Mobility Matters Daily #183 - Net Zero Strategy, buses, and rail satisfaction

Also, the French TGV isn't that great

Good day my good friend.

I managed to get annoyed today. That means I get a bit ranty, which means that this newsletter may be a bit ranty. Otherwise, it is all the good links curated just for you.

James

This free daily newsletter is sent to everyone. Paid subscribers get an ad-free version, as well as access to exclusive in-depth analysis once a week, and a tailored analysis on a policy issue once a month. You can upgrade at any time.

UK Government releases its electric vehicle strategy

Or its Net Zero Strategy as its otherwise known. People often say that priorities are not found in what people say, but what is in their budget. That’s only partly true. You also know if they have a strategy at all by whether they can link what they are doing back to a grand vision of the future.

After being told that walking and cycling is the highest priority, and then buses are the highest priority, now electric vehicles are the highest priority. Saying you can have everything may get a good headline in the papers, but it isn’t a strategy. I’m not calling for a National Transport Strategy here, but some consistency would be nice.

The bus industry is ailing - can it save itself?

I did very much enjoy this article by David Leeder on the challenges facing the bus industry. Mainly because he gets the 3 key issues absolutely spot on, although I would argue that he rather glosses over the major challenge of changing the working culture of an entire sector. At a time when buses are really struggling to maintain routes even with COVID support, several extremely tough questions on the future of buses in the UK will come to a head over the coming months.

Anyway who attended Mobility Camp on Saturday will know my honest views on this (and anyone who really wants to know them will have to meet me for a pint). For now I will say this. Simply shovelling more taxpayer money into the bus industry as it is tantamount to keeping the patient on life support and praying for a miracle. I hope that Councils and bus operators will take the chance offered to them by Enhanced Partnerships to achieve radically different outcomes for local buses. If its more of the same, I don’t see a future for buses.

How to use rail satisfaction data to recover from rail delays

How do you ensure that passengers don’t get annoyed at delays? Apart from not having them, and giving them good information of course. An interesting research paper by Monsuur et al takes data from the National Rail Passenger Survey and rail operational data to identify the sources of negative attitudes to delays. Their conclusion?

The study found that passengers reacted negatively to delays over 30 [minutes], and dissatisfaction was exacerbated when passengers had to stand during the journey and/or received poor information, and when trains were cancelled.

You may think that is nothing shocking. But sometimes research that confirms our own experience is useful research on its own.

Random things

A few random things that I found whilst scouring the Internet, that you may find interesting:

• $230M Venture Capital Fund Targets Electric Air Mobility (Flying)

• West Lothian has cut carbon footprint in half over last eight years (Edinburgh Live)

• Legislation approved to allow e-scooters on Irish roads (RTE)

• Federal transportation funding opportunities 101 (Transportation for America)

• Automated and Electric Vehicle Act report (Department for Transport)

Interesting things

Is it quicker to drive or get the train from Paris? (Image credit: u/gmilloue)

France has an excellent high speed rail network. But even then, for much of it, it is quicker to drive when travelling from Paris. This is one image from a series on the r/dataisbeautiful Subreddit.

If you don’t do anything else today, then do this

Read and respond to this thoughtful post by my good friend Jeremy Dalton. It will make you think.