Rethinking working hours could radically change traffic patterns.GETTY IMAGES
Imagine a city where the ballet of brake lights never begins – where public transit glides reliably to its destination and “active transport lanes” hum with scooters, bikes and mobility aids, where people move in symphony and every necessity is within just a few minutes of home.
In reality, our city lives are defined by traffic congestion and we pay a heavy toll. In Ontario, gridlock costs an estimated $56.4-billion annually according to the Canadian Centre for Economic Analysis (CANCEA). That includes $12.8-billion in lost productivity and goods movement and $43.6-billion in reduced quality of life from stress, delays and lost time.
But urban thinkers see another way: cities designed for people, not cars. It sounds utopian, maybe even naïve, but these three urbanists say it’s achievable if city builders are willing to take bold steps and rethink the status quo.
Dedicated lanes for buses and bikes
“Traffic is often an indication of success, and you have to manage the consequences of success,” says Brent Toderian, a global advisor on city building, founder of Toderian UrbanWorks and former chief planner for Vancouver. “People want to be there. The question is, how are they getting there? And is it in a smart way or a dumb way?”
Toderian says it’s easy to be distracted by futuristic innovations like electric cars, drone delivery networks and hyperloops. “The real solutions are a lot less sexy and a lot more common sense,” he says. “It’s not about utopia. It’s about practicality in the context of the real challenges we face. Tech won’t save us if we get the fundamentals wrong.”
A separated cycling lane on Southwark Bridge in London, UK.GETTY IMAGES
For him, the key to a low-traffic, human-centred city is proximity – dense, mixed-use neighbourhoods or 15-minute communities where housing, work and amenities are close together. It’s about “creating less car dependency,” he says.
Alongside that, he argues we need to reprioritize street space with bus-only lanes to allow public transit to bypass congestion and protected, connected active transport lanes for cycling, mobility aids and scooters.
Most importantly, says Toderian, we don’t need to look at these as tomorrow’s solutions. “Everything we talk about is urgent now,” he says. “‘Further’ and ‘faster’ are the two most important words in urban change.”
Congestion charges and mobility-as-a-service
Amer Shalaby, an expert on transportation engineering and director of the Transit Analytics Lab at the University of Toronto, looks at congestion reduction through the lens of improved mobility. He points out that most of the social costs of driving – like those highlighted by the CANCEA report – aren’t paid by individual drivers, but by society as a whole. In other words, the stress and inconvenience of constant gridlock can degrade our ability to connect with each other and make our cities worse places to live.
Shalaby says we can change our relationship with driving by implementing congestion charges, which are fees imposed on drivers to enter a designated area during peak hours.
It can be done in other ways, too, he argues, pointing to a concept called perimeter control. “In Zurich, Switzerland, they control the flow into the downtown area [with] traffic lights,” he says. The goal is to make driving unattractive in dense downtown areas by imposing delays.
A sign warning drivers that they are about to enter the central zone in London, UK, where there is a daily charge for car use to prevent traffic congestion.GETTY IMAGES
That kind of restriction can be balanced by efficient and more expansive public transit like that seen in Tokyo, Paris, Barcelona, Hong Kong and London. “They always boast in Hong Kong [that] you can go from any point to any other point in 45 minutes, if not less,” Shalaby says.
But it’s not strictly about expanding transit, he adds. Shalaby points to the growing movement surrounding mobility-as-a-service, proposing a single digital platform that would combine public transit, ride-hailing, bike-share and taxis into one user-friendly service.
Shalaby envisions a symphonic blend of city mobility that is seamless and integrated. We’re facing a generational opportunity as Gen Z and Alpha grow up in a world of micro-mobility and ride-share programs, so it’s the right time for this, he says. “They’re already open to it.”
A radical reimagining of working hours
Urban planner Gil Penalosa, founder of the Canadian non-profit 8 80 Cities, shares Toderian and Shalaby’s view: a livable city must be both transit-efficient and walkable.
But when it comes to eliminating traffic, Penalosa says he often comes back to one radical idea, an idea he’s never managed to implement in the 350 cities he’s worked in.
“Imagine if people said, ‘Okay, now you can pick what time you want to arrive [at work] between 7 a.m. and 11 a.m., then based on the time you arrive, this is when you end [your work day],” he says. “It could be done anywhere, any city, small or large – but I haven’t found the right mayor with the guts to do it.”
From Penalosa’s perspective, it’s ingenious in its simplicity. He admits it would take significant political will and organization – ideally, municipal and provincial politicians would be involved alongside mayors, boards of trade and private sector companies. But it could eliminate rush hour, he argues. “People will be so much happier and so much more productive, because some are morning people, some are night people,” he says.
To Penalosa, the question isn’t how we design a congestion-free city – it’s how we want to live.
“If we have a collective answer, [we] can develop a shared vision of our cities,” he says.
