Victoria Transport Policy Institute dedicated to improving transportation planning and policy analysis.
The Victoria Transport Policy Institute is an independent research organization dedicated to developing innovative and practical solutions to transportation problems. It provides a variety of resources available free at its website to help improve transportation planning and policy analysis. It is funded primarily through consulting and project grants. Its research is among the most current available and has been widely applied. It can help you:
- Identify better solutions to transportation problems, including some approaches that are frequently overlooked or misunderstood.
- Identify the full benefits, costs and equity impacts of alternative transportation policies and programs.
- Compare and evaluate alternatives.
- Create a bridge between theory and practice.
For more information on the Victoria Transport Policy Institute, visit its website at www.vtpi.org
Work Smarter, Not Harder to Improve Transportation
“Work smarter, not harder” is a motto for good management. It's a reminder to continually search for better solutions to the problems we face.
There is a great need for better solutions to our transportation problems. Too often, solutions consist of simply more of the same: building more roads, expanding parking facilities, maintaining low fuel prices, buying more automobiles, increasing transit subsidies, and generally devoting ever more private and public resources to transportation.
There are good reasons to question such solutions. With current underpricing of automobile travel (although owning a vehicle is expensive, driving has never been cheaper, due to low fuel prices, abundant free parking and unpriced roads) it is virtually impossible to reduce congestion, accidents, road and parking facility costs, pollution, sprawl, and poor mobility options for non-drivers by simply doing more of the same.
Attempts to solve one problem often exacerbate others. For example, increasing roadway capacity to reduce congestion in one area often worsens downstream congestion problems. The bottlenecks simply move around, while other transportation problems increase.
When all impacts are considered, accommodating more vehicle traffic is not necessarily better for society. Like any economic input, transportation activities experience diminishing returns: while society may have benefited in the past from increased motor vehicle travel, it is wrong to assume that additional travel growth will provide similar benefits to individual consumers, communities, or our economy.
The Victoria Transport Policy Institute believes that there are smarter ways to solve transportation problems. It has identified innovative strategies for more efficient and equitable transportation. They are technically feasible and cost effective. They involve giving consumers more choices, creating a more balanced transportation system, and removing market distortions that result in excessive and economically inefficient travel choices.
FOR MORE INFORMATION, CONTACT:
Todd Alexander Litman litman@vtpi.org
Victoria Transport Policy Institute
Phone & Fax 250-360-1560
1250 Rudlin Street, Victoria, BC, V8V 3R7, CANADA
Posted May 2007