How to Build Support for Transforming Transport In Car-Dependent Regions
Key Takeaways
- One of the biggest challenges in transport is successfully evolving a region away from car-dependency.
- To do this successfully, you need to leverage things that the community will support and then build on them.
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Tactics to progress include:
- Developing a vision for the centre of your region.
- Implement car-free days for your centre.
- Parking management and reduction.
- Moving public transport from prioritising coverage to including some very reliable, frequent and fast routes.
- Leveraging schools using school streets and bike buses.
- Implementing slower, low-traffic neighbourhoods.
- Building active travel infrastructure networks.
- Leveraging the sharing economy.
- Developing travel behaviour change programs.
- As well as transport, you will also need to focus on the land use of your region. This will need to consider frameworks like the 15-minute region concept and approaches to gentle densification.
- There is no one-size-fits-all; you will need to tailor to your local context.
What Next?
I am hosting a free 1-hour webinar to discuss this blog in more detail. If you are interested in attending, just reply or write to me at russell@transportlc.org
Introduction
One of the things that makes Transport so interesting to me is its multifaceted nature; there are numerous aspects to consider and improve. However, this creates a dilemma: what do you choose to work on?
When deciding this, a good question to ask is, what are the most important problems in transport? Some people will cite congestion, others will emphasise sustainability, and others will focus on ending car dependency.
However, for me, the biggest challenge is gaining community and political support for the changes we need to make to our transport systems.
Todayβs blog, therefore, focuses on that challenge. However, for today, I am not going to focus on the most congested places, large cities. Instead, I am going to focus on areas where congestion is (at least not yet) really bad.
Picture this: your town is pleasant enough, with a charming centre that once bustled with activity. People can still get around, traffic isn't terrible most days, and there's a sense that things are "working." But underneath this surface calm, warning signs are emerging. The morning school run is becoming increasingly chaotic. Finding a parking spot in the centre requires more patience each month. Young families are choosing to drive to out-of-town shopping centres rather than walk to local businesses. The bus service exists, but it's mainly for those who have no other choice.
Sound familiar? This is the reality for countless towns and small cities, places caught in the awkward middle ground between rural simplicity and urban complexity. You're not yet facing the gridlock crises that force dramatic action in major cities, but you can see the trajectory. Population growth projections suggest congestion will worsen. Your community's car dependency is quietly undermining the very places that give your town its character.
The traditional response has been to accommodate more cars: wider roads, bigger car parks, new bypasses. Yet this approach consistently fails to deliver the thriving, livable communities people actually want. Instead, it often accelerates the decline of town centres while making everywhere else less pleasant to walk or cycle.
But here's the challenge: unlike major cities where transport congestion creates political mandates for change, your community likely sees no urgent need to transform. Most residents are reasonably satisfied with their car-dependent lifestyles. Proposing radical changes, like pedestrianising the main street or removing lots of parking, could face significant resistance.
So what's the alternative? The answer lies in working with your community rather than against it. This means starting with changes people can support and building momentum from there.
This approach recognises that lasting transport transformation requires community buy-in. The good news is that when people see new approaches working, they become advocates for more change.
The following strategies provide a roadmap for this gradual transformation. The exact playbook will depend on the local context, but these will apply in many contexts. None of them require revolutionary changes or massive upfront investments. Instead, they build on each other, creating a virtuous cycle where early wins generate support for more ambitious improvements.
Focus on Your Centre
Your town or city centre is your secret weapon for building support for transport change. Unlike abstract discussions about "sustainable mobility" or "modal shift," almost everyone has strong feelings about their local centre. They remember when it was more vibrant, worry about empty shops, and want it to succeed. This shared concern creates the perfect entry point for transformation.
Start with Place, Not Transport
The key is to begin with a vision that focuses on place-making rather than transport policy. Instead of proposing bike lanes or bus priority, start conversations about what would make the centre a destination people actively choose to visit. What would make it feel alive, safe, and enjoyable? What would bring families back for weekend strolls or evening meals?
When communities envision their ideal centre, they naturally describe places that are pleasant to walk through, where children can play safely, where you can sit and watch the world go by. They imagine bustling sidewalks, outdoor dining, community events, and spaces that feel human-scaled rather than dominated by traffic and parking. Without realising it, they're describing places that prioritise people over cars.
This approach gives you permission to start making changes that support a move away from car dependency, because you're not imposing a transport agenda; you're delivering on the community's own vision for their centre.
Protect What Matters
Once you have community buy-in for a thriving centre, you can introduce policies that protect this vision from being undermined. This means taking a hard look at land use decisions that embed car dependency and gradually chip away at the centre's vitality.
The most important step is reforming your approach to new retail and commercial development. Every time you approve a new shopping centre with vast parking lots, you're making it harder for the centre to compete. These developments don't just draw customers away; they normalise car-dependent shopping patterns that are difficult to reverse.
Start by removing parking minimums from your planning regulations. These requirements, often decades old, compel developers to provide more parking than the market demands, making developments more expensive and less attractive.
For existing developments with oversized parking lots, create incentives for conversion. Rezone these properties to permit residential or mixed-use development, making it financially attractive for owners to transform underutilised parking spaces into living, working, or community areas. Each conversion reduces the total parking supply while adding to the centre's vibrancy.
Build Business Support
Success depends on getting local businesses on board, but this requires addressing their legitimate concerns about accessibility and customer convenience. Many business owners have been conditioned to believe that easy car access equals commercial success, even when evidence suggests otherwise.
Start by listening to their specific challenges. Often, business owners are frustrated by the current parking situation, customers circle blocks looking for spaces, commuters block loading zones, and the parking regime creates barriers rather than supporting commerce. These problems create an opening for solutions.
Share examples of how other similar centres have thrived by prioritising pedestrians and cyclists. Show them data on how walkable areas typically have higher sales per square foot, longer dwell times, and more repeat customers. Help them understand that people who walk or cycle to the centre often spend more money than those who drive, because they're more likely to make multiple stops and spontaneous purchases.
When businesses feel heard and involved in planning, they're more likely to become advocates for improvements rather than obstacles.
Create Quick Wins
While working on longer-term policy changes, look for opportunities to demonstrate what's possible through temporary interventions. These include tactical urbanism projects, market days or festivals, as well as improved street furniture and lighting.
These interventions cost relatively little but can shift perceptions about what the centre could become. They also provide concrete examples when discussing more permanent changes.
The goal is to create a centre that people genuinely want to visit. When your centre becomes a destination rather than just a collection of shops, the transport improvements needed to support it become not just acceptable, but actively demanded by the community.
Parking
Parking is often one of the most contentious aspects of transport policy, but it's also one of the most powerful tools for change. The way you manage parking shapes everything from traffic patterns to business viability to community character. Get it right, and you create a virtuous cycle of improvement. Get it wrong, and you'll undermine every other effort to reduce car dependency.
The Hidden Costs of "Free" Parking
Many town centres suffer from parking that's either free or drastically underpriced. This might seem community-friendly, but it creates a cascade of problems. Cheap parking encourages driving for even short trips, generates traffic as people look for spaces, and means prime property is devoted to storing cars rather than creating economic value.
Free parking also creates a tragedy of the commons. The first arrivals, often long-term parkers like commuters or business owners, occupy the most convenient spaces all day, forcing customers to circle blocks or give up entirely. This isn't just inconvenient; it's economically destructive for local businesses.
The solution lies in Donald Shoup's elegantly simple parking principles: price parking so that roughly one space per block remains available (around 80% occupancy), and invest the revenue in visible improvements to the area. This approach transforms parking from a source of frustration into a tool for enhancement.
For government-owned car parks, properly priced parking often reveals that demand was artificially inflated. This creates opportunities to convert some parking areas into more valuable uses, such as housing, public space, or commercial space that generates ongoing economic activity rather than just storing vehicles.
The Parking Space Levy
Where local government has the authority, a Parking Space Levy can be transformative. This annual charge on all parking spaces in a defined area creates multiple benefits simultaneously.
First, it generates substantial revenue that can fund public transport improvements, cycling infrastructure, or centre enhancements. Second, it incentivises parking space owners to reduce supply, naturally constraining car access. Third, it encourages free private parking to be priced, supporting the broader pricing strategy.
Car-Free Days
Car-free days are a powerful tool for shifting perceptions about what your centre could become. They provide a risk-free way to demonstrate the potential of pedestrian-priority spaces while building community support for permanent changes.
Begin with a single car-free day, perhaps coinciding with a local festival or market. Close key streets to traffic, allowing only pedestrians and cyclists. The transformation is usually immediate and dramatic; spaces that felt dominated by cars suddenly become places for conversation, play, and discovery.
If the first car-free day is successful (and it almost always is), the community will often ask for more. This creates a natural progression, perhaps monthly car-free days, then weekly, then consideration of permanent pedestrianisation.
Each event builds familiarity with the concept while demonstrating growing community support. Local businesses typically become strong advocates once they see the increased foot traffic and sales that car-free days often generate.
Use these events to showcase public transport options, perhaps running special services or offering free rides to the car-free area. This helps people experience alternatives to driving while associating public transport with positive community events.
As car-free days become regular occurrences, permanent pedestrianisation starts to feel natural rather than radical. The community has experienced the benefits repeatedly, and local businesses have seen the economic advantages.
Public Transport
Traditional public transport planning in car-dependent areas focuses on coverage, ensuring service reaches as many areas as possible, even if infrequently. This approach seems equitable, but often fails everyone. Routes become circuitous to serve more stops, journey times become uncompetitive with driving, and the service attracts minimal ridership.
Start by identifying corridors with the highest potential ridership, typically routes connecting residential areas to the centre, major employers, or education facilities. These become your foundation routes that receive the most investment and attention.
For these core routes, aim for service every 10 minutes or better during peak periods. This frequency transforms the user experience because people can simply show up rather than planning around timetables. It also provides resilience; if one bus is delayed, the next one follows shortly.
Invest in infrastructure that makes these services fast and reliable. This means dedicated bus lanes where possible, priority at traffic signals, and high-quality stops with real-time information. These improvements might seem controversial initially, but they're essential for creating services that compete with driving.
Rather than trying to upgrade all routes simultaneously, focus on making a few routes genuinely excellent. Success breeds success, as ridership grows on a few core routes, you can do the same for other routes.
Leveraging Schools
Schools are uniquely powerful allies in transforming transport culture. Parents across the political spectrum share common concerns about their children's safety, health, and independence. This creates opportunities to implement changes that might face resistance in other contexts, while simultaneously building long-term support for active transport.
The daily school run has become a microcosm of broader transport problems. Parents drive their children to school partly for convenience, but increasingly out of safety concerns created by... other parents driving their children to school. This creates a self-reinforcing cycle where each additional car makes walking and cycling feel less safe, encouraging more parents to drive.
This crisis creates an opening for change. When parents see their children struggling with traffic, pollution, and stress at school gates, they become receptive to solutions that seemed radical in other contexts.
School Streets
School streets represent one of the most successful transport interventions of recent years. By restricting vehicle access to roads outside schools during drop-off and pick-up times, they create immediate improvements in safety, air quality, and quality of life.
Start with schools where there's already parent demand or where safety concerns are particularly acute. Look for schools with strong parent associations that can champion the initiative and help with implementation. The first school street often generates requests from other schools, creating organic demand for expansion.
Bike Buses
Bike buses transform cycling from an individual transport choice into a community activity. Groups of children and adults cycle together to school on planned routes with designated stops, creating safety through visibility and numbers.
The concept addresses parents' primary concerns about cycling, safety and logistics. Children travel in supervised groups on predetermined routes, making the journey safer and more social than individual cycling. Parents can take turns leading or accompanying the group, sharing the responsibility while building community connections.
Slower, Low Traffic Neighbourhoods
Low Traffic Neighbourhoods (LTNs) and slow streets represent a fundamental shift in how we think about residential roads. Instead of prioritising vehicle movement, they prioritise the needs of residents, children playing, neighbours socialising, people exercising, and everyone moving safely on foot or by bike.
LTNs use modal filters like planters, bollards, or cameras to prevent through-traffic while maintaining access for residents. They increase walking and cycling while reducing car ownership over time. They create environments where active travel feels safe and pleasant, encouraging mode shift that extends beyond the immediate neighbourhood.
Start with pilot areas that can demonstrate benefits and build support for wider implementation. Success in one neighbourhood often generates requests from others, creating organic demand for expansion.
For areas where full LTNs might face resistance, individual slow streets offer a less controversial starting point. These interventions focus on reducing vehicle speeds to 30km/h (20mph) while maintaining through access.
Active Travel Infrastructure
The biggest mistake in active travel infrastructure is building isolated facilities that don't connect to anywhere useful.
Successful active travel infrastructure creates continuous, connected networks that link the places people actually want to go. This means identifying key desire lines, the routes people naturally want to take between home, work, school, shops, and recreation facilities.
Start by mapping existing pedestrian and cycling patterns. Where do people already walk and cycle, even if infrastructure is poor? These routes represent proven demand and often show the most immediate benefits when infrastructure improves.
Leveraging the Sharing Economy
The sharing economy offers powerful tools for reducing car dependency by providing access to mobility without the burden of ownership. Car share, bike share, scooter share and car pooling services can fill crucial gaps in the transport network while helping people transition away from private car ownership.
Car Share: Reducing the Need for Private Vehicles
Car share works best in areas with sufficient density and mixed land use, typically your town centre and surrounding neighbourhoods. Members can access vehicles on-demand for trips where cars are genuinely necessary, without the costs and commitments of ownership.
Bike Share: Extending Active Travel's Reach
Bike share systems work particularly well for short trips in relatively flat areas with good cycling infrastructure. They're ideal for connecting public transport stops to final destinations, or for trips where cycling one-way is convenient but cycling back is less appealing.
Scooter Share: Filling the Last-Mile Gap
Electric scooter share can be particularly effective for "last-mile" connections. They're faster than walking for medium distances, but don't require the infrastructure investment of bike share systems. However, scooter share requires careful management to avoid creating safety hazards or streetscape problems.
Car Pooling: Maximising Vehicle Efficiency
Car pooling represents one of the most accessible entry points into shared mobility, requiring minimal infrastructure investment while delivering immediate benefits. Unlike car share services that require new business models, car pooling leverages existing vehicles and can work in lower-density areas where other sharing services struggle.
Behaviour Change Programs
Effective behaviour change programs combine information with practical support and infrastructure improvements. They address the real barriers people face while providing the knowledge and confidence needed to try new travel options.
Land Use Planning
Transport and land use are inextricably linked. No amount of transport investment can overcome land use patterns that make car travel essential for accessing basic services. Conversely, thoughtful land use planning can make walking, cycling, and public transport not just possible but preferred for many journeys.
The 15-Minute Neighbourhood Concept
The 15-minute neighbourhood concept envisions places where residents can access most of their daily needs within a 15-minute walk or bike ride. This doesn't mean every neighbourhood needs every service, but rather that people can meet most regular needs, groceries, healthcare, education, recreation, through active travel.
Gentle Densification Strategies
Gentle densification, gradually increasing housing density while maintaining neighbourhood character, supports sustainable transport by creating the population levels needed for viable public transport and local services.
This might involve allowing secondary suites in single-family homes, permitting small-scale apartment buildings in residential areas, or converting large single-family lots into multiple smaller homes. The key is to increase density gradually and sensitively, maintaining the qualities that make neighbourhoods attractive while creating more sustainable settlement patterns.
Strategic Commercial Development
Control the location and design of new commercial development to support rather than undermine sustainable transport. Large-format retail with extensive parking, particularly on urban peripheries, makes car travel essential while undermining walkable neighbourhood centres.
Using Developer Contributions Strategically
Developer contributions can provide crucial funding for transport infrastructure, but use them strategically to support sustainable transport rather than simply accommodating more cars. Prioritise funding for public transport improvements, active travel infrastructure and public realm improvements.
Avoid using developer contributions primarily for road widening or additional parking, which typically generates more traffic and undermines other transport improvements.
Conclusion
The path away from car dependency in many regions wonβt work through revolutionary upheaval or overnight transformation. It requires something far more challenging: patience, persistence, and the political skill to bring communities along on the journey.
The strategies outlined above work because they recognise people need to see and experience benefits before they'll support more ambitious improvements. When residents witness their centre becoming more vibrant through car-free days, when parents see their children cycling safely to school, when businesses discover that pedestrian-friendly streets actually increase foot traffic, they become advocates for further change.
This approach requires listening carefully to community concerns, starting with changes that align with people's existing values, and proving that alternatives to car dependency can enhance rather than restrict their lives. It means celebrating small wins while keeping sight of the bigger transformation you're working toward.
The communities that succeed in this transformation will be places that people genuinely love, places that create joy, connection, and a sense of belonging. And that's something worth the long journey to achieve.