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Much attention has of late been paid to the issue of tourist sustainable ­mobility at the destination. This issue takes on particular significance in big cities, which, prior to the outbreak of the pandemic, saw considerable increases in visitor numbers. The aim of this chapter, which draws on the case study method, is to explore the question of how foreign tourists move around in a Polish conurbation, known as Tri-city. Made up of three cities – Gdansk, Sopot, and Gdynia – it is one of Poland’s most popular tourist destinations. Crucially, in Tri-city all major tourist attractions and facilities are dispersed over a wide area, which makes it particularly well suited to researching visitor mobility patterns. The case study that forms the core of this chapter relies mainly on a paper-and-pencil questionnaire survey conducted among foreign tourists visiting Tri-city in January 2020 as well as on direct observation of reality. It turned out that walking was a preferred way of moving around Tri-city for most foreigners. The findings indicate, too, that young female visitors used public transport more often than older women and all men regardless of age. Furthermore, tourists with a university education more often opted for public transport than those without a degree, and visitors who lived in urban areas used public transport more often than those living in the countryside. The chapter concludes by ­summarizing the argument and drawing practical lessons for municipal authorities interested in facilitating tourist sustainability in their cities.

Purpose – This chapter explores the functions of institutional setting, technical requirements and local city characteristics as they affect the implementation of sustainable urban travel policies in China under the pressure of fast motorization and the constraints of energy and resource limitations.

Methodology – We reviewed the documents related to sustainable urban transport vision in China from central government and compared the motorization and urban transport policy at local city level in relation to social equity, urban transport finance, as well as the challenge of an ageing society.

Findings – The concept of sustainable development had been widely talked about in China but has not yet been effectively translated into actions in urban transport. There is a need to strengthen the synchronization of central government and local government strategies on sustainable transport in order to achieve less car-dependent cities.

Research limitations/implications – We need more research to understand the specific characteristics of the Chinese urban transport system and the constraints on the implementation of sustainable transport policy at a local level.

Practical and social implications – The achievement of a higher share of walking and cycling will greatly improve sustainable urban mobility, in terms of social equity, quality of urban life and also fossil energy consumption.

Originality – Current policy documents and implementation practice were analysed to provide the reader with a deep understanding of urban transport policy in China.

A general global wave of public participation is occurring. Students and researchers as well as civil servants, policy-makers, and NGO representatives are encouraged to study, propose, and engage in public participation. New innovative forms of participation are suggested, and experiments in participation are ongoing locally and nationally. Within the transport sector, most studies of participation focus on road infrastructure and other land use changes. However, for other areas within transport, studies are limited and fragmented. Based on this, we see a need for a volume on public participation in transport, aimed at practitioners, students, and researchers, in what are unarguably times of change. The overall aim of the volume is to provide examples of different forms of public participation in transport, which can work as a setting for further analyses and discussions of public participation in transport. Drawing on different cases, eight empirical chapters are presented covering three main themes: grass-roots participation initiatives, participation in unconventional areas, and public participation that throws up unexpected results. In this introductory chapter, we set the scene for later discussions and analyses of public participation in transport. This chapter also provides an overview of the structure and content of the volume.

COVID-19 has changed the landscape within which we travel. Working from Home (WFH) in many countries has increased significantly, and while it was often forced on a society it has delivered some unintended positive consequences associated in particular with the levels of congestion on the roads and crowding on public transport. With a likelihood of some amount of WFH continuing as we move out of the active COVID-19 period, the question being asked is whether the post-COVID-19 period will return the pre-COVID-19 levels of traffic congestion and crowding. In many jurisdictions, there is a desire to avoid this circumstance and to use WFH as a policy lever that has appeal to employees, employers and government planning agencies in order to find ways of better managing future levels of congestion and crowding. This chapter uses the ongoing research and surveys we have been undertaking in Australia since March 2020 to track behavioural responses that impact on commuting and non-commuting travel, and to examine what the evidence tells us about opportunities into the future in many geographical settings to better manage congestion and crowding. This is linked to a desire by employers to maintain WFH where it makes sense as a way of not only supporting sustainability charters but also the growing interest in a commitment to a broader social licence. We discuss ways in which WFH can contribute to flattening peaks in travel; but also the plans that some public transport authorities are putting in place to ensure that crowding on public transport is mitigated as people increasingly return to using public transport. Whereas we might have thought that we now have plenty of public transport capacity, this may not be the case if we want to control crowding, and more capacity may be needed which could be a challenge for trains more than buses given track capacity limits. We conclude the chapter by summarising some of the positive benefits associated with WFH, and the implications not just for transport but for society more widely.

This chapter focuses on how to leverage public transport infrastructure to produce walk-friendly environments, positioning public transport as a walk-enhancing mode. What are the steps that public transport operators can take to create walk-friendly environments? Do more comfortable waiting conditions result in stronger loyalty from the existing customer base and stronger buyout from new customers? This novel approach stemmed from a partnership with the public transport operator Transdev on a real-life experiment in Grenoble to provide a more comfortable walking and resting experience for public transport users. Named Carrefour de Mobilité (‘the crossroads of mobility’), the experiment prototyped urban design interventions to enhance the access and waiting experience of users engaged in mixed-mode commuting. An ex ante/ex post evaluation was deployed to ascertain whether walk-friendlier environments encourage a more intensive use of public space and easier shifting between public transport modes. The findings show that when users perceive dedicated infrastructure as walk-friendly, they consider it more visible and more attractive, and find it comfortable enough to spend longer waiting times there. The evaluation would have benefited from an extension of the perimeter covered by the sensor technology measuring system which was not feasible because of budget constraints. The experiment reached out beyond the initial target public and captured children and older women as well, providing an amenity which was lacking for these groups and resulting in a livelier and more diverse environment for everyone. This lean and low-cost experiment shows that activating public space near public transport hubs enhances their attractiveness in the eyes of the public transport users.

Public participation is sometimes suggested as a way to establish legitimacy for contentious policies needed to realise a transformation in the transport sector to meet sustainability and climate goals. In this chapter, we first aim to summarise and draw conclusions from each part of the book, not least in relation to the transformative potential of public participation in the sector. The chapter also suggests recommendations for further research in the field. Important topics discussed are the diversity of public participation in transport; limits to participation; the specifics of participation in the field of transport; and the issue of consensus and dissensus. As regards transformation of the sector, public participation is considered a prerequisite, but the book also includes several cases where public participation does not seem to possess a transformational potential. We suggest representative, deliberative forms of participation as a possible solution to overcome dilemmas of representativeness, (lack of) knowledge, and the participation burden. We conclude that public participation is not easy, it has to be prepared and designed carefully to avoid unexpected consequences, and there is currently a need for more experiments and pilot projects on public participation in the field of transport.