BROADCASTS.com

Transit priority is controversial and its potential to unclog congested roads often goes overlooked. How can cities gain support for implementing priority measures aimed at improving the operation of transit and the efficiency of the road network?\n\nIn this episode of Researching Transit, James Reynolds of Monash University\u2019s Public Transport Research Group explains the notion of incrementalism in the context of transport planning. Mixing engineering with public policy has allowed James to recognise that technical solutions without political will are destined to languish.\n\n\u201cIt\u2019s not just the amount of [transit] priority that matters, but the legitimacy, and how much is legitimate\u201d. \n\nJames offers three main approaches \u2013 and some pragmatic strategies \u2013 to achieve legitimacy in transit priority. Drawing on case studies from Toronto, Melbourne and Curitiba, James explains how transport planners are already achieving success by using these pragmatic strategies to implement transit priority, and that the missing element has largely been a lack of links to public policy analysis and legitimacy theory, which provide the formal language and understanding to describe these types of approaches in transport planning.\n\nFor more on transit priority and related public policy research, James recommends:\n\u2022\tMarsden and Reardon (2017) Questions of governance: rethinking the study of transportation policy, discussion to much techno-rationalism, and a lack of engagement with social sciences and politics, in transport research;\n\u2022\tLindblom (1959) The science of "muddling through", on incrementalism\n\u2022\tLindblom (1979) Still muddling, not yet through, refining incrementalism into three types \n\u2022\tReynolds et al. (2017) Moving beyond techno-rationalism: new models of transit priority implementation, applying public policy analysis to transit priority\n\u2022\tReynolds et al. (2018) Top-down versus bottom-up perspectives on streetcar priority, comparing the effectiveness of different policy implementation approaches in Melbourne\n\nVideos of presentations about the research:\no\tPTRG Transport Research Series: on pragmatic strategies for practitioners. https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLdKZm70C8JtUhxmdHtdcc_gZ0n6xsP68G\no\tPhD project final review seminar: on three main approaches: (1) building legitimacy before implementation; (2) avoiding impacts on other road users; and (3) building legitimacy through implementation; and eight pragmatic strategies https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLdKZm70C8JtUkhuBkq5Jt4pvRYIQitfpi\n\nLearn more about the three different roles for public transport in a city\u2019s transport policy of: 1) providing for social transport needs, 2) peak-period congestion relief, and/or 3) as a replacement for the car; in a chapter by Professor Graham Currie (2016) in Handbook on transport and urban planning in the developed world.\n\nTheme music for this episode is from https://www.purple-planet.com