Access and Safety in European Cities
On accessibility, the project will develop a global tool for urban accessibility metrics that can be used to compare access to employment, goods, services and other opportunities across cities. It will look beyond traditional measures for access such as travel time savings, congestion relief or infrastructure availability. Instead, it will use standardised, easily available data to create a set of indicators that measure access by public transport, car, bicycle and walking to public services (schools, hospitals), amenities (green space, waterfront), consumption (supermarkets, restaurants, shops) and recreational opportunities (e.g. theatres, tourist attractions). Indicators will be available for a large range of European cities as well as some non-European cities.
On safety, the project will develop indicators specifically for urban road safety to enable direct comparisons across European cities and urban regions. Differences in safety performance will be examined in the light of differing mobility patterns and road user behaviour. A number of case studies will describe how specific cities have succeeded in putting road safety high up on the political agenda and in delivering tangible results. The road safety dimension of the project is building on the International Transport Forum’s Safer City Streets network.