Planning travel as everyday design

This paper examines the implications of conceptualising planning as a type of design activity. This is explored through results from a two-month field study that investigated the planning and decision making behaviour of people engaged in preparing for multipoint, international air travel. Planning travel is a type of ill-structured complex problem that is characterised as being temporally sporadic, sometimes synchronous, often asynchronous, frequently collaborative, and spatially varied with participants at different times co-located and in separate places. Research participants were professional travel agents and non-professional but experienced travel planners. Ancillary material collected included photographs of the planning situation and drawings and notes made by participants. In contrast to the formalised prescriptive planning models common in cognitive science and operations research, the everyday planning activity featured in this study is situated and naturalistic. This research is undertaken with a view to designing systems to support the design and decision making activity of travel planners. Copyright the author(s) and CHISIG

Moving on : the role of transport in the everyday mobilities of children and young people in urban Australia

This grounded study explores the role of transport, broadly conceived, in shaping and differentiating the everyday mobilities of children and young people in contemporary urban Australia. Drawing on approaches from across urban, transport and children and young people’s geographies, and the sociology of mobilities, the research investigated the everyday travel of 82 children, aged 9 to 12 years, and 176 young people, aged 13 to 15 years, living in Blacktown, Western Sydney who described their use of transport to a range of educational, social, cultural and recreational activities. Blacktown epitomises many aspects of urban Australia. Blacktown is a local government area with a large, rapidly growing, comparatively youthful, culturally and socially diverse population of more than 300,000 people. It has a variety of urban forms and is serviced by a mix of public transport, local buses and rapid bus transit ways, and the metropolitan road and rail networks. The research was conducted in government schools (five secondary and three primary schools) located in five different neighbourhoods. The neighbourhoods were distinguished by their location in relation to the Blacktown city centre, urban form and socio-economic characteristics. The research adopted a child-focussed methodology and a mixed method design. A variety of quantitative and qualitative data was derived from classroom discussions, local area walking tours with photography, video recordings, individual drawings, maps, travel and activity diaries and interviews. From the materials produced this thesis illustrates how children and young people are negotiating their everyday mobilities afforded by the available transport network as well as by the dynamics of their own households. It argues that children’s and young people’s ‘everyday mobilities’ are irreducibly situated within the context of their households and urban spaces, which must be better understood and adequately addressed in policy and planning to achieve a more age-responsive, socially-inclusive urban transport policy and planning

Moving on : the role of transport in the everyday mobilities of children and young people in urban Australia

This grounded study explores the role of transport, broadly conceived, in shaping and differentiating the everyday mobilities of children and young people in contemporary urban Australia. Drawing on approaches from across urban, transport and children and young people’s geographies, and the sociology of mobilities, the research investigated the everyday travel of 82 children, aged 9 to 12 years, and 176 young people, aged 13 to 15 years, living in Blacktown, Western Sydney who described their use of transport to a range of educational, social, cultural and recreational activities. Blacktown epitomises many aspects of urban Australia. Blacktown is a local government area with a large, rapidly growing, comparatively youthful, culturally and socially diverse population of more than 300,000 people. It has a variety of urban forms and is serviced by a mix of public transport, local buses and rapid bus transit ways, and the metropolitan road and rail networks. The research was conducted in government schools (five secondary and three primary schools) located in five different neighbourhoods. The neighbourhoods were distinguished by their location in relation to the Blacktown city centre, urban form and socio-economic characteristics. The research adopted a child-focussed methodology and a mixed method design. A variety of quantitative and qualitative data was derived from classroom discussions, local area walking tours with photography, video recordings, individual drawings, maps, travel and activity diaries and interviews. From the materials produced this thesis illustrates how children and young people are negotiating their everyday mobilities afforded by the available transport network as well as by the dynamics of their own households. It argues that children’s and young people’s ‘everyday mobilities’ are irreducibly situated within the context of their households and urban spaces, which must be better understood and adequately addressed in policy and planning to achieve a more age-responsive, socially-inclusive urban transport policy and planning

Encounters in motion: considerations of time and social justice in urban mobility research

This chapter investigates the qualities of urban travel time by looking at daily mobilities as time-spaces of social encounter. Following the ‘new mobilities paradigm’, we regard everyday urban mobility not only as a ‘means to an end’ but also as an ‘end in itself’. This implies a move from instrumental, utilitarian and deterministic understandings of travel time towards a holistic conceptualisation of urban mobility that calls for the embedding of social qualities of travel in urban planning and design. We argue that urban public transport networks are political sites of the everyday wherein emancipatory and discriminatory practices are not only enacted but also reshaped through different events, encounters and processes. Hence, we challenge traditional time-saving strategies in transport appraisal and call for a more complex and politicised approach to time in policy-making that would highlight a socially just consideration of speed, efficiency and qualitative aspects of urban travel

Program your city: Designing an urban integrated open data API

Cities accumulate and distribute vast sets of digital information. Many decision-making and planning processes in councils, local governments and organisations are based on both real-time and historical data. Until recently, only a small, carefully selected subset of this information has been released to the public – usually for specific purposes (e.g. train timetables, release of planning application through websites to name just a few). This situation is however changing rapidly. Regulatory frameworks, such as the Freedom of Information Legislation in the US, the UK, the European Union and many other countries guarantee public access to data held by the state. One of the results of this legislation and changing attitudes towards open data has been the widespread release of public information as part of recent Government 2.0 initiatives. This includes the creation of public data catalogues such as data.gov.au (U.S.), data.gov.uk (U.K.), data.gov.au (Australia) at federal government levels, and datasf.org (San Francisco) and data.london.gov.uk (London) at municipal levels. The release of this data has opened up the possibility of a wide range of future applications and services which are now the subject of intensified research efforts. Previous research endeavours have explored the creation of specialised tools to aid decision-making by urban citizens, councils and other stakeholders (Calabrese, Kloeckl & Ratti, 2008; Paulos, Honicky & Hooker, 2009). While these initiatives represent an important step towards open data, they too often result in mere collections of data repositories. Proprietary database formats and the lack of an open application programming interface (API) limit the full potential achievable by allowing these data sets to be cross-queried. Our research, presented in this paper, looks beyond the pure release of data. It is concerned with three essential questions: First, how can data from different sources be integrated into a consistent framework and made accessible? Second, how can ordinary citizens be supported in easily composing data from different sources in order to address their specific problems? Third, what are interfaces that make it easy for citizens to interact with data in an urban environment? How can data be accessed and collected

Understanding temporal rhythms and travel behaviour at destinations: Potential ways to achieve more sustainable travel

This paper analyses the roles played by time in destination-based travel behaviour. It contrasts clock time's linear view of time with fragmented time, instantaneous time, fluid time and flow, time out and the multiple temporalities of tourism experiences. It explores temporal issues in a destination travel context, using qualitative techniques. Data were captured using diary photography, diary-interview method with tourists at a rural destination; their spatial and temporal patterns were captured using a purpose built smartphone app. The analysis revealed three temporal themes influencing travel behaviour: time fluidity; daily and place-related rhythms; and control of time. Three key messages emerge for future sustainable tourist destination-based travel systems. Given the strong desire for temporal fluidity, transport systems should evolve beyond clock-time regimes. Second, temporal forces favour personal modes of transport (car, walk, cycle), especially in rural areas where public transport cannot offer flexibility. Third, the car is personalised and perceived to optimise travel fluidity and speed, but is currently unsustainable. Imaginative initiatives, using new mobile media technology can offer new positive and proactive car travel, utilising spare public and private vehicle capacity. Research is needed to implement mechanisms for individualised space-time scheduling and collective vehicle use strategies. © 2013 Copyright Taylor and Francis Group, LLC

"Driven to distraction?" Children's experiences of car travel

This is an Author's Accepted Manuscript of an article published in volume, 4, issue 1, pages 59-76 in Mobilities 2009. Copyright @ 2009 Taylor & Francis, available online at: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17450100802657962.Cars have become increasingly significant features in the lives of many children and adults in the UK and elsewhere. Whilst there is a growing body of research considering how adults experience automobility, that is the increasingly central role of cars within societies, there has been little equivalent research exploring children's perspectives. Drawing upon a variety of methods including personal diaries, photographs, in‐depth interviews and surveys amongst schools within Buckinghamshire and North London, the paper contributes to filling this gap in existing research through exploring how cars are not only journey spaces for children, but are also sites for play, relaxation, homework, companionship, technology and the consumption of commodities. Using a Foucauldian analysis of power, insights into wider familial processes relating to mobility are provided by exploring how cars are sites of conflicting power relations between parents and children. The paper also explores how children's everyday experiences of cars were framed by wider sets of power relations, including car corporations which design and manufacture these spaces, and the role of capital which commodifies everyday activities in cars. In doing so, the paper challenges existing research on automobility for only focusing upon adults' experiences of cars and begins to theorise a more inclusive account of automobility which incorporates children and young people

Understanding walking and cycling:summary of key findings and recommendations

It is widely recognized that there is a need to increase levels of active and sustainable travel in British urban areas. The Understanding Walking and Cycling (UWAC) project, funded by the EPSRC, has examined the factors influencing everyday travel decisions and proposes a series of policy measures to increase levels of walking and cycling for short trips in urban areas. A wide range of both quantitative and qualitative data were collected in four English towns (Lancaster, Leeds, Leicester and Worcester), including a questionnaire survey, spatial analysis of the built environment, interviews (static and whilst mobile) and detailed ethnographies. Key findings of the research are that whilst attitudes to walking and cycling are mostly positive or neutral, many people who would like to engage in more active travel fail to do so due to a combination of factors. These can be summarised as: Concerns about the physical environment, especially with regard to safety when walking or cycling; The difficulty of fitting walking and cycling into complex household routines (especially with young children); The perception that walking and cycling are in some ways abnormal things to do. It is suggested that policies to increase levels of walking and cycling should focus not only on improving infrastructure (for instance through fully segregated cycle routes along main roads and restriction on vehicle speeds), but also must tackle broader social, economic, cultural and legal factors that currently inhibit walking and cycling. Together, such changes can create an environment in which driving for short trips in urban areas is seen as abnormal and walking or cycling seem the obvious choices. A joint project by by Lancaster University, Oxford Brookes University and the University of Leeds

Probabilistic Hybrid Action Models for Predicting Concurrent Percept-driven Robot Behavior

This article develops Probabilistic Hybrid Action Models (PHAMs), a realistic causal model for predicting the behavior generated by modern percept-driven robot plans. PHAMs represent aspects of robot behavior that cannot be represented by most action models used in AI planning: the temporal structure of continuous control processes, their non-deterministic effects, several modes of their interferences, and the achievement of triggering conditions in closed-loop robot plans. The main contributions of this article are: (1) PHAMs, a model of concurrent percept-driven behavior, its formalization, and proofs that the model generates probably, qualitatively accurate predictions; and (2) a resource-efficient inference method for PHAMs based on sampling projections from probabilistic action models and state descriptions. We show how PHAMs can be applied to planning the course of action of an autonomous robot office courier based on analytical and experimental results

‘Walking ... just walking’: how children and young people’s everyday pedestrian practices matter

In this paper we consider the importance of ‘walking… just walking’ for many children and young people’s everyday lives. We will show how, in our research with 175 9-16-year-olds living in new urban developments in south-east England, some particular (daily, taken-for-granted, ostensibly aimless) forms of walking were central to the lives, experiences and friendships of most children and young people. The main body of the paper highlights key characteristics of these walking practices, and their constitutive role in these children and young people’s social and cultural geography. Over the course of the paper we will argue that ‘everyday pedestrian practices’ (after Middleton 2010, 2011) like these require us to think critically about two bodies of geographical and social scientific research. On one hand, we will argue that the large body of research on children’s spatial range and independent mobility could be conceptually enlivened and extended to acknowledge bodily, social, sociotechnical and habitual practices. On the other hand, we will suggest that the empirical details of such practices should prompt critical reflection upon the wonderfully rich, multidisciplinary vein of conceptualisation latterly termed ‘new walking studies’ (Lorimer 2011). Indeed, in conclusion we shall argue that the theoretical vivacity of walking studies, and the concerns of more applied empirical approaches such as work on children’s independent mobility, could productively be interrelated. In so doing we open out a wider challenge to social and cultural geographers, to expedite this kind of interrelation in other research contexts