This book maps out how to design better transport. Engineers measure success by speed and efficiency – but these are not the way that passengers think about a good trip. We choose how to travel, influenced not only by speed and time but by habit, status, comfort, variety – and many other factors that engineering equations don’t capture at all.
Christian Wolmar argues that autonomous cars are the wrong solution to the wrong problem. Even if the many technical difficulties that stand in the way of achieving a driverless future can be surmounted, autonomous cars are not the best way to address the problems of congestion and pollution caused by our long obsession with the private car.
This book offers a comprehensive overview of the transport system. It looks at how it has developed, at how it will need to evolve to meet our need for travel – sustainably and economically – and at what our options are for meeting those needs.
This book sets out the principles that could underpin a strategic policy for transport. Instead of focusing piecemeal on trying (and failing) to get from place to place ever faster, we need to think about how and where we want the economy to develop, and about how new the digital technologies can help achieve this.
If you have ever wondered why the roads are congested, the trains are full and the buses are no longer running, this book provides the answers. The UK has never had a proper transport policy and it desperately needs one to address the twin challengers of getting people around cheaply and safely, while safeguarding the environment.
