Final Report

From 1998 to 2001, the ECMT in co-ordination with the OECD conducted a

three-year study designed to identify why sustainable urban travel policy strate-

gies have proven so difficult for countries to implement, and, more generally, how

countries and cities can bridge the gap between policy recommendations and

their implementation.

This project on Implementing Sustainable Urban Travel Policies was com-

prised of three principal parts: a series of workshops on particular themes related

to sustainable urban travel; a survey of urban travel patterns and trends in over

160 cities, and a series of national urban travel policy reviews.

The starting point for this three-year project was the ECMT-OECD report

Urban Travel and Sustainable Development

(UTSD),* presented to Ministers at their 1994 Coun-

cil in Annecy and published in 1995, which set out a three-part integrated policy

strategy promoting combined implementation of measures designed to bring about

sustainable urban travel based on best practice, innovation, and pricing.

Ministers in Annecy asked ECMT to review country policies in several years’

time in light of the findings of the report. Whilst the recommendations set out in

UTSD have been well received, their implementation has proven easier said than

done for a great number of cities and countries.

The project on implementation has shown that countries are making progress

in developing policy schemes to confront congestion, urban sprawl and in tackling

the environmental problems associated with unsustainable urban travel patterns.

However the trends revealed in the survey and in the policy reviews show that

serious difficulties persist in putting these policy plans to work and in seeing the

impact of policy actions reflected in the data.

Drawing on the findings of the three principal elements of the project – the

workshops, the survey of cities, and the national policy reviews – this report aims

to examine how Governments, national governments in particular, can improve

opportunities for implementation of integrated policy strategies for sustainable urban travel.

* ECMT-OECD (1995)