Abstract
An urban mobility plan’s preliminary operations and researches are anything but routine as they determine the final recommendations and decisions. As a first step it is necessary to distinguish between dependent and independent variables. One of the basic questions is: (a) Is it better to analyze first the current situation and then think about how we can deal with the problems and modify the situation? (b) Or is it more convenient to identify the situation we want and then design a plan to make it happen? A further basic question is: When and if we find that groups of citizens have different preferences, should we provide a plan that is reasonably good for everyone or we better design a multiplicity of possible mobilities? Another crucial issue is how to deal with vested and diffused interests. Although different solutions can be equally legitimate and effective, I propose a radical approach based on reduction of mobility needs and on providing citizens with variegated solutions to their specific movement problems.
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Notes
- 1.
 “Those who are happy prefer staying at home”.
- 2.
 “Precision” and data accountability are, by the way, a myth. In fact, data on traffic are typically random as they depend on thousands of unpredictable and unexpected human decisions.
- 3.
 In a competing society, which is far from being an ideal free-market of politics, we may need organizations to defend and affirm some threatened rights in some circumstances.
- 4.
 It is interesting to notice how politicians adopt an aggressive, war-like, and thoroughly “macho” language, but in reality the crucial behavioral pattern of decision-making actors is negotiation and mediation. Should we conclude that political discourse is the encounter of a traditional male language with a female behavior?
- 5.
 In many urban areas, there is literally no more space to build new roads. Therefore, the only possibility for public investments is in public transportation facilities. The option to shift conspicuous investments from new construction to intense maintenance and improvements is, instead, generally neglected.
- 6.
References
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Engwicht D (1989) Traffic calming: the solution to route 20 and a new vision for Brisbane. CART, Ashgrove
Gottlieb R (2007) Reinventing Los Angeles: nature and community in the global city. MIT University Press, Cambridge
Leontief W (1966–1986) Input-output economics. Oxford University Press, New York
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Poli, C. (2011). Some Procedures and Some Content. In: Mobility and Environment. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-1220-1_11
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-1220-1_11
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