NOW:
New Transportation Technologies for Reducing Congestion
George Hazel, based in Scotland, will be speaking on new technologies in transportation that are being used to reduce congestion, make transportation systems more efficient,
make pricing and payments more convenient, provide more travel options, and reduce trips and traffic.
George is an international expert in city and mobility analysis, policy advice and development and in innovative funding and delivery mechanisms. He has extensive experience of how towns and cities work, having written a book in 2004 on “Making Cities Work” and led the team which produced the Megacities Challenges report for Siemens.
Wednesday, May 30, 2012 – 7- 9:00pm
SFU Vancouver (Room 1400) – 515 West Hastings Street
Admission: $10 (cash only at door). RSVP
A panel with local transportation expertise will add their comments: Peter Fassbender, Mayor of the City of Langley; Peter Holt, Principal, Buckley Blair & Associates Inc.; and Nathan Pachal of South Fraser OnTrax
Hosted by the Sustainable Transportation Coalition, the Planning Institute of BC South Coast Chapter and SFU Continuing Studies (City Program). With generous support provided by TransLink.
The Sustainable Transportation Coalition is a group of volunteers and organizations dedicated to promoting transportation choices in Metro Vancouver, in particular building public understanding of the best options for sustainable transportation funding in the region.
THEN:
An excerpt from the 1958 Disneyland TV Show episode entitled Magic Highway USA. In this last part of the show, an exploration into possible future Transportation technologies is made.
It’s hard to believe how little we’ve accomplished on this front since 1958, and how limited the scope for imagining such future technologies has become. Witness an artifact from a time where the future was greeted with optimism.
As I’m sure you and your readers know, congestion has nothing to do with transportation technologies and everything to do with land use. I do hope the Mayor of Langley takes the opportunity to announce adoption of Duany’s smartcode instead the city’s current 1960s style single-use zoning.
In re the Disney cartoon version of the future: The future is hard to predict. What’s interesting to see in the cartoon are all the predictions that we can be glad did not come true. For example, the urban world of today has many wonderful, walkable, human-scale streets that are not suggested in the cartoon’s stark vision of tomorrow’s cities.
Also on the topic of future visions, check out this video on EN-V technology from General Motors, posted about a year ago: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0tiHwzGsotA Shows quiet electric vehicles on urban streets with sidewalks and pedestrians. And as Walt’s crew envisioned way back yonder, the cars are still predicted to drive themselves.
And while predicting the future, I’m guessing Mr. Hazel’s thinking can be previewed in the reports from Siemens posted at http://www.siemens.ca/web/portal/en/AboutUs/Sustainability/completemobility/Pages/Default.aspx. Should be an interesting presentation on May 30! Maybe I’ll come up on May 30 for this one!