (IMT), a
ministry research agency.
Mr Viegas also presented ITF research
to the Mexican
Transport Commission at
Mexico's parliament, the
National Congress (pictured, from left, Fernando
Maldonado Hernández,
Secretary of the
Transport Commission, Juan Carlos Muñoz Márquez,
President of the
Transport Commission,
and José Viegas, ITF
Secretary-General). He
later met with Undersecretary
Salvador Sanchez Estrada
of the Ministry of Tourism.
The mission
continues ITF's
increasing engagement with
Latin American
countries which follows Argentina's
joining the International Traffic Safety Data and Analysis Group (IRTAD)
and the first ITF Latin
American Roundtable on
Port Investment in
Chile earlier this month.
Awards | 21 November 2013 New Transport Innovation Award launched
The
new Promising Transport Innovation Award will recognise an innovation with the potential to significantly improve the transport industry. The innovation can be based on technological change, operational change, organisational change or a combination of these.
In order to be eligible, the project must have received either financial or regulatory approval for implementation, or be in implementation for less than two years. The award is open to businesses, government and non-government organisations and individuals within
ITF member or observer countries.
The Promising Transport Innovation Award complements the two prestigious annual awards already offered by the International Transport Forum:
The Transport Achievement Award
recognises a demonstrated achievement of successful transport innovation that has brought about significant improvement in the transport industry and has been operational in the market for at least two years, but no more than five years. It is open to transport operators and other service providers, transport authorities, suppliers and manufacturers within ITF member or observer countries.
The Young Researcher of the Year Award
(2013 winner
Laura Schewel pictured) rewards creative reflection and analysis on the part of young researchers investigating the contribution of transport to the well-being of our societies. It is open to researchers under 35 years of age who have undertaken their research in an institution, university or consultancy firm within ITF member or observer countries.
Closing date for
applications for all
three awards:
Friday 7 February 2014
Event | 15 November 2013
ITF Joins COP19 Effort to Combat Climate Change
Transport
CO2 emissions in urban
Latin America could be
34% higher than a
business-as-usual
scenario by 2050 should
mobility there follow a
private
transport-oriented, high
road-growth path. This
forecast is based on
ITF's Urban Transport
Model which will be
presented at COP19, the
United Nations Framework
Convention on Climate
Change Conference of the
Parties in Warsaw,
Poland this week.
In an alternative
scenario based on the
model, urban transport
emissions in the region
could fall by 27% over
the same period,
provided that long-term
transport planning and
policies translate into
public
transport-oriented,
lower road growth
mobility. The modeling
results highlight the
critical importance of
decisions taken by
transport policy-makers.
The ITF Urban Transport
Model simulates urban
evolution based on
average agglomeration
classes and allows
modeling of mobility,
modal shares and also of
CO2 emissions, being
fully compatible with
the Mobility Model
(MoMo) used by the
International Energy
Agency (IEA). It
provides important input
for ITF's annual
Transport Outlook, to be
published in the OECD
Outlook series in
December. In a next
step, the ITF Urban
Transport Model will be
expanded to cover Asia,
beginning with China and
India.
At COP19, ITF will be
joining the efforts for
meaningful progress in
climate change
mitigation with two
presentations. ITF
economist Aimée Aguilar
Jaber will showcase the
Urban Transport Model
during the side event on
"Potential of Low-Carbon
Transport". On 17
November, she will
present the Forum's work
on research priorities
and better communication
of potential C02
mitigation during a
session on COP19's
"Transport Day". (Photo:
Juanedc/Flickr cc)
Working Group | 14 November 2013
Argentina joins ITF’s Road Safety Working Group
In
a big step towards
better road safety in
the region, Argentina
has become the first
Latin American country
to join the
International Traffic
Safety Data and Analysis
Group (IRTAD), the
International Transport
Forum’s permanent
working group on road
safety data collection
and analysis. IRTAD is
particularly renowned
for its road safety
database and its
twinning programmes to
improve road safety data
collection as a key tool
for guiding road safety
policies.
In a ceremony in Buenos
Aires on November 13,
Felipe Rodríguez Laguens, Executive Director of the National Road Safety Agency of Argentina (photo: right),
received a commemorative
certificate to mark the
accession of Latin
America’s second largest
country. IRTAD chairman
Fred Wegman highlighted
the importance of
Argentina’s decision to
make road safety a
national policy
priority. “Argentina is
the first Latin-American
country to take part in
IRTAD, which makes it a
reference for other
countries in the
region”, Wegman added.
Road Safety experts from
around the world are
meeting in Buenos Aires
this week for a
conference on “Better
Safety Data for Better
Road Safety Outcomes”,
jointly organised by
IRTAD and the
Ibero-American Road
Safety Observatory
(OSIEVI), an umbrella
for co-operation among
road safety authorities
from 18 Latin American
and Caribbean countries
that grew out of the
IRTAD twinning programme
in 2011. To support
OISEVI, IRTAD created
the IRTAD LAC road
safety database with a
Spanish interface,
recently highlighted at
the 68th Session of the
UN General Assembly by
UN Secretary-General Ban
Ki-Moon as an important
initiative for the
improvement and
standardisation of data
collection methods and
data quality in Latin
America.
Event | 12 November 2013 Transport Design with Everybody in Mind
The need to design tomorrow’s transport systems with a broad range of users in mind was the message delivered by José Viegas,
Secretary-General of the International Transport Forum in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, this week at the 17th World meeting of the
International Road Federation (IRF). At any given time, one third of transport users face some form of impairment of their
personal mobility such as reduced vision or movement. Accessibility should therefore be an integral part of transport system design,
argued Viegas. All transport and land-use policies should take into account the needs of user groups such as the elderly or disabled. Designing transport for better accessibility – for instance improving door-to-door mobility by focusing on intra- and inter-modal links
or designing pedestrian movements for safety and comfort - will benefit all citizens. Despite the general benefits, accessibility is
often treated as a marginal issue with low priority and addressed late or even as optional. Legal, regulatory and technical frameworks
are rarely adequate, responsibility fragmented, coordination weak and monitoring/evaluation insufficient. But accessibility enhancements
can only be successfully implemented if governments, local authorities, manufacturers and operators work together – and, most importantly,
consultations with those concerned are an integral part of the planning process. (Photo: Jacobo Tarrío/Flickr cc)
Roundtable |
07 November 2013 First ITF Roundtable in South America examines Port Investment
The
ITF’s first ever Roundtable in South America is taking place n Santiago de Chile on 7/8 November. Jointly
organised by Chile’s Ministry of Transport and Communication and ITF, international experts will examine “Port Investment
and Container Shipping Markets”. Chile is ITF’s most recent member country, joining the organisation in 2012.
The widening of the Panama Canal for 12 400 TEU vessels and the introduction of even larger ships of up to 18 000 TEU
on the busy Asia-Europe routes raises the prospect of major change in the global shipping market. The ability to
accommodate very large ships has to be considered in planning new port developments, especially where there is likely
to be competition between ports.
In this environment, aggressive yet sensible port planning is key to the sustained economic growth of exports-driven economies.
The Roundtable, chaired by Mary Brooks of Dalhousie University, Nova Scotia, Canada will examine the broader issues that influence
the development of container transport, with a focus on Chile’s plans for port expansion. Discussion papers prepared for the Roundtable
are available for free download. (Photo: Matt Hinsa/Flickr/cc)
Publication |
31 October 2013 Funding Urban Public Transport in
Chicago
In our compendium on funding urban public transport, ITF with the
International Association of Public Transport (UITP) looks
at how the challenges of financing urban transport systems in the
face of increasing urbanisation are being met in 10 cities of
ITF member countries.
These case studies highlight the diversity of local situations and
needs as well as the important role of national governments in supporting resilient
funding architectures.
The second ITF member country city in the series, Chicago, has been able to mitigate
the challenges of lower density growth through having an extensive rail
and bus network, one of the USA's largest, providing a strong backbone on which core
regional office and residential development can be based. However, problems of maintenance
and infrastructure spending backlogs have been further hindered by
lack of financial stability. Regional authorities recognise these issues and are
seeking strategies to ensure long-term, high-quality public transport services in
the region.
The case study examines the roles of various key actors (government, transport authorities
and operators), funding systems and the opportunities and challenges ahead for
the Chicago region.
Interview | 06 November 2013 Interview: José Viegas on political actions that will reduce road deaths
In an interview with
TheCityFix, ITF
Secretary-General José
Viegas urges governments
to emphasise road safety as a national priority across federal,
state and local levels as the only way to get results.
ITF’s International Traffic Safety Data and Analysis Group (IRTAD), the Ibero-American Road Safety Observatory (OISEVI) and Argentina’s
National Road Safety Agency (ANSV) are bringing together experts from Latin America to improve the quality of road safety data at a joint
conference on 13/14 November 2013 in Buenos Aires. The meeting is a big step towards facilitating knowledge transfer between experts from
OECD and Latin American and Caribbean countries in the key policy area of road safety. The meeting will showcase recent initiatives to
improve safety data collection and present new research and analysis undertaken by the IRTAD Group, including on speed and crash risks,
forecasts, the link between safety performance short run GDP trends, and addressing serious injuries. Support for the conference comes
from the World Bank, the Inter-American Development Bank and the Development Bank of Latin America.
Sixty years ago, on 17 October 1953, Ministers from 16 European countries met in Brussels, Belgium,
to create the European Conference of Ministers of Transport. The ECMT, as it became widely known,
was intended by its founders as “a procedure whereby effective steps can be taken to coordinate and
rationalise European inland transport of international importance”.
ECMT remains the legal core of ITF and maintains a number of European activities, such as the Multilateral Quota System.
On the occasion of its 60th anniversary, the ECMT archive has been digitalised and is now freely available online on the OECD
iLibrary.
Publication | 09 October 2013 Funding Urban Public Transport in Beijing
In
our compendium on
funding urban public
transport, ITF with the
International
Association of Public
Transport (UITP) looks
at how the challenges of
financing urban
transport systems in the
face of increasing
urbanisation are being
met in 10 cities of
ITF member countries.
These case studies
highlight the diversity
of local situations and
needs as well as the
important role of
national governments in
supporting resilient
funding architectures.
The first ITF member
country city in the
series, Beijing, has
seen tremendous recent
growth with increasing
car ownership rates
straining the region's
road networks. 240km of
new metro lines have
been built since 2008,
multi-level bus services
matching new travel
patterns have been
developed and active
management of car
ownership via a license
plate lottery and
zone-based parking
charges introduced to tackle
traffic congestion.
The case study examines
the roles of various key
actors (government,
transport authorities
and operators), funding
systems and the
opportunities and
challenges ahead for
Beijing.
Working Group | 25 September 2013 Road
Transport Group approves Quality Charter
The
ITF's Road Transport Group, meeting on 19-20 September 2013,
approved the text of a Quality Charter for
International Haulage Operations under the
ECMT Multilateral Quota.
It was also decided that the Group will work
further on implementation and
incitation mechanisms, linking the
implementation of
provisions of the
Charter to Quota
development. These
mechanisms shall be
approved and become
operational on 1 January
2016, at the latest.
The
provisions of the Charter set the highest
standards in the domain of access to the
profession of international road
haulage operators, as well as initial and
periodic training of international drivers across the European
content. Thus these standards will be
brought up to EU level
for all 43 European ITF member countries participating in the
Multilateral Quota system. The aim is to increase the overall quality of international
road transport in Europe and further strengthen
the image of the Multilateral Quota as a
symbol of the highest quality in road transport in both environmental and social fields.
The
Group also approved the text of the new User Guide
on ECMT Multilateral Quota, which enters in
force on 1 January 2014, following the
introduction of ”EURO VI
safe” lorries into the Quota. This Guide
defines the operational rules of the
Multilateral Quota, and
establishes new
certificates for the
inclusion of the EURO VI
lorry category in the
system. The new certificates can be
consulted
at this link. The new Guide will become
available on the same webpage shortly.
The Group also decided to
establish a new Certificate of Compliance with
Technical Provisions Concerning Exhaust and
Noise Emissions and Safety Requirements for
lorries with total permissible laden weight (TPLW) between 3.5 and 6
tonnes, in order to facilitate and harmonise control procedures for
these lorries in Europe. The certificate will be
established during 2014.
ITF
Pedestrian Safety expert
Véronique Feypell (left)
with
Gunda Krauss, Citizen of
Munich, on the
"Walking at All Levels"
panel
during Walk21 Munich
ITF's Véronique
Feypell, a member
of the Walk21 Conference's
Scientific Committee,
provided pedestrian
safety expertise on the
"Walking at all levels"
panel joined by the
Mayor of Munich during
the Conference in Munch,
Germany last week. A
pre-workshop of the ITF
Working Group on Pedestrian Safety, Urban Space and Health and the European Cooperation in Science and Technology
(COST) project group on
pedestrians was
organised at the
conference to discuss new
initiatives since the
ITF's report on
Pedestrian Safety was
released. The ITF
Working Group Chairman
Thanos Vlastos also gave
a keynote speech on the
groups conclusions.
The Walk21 Conference,
with the vision "to
support, encourage and
inspire professionals to
evolve the best policies
and implement the best
initiatives, which
create and promote
environments where
people choose to walk as
an indicator of liveable
communities", attracted
500 particpants from 40
countries.
Event | 12 September 2013 ITF at the APEC Transport Ministers' Meeting
In preparation for the APEC Leaders' Meeting in Bali, Indonesia in October,
the 8th APEC Transport Ministers' Meeting in Tokyo on 4-6 September
focused on how to enhance connectivity in the region through high-quality
transport. Connectivity is one of the priorities of this year's APEC
Leaders' Meeting. Ministers agreed to develop a transport "Connectivity Map" that will visualise the ideal transport network for the year 2020 within the region. They will also develop a
"Quality Transport" vision that encompasses convenience, efficiency, safety, security, and sustainability as priorities.
For the ITF, which participated as a guest, Secretary-General José Viegas reported on the ITF Summit on
"Funding Transport" in May. Viegas emphasised the importance of trust between public and private partners for successful infrastructure projects, as well as the need to provide a steady pipeline of projects to
diversify the risk of investing in large-scale projects. Generally, the focus of governments is shifting to better project selection, more realistic risk transfer and freedom to innovate.
Mr. Viegas held seven bilaterals, meeting with Minister
Gerry Brownlee
of New Zealand, the upcoming 2014/15 ITF Presidency country, and Minister
Maksim Sokolov
of Russia. Viegas also exchanged views with Senior Vice-Minister
Hiroshi Kajiyama
of Japan, US Deputy Secretary of Transport
John Porcari, Vice-Minister
Yeo Hyung-ku
of Korea, Mexican Undersecretary of Transport,
Carlos F. Almada, and
Andrew Wilson, Deputy Secretary of Infrastructure and Transport, Australia. Three further meetings with top executives from NYK Line, Hitachi and Mitsui focused on
ITF's new outreach mechanism for the private sector, the Corporate Partnership Board (CPB).
The forecasts and scenarios for future growth of air passenger demand developed by the UK Airports Commission with regard to the expansion of Heathrow or Gatwick airports are appropriate and robust. This is the key finding of the new study “Forecasting Airport Demand: Review of UK Airports Commission Forecasts and Scenarios” produced by the International Transport Forum (ITF). The Airports Commission had asked the ITF for an external view on its forecasting models and scenarios in preparation for its final report. The Commission’s final report, published on 1 July, recommends a third runway at Heathrow airport as the best option for expanding airport capacity within the London area. The ITF review finds the approach followed by the Airports Commission to estimate future demand to
be “the best available” and “very well adapted” to modelling the London airports system.
The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) and the International Transport Forum (ITF) at the OECD will collaborate in working towards the sustainable development of air transport. A framework to engage in joint research and events as well as exchange of information and of staff was signed by both organisations on 23 June in Montreal.
The agreement identifies topics such as international air transport liberalisation, security and facilitation of travellers, or aviation infrastructure investment as areas for co-operation between ICAO and ITF.
A Quality Charter for international road haulage operations has been approved by the transport ministers of the
ITF European member countries. 
The
Best Paper Award in Freight Modelling has been
awarded to a paper written by three ITF experts by
the U.S. Transportation Research Board (TRB). Two of
the paper's authors, Jari Kauppila and Luis Martinez
received the award at the TRB's annual conference in
Washington, D.C. on 12 January. 
World leaders will convene in New York for the UN Climate Summit 2014 next week. The summit called by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon for 23 September is intended to catalyse action for combatting climate change. One of eight action areas identified is transport; the first time the UN has targeted the sector as a climate policy player in its own right.
Reducing uncertainty for travellers about the time it will take to reach their destination
should become a policy priority for authorities. Research shows that the cost of unreliable
travel may rival that of congestion, a topic on which transport policy has traditionally
focused. This is the key message of a presentation by International Transport Forum (ITF)
senior economist Jari Kauppila at the ITS World Congress in Detroit (7-11
September, Cobo Center, Detroit MI).
United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon
(photo) has announced the creation of a High-Level Advisory Group on Sustainable Transport.
Over the next three years, the Group will develop recommendations on sustainable transport for the UN Secretary-General that are actionable on
global, national, local and sector levels. The recommendations are intended to feed as transport-specific initiatives into a comprehensive sustainable
development agenda for the time after 2015, the target date for the UN’s Millennium Development Goals. 
The latest update of global freight data collected by the
ITF through December 2013 reinforces Asia’s role
as the locomotive of growth:
Safe
travel for all road
users is a prerequisite
for ensuring sustainable
and inclusive cities.
Providing safe transport
systems is an objective
for sustainable
transport, because risk
of injuries and deaths
from traffic crashes has
become a major public
health concern
worldwide. Safe travel
options for women in
general and specifically
low income women are
important for addressing
livelihood and poverty
issues for a significant
proportion of urban
population in low income
countries like India.
ITF Secretary-General José Viegas delivered an opening keynote speech on Innovation in Transport at the plenary session "From Research to Deployment: a Driver for Job Creation in Europe" at the 2014
Transport Research Arena
(TRA), on 14 April in Paris. TRA is the major conference on transport in Europe, bridging the gap between research and the market to improve European transport competitiveness, with over 3 000 participants expected. Mr Viegas also moderated a session on "Urban Innovation and Change: the Dynamic Nexus of Transport, Environment and Health", in the presence of Khatuna Gogaladze, Georgian Minister of Environment and Natural Resources Protection, on 14 April.
Policy makers face both challenges and opportunities from a rapidly changing demography and the advancement of information and communication technology (ICT). Changes in demography have been most noticeable in East Asia, especially in Japan, Korea and China. And the ICT revolution is rapidly changing lifestyles in these countries and elsewhere by enabling previously unthinkable levels of information exchange and connectivity. The transport sector needs to adapt to these changes and focus on the opportunities they present. Nowhere is this more evident than in an urban context, where rapid growth of cities poses enormous challenges for transport, but increasing connectivity is already becoming part of the answer.
The International Transport Forum has opened a new chapter in its long-standing co-operation with the corporate world. Twelve
multi-national companies from seven countries met in Paris on 20 January to inaugurate the Forum's new Corporate Partnership Board (CPB)
and set a roadmap for private-sector knowledge sharing with policy makers.
The
critical importance of better data to improve road safety has led
international road safety experts from 40 countries to issue the "Buenos
Aires Declaration on Better Safety Data for Better Road Safety Outcomes".
In our compendium on funding urban public transport, ITF with the International Association of Public Transport (UITP) looks at how the challenges of financing urban transport systems in the face of increasing urbanisation are being met in 10 cities of ITF member countries. These case studies highlight the diversity of local situations and needs as well as the important role of national governments in supporting resilient funding architectures.
The third ITF member country city in the series, London, transformed the
challenge represented by the expected fast
growth in population and jobs in the next 20 years into an opportunity
for establishing public transport as key driver of economic development
and attractiveness of the city. This opened the way to ambitious
programmes of development and modernisation of public transport in
London. This is supported by a combination of funding sources,
involving not only users and different levels of government, but also
the beneficiaries of improved public transport in London, as well as
innovative third-party funding arrangements. The case study examines the roles of various key actors (government, transport authorities and operators), funding systems and the opportunities and challenges ahead for the
London region.
Many countries have developed policies and initiatives to reduce CO2 emissions from transport to combat climate change. But which of these policies will be most effective over the long term? What are possible side-effects, and how can they be managed? Are the measures cost effective and how is effectiveness best measured? And not least:
should policy makers focus more on supporting specific technological advances, for instance in fuel efficiency, or on broad policies, e.g. measures that influence modal choice and land use?
Mobilising
investment in the land
transport sector will be
examined on 5-6 December
at the OECD 2013 Green
Growth and Sustainable
Development Forum in
co-operation with ITF.
The forum will explore
solutions to how
governments can improve
their investment policy
frameworks to reduce
risk and attract
long-term private
financing in support of
green growth. 
As governments across the world seek a path to more resilient, inclusive and sustainable growth, cities are reforming and innovating at an unprecedented pace and scale. Cities are increasingly creative in delivering basic local services and undertaking critical investments for the future, at a time of severe financial constraints and in response to broader global trends with enormous implications for the future of cities, such as climate change, migration and population ageing. Cities’ actions contribute to growth, but they are often undermined by a lack of coherence between national and city-level policies.
Secretary-General
José Viegas discussed
global transport trends
and policy issues with
Mexican Secretary of
Communications and
Transport Gerardo Ruiz
Esparza and
Undersecretary Carlos
Almada during a
top-level mission aimed
at strengthening ties
with the ITF member
country on 19-20
November 2013. The
strong interest from
Mexico in ITF's
research work was
highlighted during
meetings at the
transport
ministry with the Director General of Rail and Multimodal Transport, Pablo Suárez, Director General of Federal Road Transport, Federico Domínguez, Director General of Civil Aviation, Alejandro Argudín, Director General of Engagement with Civil Society Organisations, Adrián del Maz.
Road safety was at the
centre of a meeting with José San Martin,
Director General of the Mexican Institute of Transport (IMT), a
ministry research agency.
Mr Viegas also presented ITF research
to the Mexican
Transport Commission at
Mexico's parliament, the
National Congress (pictured, from left, Fernando
Maldonado Hernández,
Secretary of the
Transport Commission, Juan Carlos Muñoz Márquez,
President of the
Transport Commission,
and José Viegas, ITF
Secretary-General). He
later met with Undersecretary
Salvador Sanchez Estrada
of the Ministry of Tourism.
The
new Promising Transport Innovation Award will recognise an innovation with the potential to significantly improve the transport industry. The innovation can be based on technological change, operational change, organisational change or a combination of these.
Transport
CO2 emissions in urban
Latin America could be
34% higher than a
business-as-usual
scenario by 2050 should
mobility there follow a
private
transport-oriented, high
road-growth path. This
forecast is based on
ITF's Urban Transport
Model which will be
presented at COP19, the
United Nations Framework
Convention on Climate
Change Conference of the
Parties in Warsaw,
Poland this week. 
In
a big step towards
better road safety in
the region, Argentina
has become the first
Latin American country
to join the
International Traffic
Safety Data and Analysis
Group (IRTAD), the
International Transport
Forum’s permanent
working group on road
safety data collection
and analysis. IRTAD is
particularly renowned
for its road safety
database and its
twinning programmes to
improve road safety data
collection as a key tool
for guiding road safety
policies. 
The need to design tomorrow’s transport systems with a broad range of users in mind was the message delivered by José Viegas,
Secretary-General of the International Transport Forum in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, this week at the 17th World meeting of the
International Road Federation (IRF). At any given time, one third of transport users face some form of impairment of their
personal mobility such as reduced vision or movement. Accessibility should therefore be an integral part of transport system design,
argued Viegas. All transport and land-use policies should take into account the needs of user groups such as the elderly or disabled. Designing transport for better accessibility – for instance improving door-to-door mobility by focusing on intra- and inter-modal links
or designing pedestrian movements for safety and comfort - will benefit all citizens. Despite the general benefits, accessibility is
often treated as a marginal issue with low priority and addressed late or even as optional. Legal, regulatory and technical frameworks
are rarely adequate, responsibility fragmented, coordination weak and monitoring/evaluation insufficient. But accessibility enhancements
can only be successfully implemented if governments, local authorities, manufacturers and operators work together – and, most importantly,
consultations with those concerned are an integral part of the planning process. 
The
ITF’s first ever Roundtable in South America is taking place n Santiago de Chile on 7/8 November. Jointly
organised by Chile’s Ministry of Transport and Communication and ITF, international experts will examine “Port Investment
and Container Shipping Markets”. Chile is ITF’s most recent member country, joining the organisation in 2012. 
Sixty years ago, on 17 October 1953, Ministers from 16 European countries met in Brussels, Belgium,
to create the European Conference of Ministers of Transport. The ECMT, as it became widely known,
was intended by its founders as “a procedure whereby effective steps can be taken to coordinate and
rationalise European inland transport of international importance”.
In preparation for the APEC Leaders' Meeting in Bali, Indonesia in October,
the 8th APEC Transport Ministers' Meeting in Tokyo on 4-6 September
focused on how to enhance connectivity in the region through high-quality
transport. Connectivity is one of the priorities of this year's APEC
Leaders' Meeting. Ministers agreed to develop a transport "Connectivity Map" that will visualise the ideal transport network for the year 2020 within the region. They will also develop a
"Quality Transport" vision that encompasses convenience, efficiency, safety, security, and sustainability as priorities.
