- Much can be done to reduce the worst traffic
congestion
Dynamic, affordable, liveable and attractive urban regions will never be free of congestion.
Road transport policies, however, should seek to manage congestion on a cost-effective basis with
the aim of reducing the burden that excessive congestion imposes upon travellers and urban
dwellers throughout the urban road network.
- Effective land use planning and appropriate levels of
public transport service are essential for delivering high quality access in congested urban
areas
Integrated land use and transport planning and coordinated transport development involving all
transport modes - including appropriate levels of public transport - are fundamentally important
to the high quality access needed in large urban areas.
- Road users want reliable door-to-door trips that are
free of stress
Road users generally accept a degree of road congestion but attach a high value to the reliability
and predictability of road travel conditions. Reliability needs to be given greater weight in
assessing options and prioritising congestion mitigation measures.
- Targeting travel time variability and the most extreme
congestion incidents can deliver rapid, tangible and cost-effective improvements
Unreliable and extremely variable travel times impose the greatest "misery" on road users. An
increase in the reliability and predictability of travel times can rapidly reduce the cost
associated with excessive congestion levels.
- The age of unmanaged access to highly-trafficked urban
roads is coming to an end
Most traditional congestion relief measures either free up existing capacity or deliver new road
capacity, which is likely to be rapidly swamped with previously suppressed and new demand, at least
in economically dynamic cities. In future, demand for use of highly trafficked roads will need
to be managed. Demand management strategies should take full account of how residents and roadway users
wish to see their community develop as well as their longer term mobility preferences.
- Transport authorities will inevitably need to employ a
combination of access, parking and road pricing measures to lock in the benefits from operational
and infrastructure measures aimed at mitigating traffic congestion
By comparison with non-road infrastructure managers, road administrations generally have much less
of a role - if they are assigned any role at all - in managing overall levels of demand. Often
little consideration is given to the question of whether overall demand for use of the roadway
system should be managed at all. Management of roadway demand is increasingly likely to be
required in large urban areas.
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