“Despite all the well-known harmful side effects of driving, an important social cost is often overlooked: the opportunity cost of not walking or cycling, including to public transport stops.” Excellent summary from LSE on the need to focus on health in delivering transport policies
Electric vehicles are key for reducing transport emissions, but do they produce a healthy urban transport system? David Klenert, Linus Mattauch and Simona Sulikova argue that the health benefits of…
“70 per cent are under 5 miles, distances that can be covered without a car” <= is the rest of the article worth reading if it is based on an assumption that we should routinely walk for four mile trips?
Recommends: - a mileage-based tax that weighs the miles driven per social cost incurred - getting infrastructure right is key to encouraging ppl to choose active models of travel (including integrating with buses) - physical activity should be a major focus of rethinking economics of transport
Conversely, would it be necessary to calculate the increased transmission of airborne pathogens and the resulting health costs amongst public transport users?
Wonder if they would differentiate between trips? They would need to recognize that some trips can’t be done by active travel (longer distance) so short, within urban area trips should be seen as imposing a higher health opportunity cost than inter-urban or long rural trips?