From Mobility To Accessibility

In From Mobility to Accessibility, an expert team of researchers flips the tables on the standard models for evaluating regional transportation performance. Jonathan Levine, Joe Grengs, and Louis A. Merlin argue for an "accessibility shift" whereby transportation planning, and the transportation dimensions of land-use planning, would be based on people's ability to reach destinations, rather than on their ability to travel fast. Existing models for planning and evaluating transportation, which have taken vehicle speeds as the most important measure, would make sense if movement were the purpose of transportation. But it is the ability to reach destinations, not movement per se, that people seek from their transportation systems. While the concept of accessibility has been around for the better part of a century, From Mobility to Accessibility shows that the accessibility shift is compelled by the fundamental purpose of transportation. The book argues that the shift would be transformative to the practice of both transportation and land-use planning but is impeded by many conceptual obstacles regarding the nature of accessibility and its potential for guiding development of the built environment. By redefining success in transportation, the book provides city planners, decisionmakers, and scholars a path to reforming the practice of transportation and land-use planning in modern cities and metropolitan areas.

A new way forward for sustainable quality of life in cities of all sizes Strong Towns: A Bottom-Up Revolution to Build American Prosperity is a book of forward-thinking ideas that breaks with modern wisdom to present a new vision of urban development in the United States. Presenting the foundational ideas of the Strong Towns movement he co-founded, Charles Marohn explains why cities of all sizes continue to struggle to meet their basic needs, and reveals the new paradigm that can solve this longstanding problem. Inside, you’ll learn why inducing growth and development has been the conventional response to urban financial struggles—and why it just doesn’t work. New development and high-risk investing don’t generate enough wealth to support itself, and cities continue to struggle. Read this book to find out how cities large and small can focus on bottom-up investments to minimize risk and maximize their ability to strengthen the community financially and improve citizens’ quality of life. Develop in-depth knowledge of the underlying logic behind the “traditional” search for never-ending urban growth Learn practical solutions for ameliorating financial struggles through low-risk investment and a grassroots focus Gain insights and tools that can stop the vicious cycle of budget shortfalls and unexpected downturns Become a part of the Strong Towns revolution by shifting the focus away from top-down growth toward rebuilding American prosperity Strong Towns acknowledges that there is a problem with the American approach to growth and shows community leaders a new way forward. The Strong Towns response is a revolution in how we assemble the places we live.

"Beyond Mobility" also seeks to rethink how projects are planned and designed in cities and suburbs at multiple geographic scales, from micro-designs such as parklets to corridors and city-regions. The book closes with a reflection on the opportunities and challenges in moving beyond mobility, with attention to emerging technologies such as self-driving cars and ride-hailing services and social equity topics such as accessibility, livability, and affordability.

Focusing from the perspective of the user, Urban Mobility Design investigates how designed mobility and design processes can respond to and drive the emerging social and technological disruptions in the passenger transport sector. Profound technological advances are changing the mobility expectations of city populations around the world. Transportation design is an under represented research area of urban transportation planning. Urban Mobility Design addresses this gap, providing research-based analysis on current and future needs of urban transportation passengers. The book examines mobility from a uniquely multidisciplinary perspective, involving a variety of innovative design and transportation planning approaches. Examines urban mobility from a new perspective Coherently combines current research and practice in transport design, technology, mobility, user behaviour experience, and cultural analysis Utilizes hands-on experiences with transportation manufacturers, transit operators and engineers to bring a practical view on today’s mobility challenges Shows how design approaches to problem solving can influence travel behaviour and improve passenger experience

Text Entry Systems covers different aspects of text entry systems and offers prospective researchers and developers global guidelines for conducting research on text entry, in terms of design strategy, evaluation methodology, and requirements; a discussion of the history and current state of the art of entry systems; and specific guidelines for designing entry systems for a specific target, depending on devices, modalities, language, and different physical conditions of users. Text entry has never been so important as it is today. This is in large part due to the phenomenal, relatively recent success of mobile computing, text messaging on mobile phones, and the proliferation of small devices like the Blackberry and Palm Pilot. Compared with the recent past, when text entry was primarily through the standard "qwerty" keyboard, people today use a diverse array of devices with the number and variety of such devices ever increasing. The variety is not just in the devices, but also in the technologies used: entry modalities have become more varied and include speech recognition and synthesis, handwriting recognition, and even eye-tracking using image processing on web-cams. Statistical language modeling has advanced greatly in the past ten years and so therein is potential to facilitate and improve text entry — increasingly, the way people communicate. This book covers different aspects of text entry systems and offers prospective researchers and developers Global guidelines for conducting research on text entry, in terms of design strategy, evaluation methodology, and requirements History and current state of the art of entry systems, including coverage of recent research topics Specific guidelines for designing entry systems for a specific target, depending on devices, modalities, language, and different physical conditions of users

This international volume explores the transformations of public space and public transport in response to COVID-19, both those resulting from official governmental regulations and from everyday practices of urban citizens. The contributors discuss how the virus made urban inequalities clearer, and redefined public spaces in the “new normal”.

The growth of global urbanization places great strains on energy, transportation, housing and public spaces needs. As such, transport and land use are inextricably linked. Urban Form and Accessibility: Social, Economic, and Environment Impacts consolidates key insights from multidisciplinary perspectives on the relationship between urban form and transportation planning. Synthesizing the latest cutting-edge research, the book translates academic evidence into practice. Starting with an overview of the key concepts relevant to each discipline, the book covers critical elements such as governance, travel behavior, and technological disruption, showing how to move towards a more sustainable society for all city inhabitants. Draws on evidence-based success stories from countries around the globe Gathers global leading thinkers to provide the state-of-the-art on the topic Examines social, economic, and environmental impacts within each chapter Each chapter’s content will have the same structure for easier discoverability

The New Companion to Urban Design continues the assemblage of rich and critical ideas about urban form and design that began with the Companion to Urban Design (Routledge, 2011). With chapters from a new set of contributors, this sequel offers a more comparative perspective representing multiple voices and perspectives from the Global South. The essays in this volume are organized in three parts: Part I: Comparative Urbanism; Part II: Challenges; and Part III: Opportunities. Each part contains distinct sections designed to address specific themes, and includes a list of annotated suggested further readings at the end of each chapter. Part I: Comparative Urbanism examines different variants of urbanism in the Global North and the Global South, produced by a new economic order characterized by the mobility of labor, capital, information, and technology. Part II: Challenges discusses some of the contemporary challenges that cities of the Global North and the Global South are facing and the possible role of urban design. This part discusses spatial claims and conflicts, challenges generated by urban informality, explosive growth or dramatic shrinkage of the urban settlement, gentrification and displacement, and mimesis, simulacra and lack of authenticity. Part III: Aspirations discusses some normative goals that urban design interventions aspire to bring about in cities of the Global North and the Global South. These include resilience and sustainability, health, conservation/restoration, justice, intelligence, access and mobility, and arts and culture. The New Companion to Urban Design is primarily intended for scholars and graduate students interested in cities and their built environment. It offers an invaluable and up-to-date guide to current thinking across a range of disciplines including urban design, planning, urban studies, and geography.