The term ‘sustainable development’ is commonly attributed (Duncan, 2010) to a seminal 1987 report from the UN world commission on Environment and Development (WCED, 1987), where it is defined as “development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” , essentially an end goal of homeostasis. The vital aspects are both material resources and especially energy (as enough energy can, even today, offset materials limitations through recycling) As a sub-set, transport, is important because of the huge proportion of energy it currently uses; and sustainable transport is mainly about developing different sources of energy that satisfy the above definition.

Over time, it has become increasingly clear that a systemic solution to the problem of creating a sustainable transport solution is required, as three kinds of market failure (Cohen, 2007); under valuated natural and social capital, externalized costs of natural and social capital depletion and informational asymmetry. The proposed systemic actors are varied, as we will see, but generally have set upon the same solution for the very long-term planning necessary; Visioning. This is a method of ‘identifying desirable futures’ (Highways Agency, 2003), built upon social constructivism (Tight, 2011), the idea that it is possible to shape the future direction of society (While this is not uncontroversial, it is probably a necessary assumption in an essay centred around that subject).

In this essay we consider three specific sources from varied perspectives, that together offer considerable insight:

• Visions 2030: A highways agency report informing long term government planning. As good government must react to society, the report considers a possible range of scenarios; from low-high government involvement and low-high consumerism and then draws out visionary solutions. These might be useful in either narrow or wide circumstances, depending upon the vision.
• Visions for a walking and cycling focussed urban transport system: Containing a variety of possible scenarios; current best practice, an energy conscious society and a society experiencing severe energy restrictions. I have chosen to analyse current best practise, as it does not presuppose a massive external change to society and therefore it is possible to think through much more rigorously.
• Vision 2050: Despite the similar name, contains an analysis from the perspective of business. As an active vison it does not contain a range of responses but is focussed around an ‘optimum outcome’. It recognises that government policy frameworks shape the business environment and sees current problems because of market failures that should be addressed.

As mentioned in the introduction, Vision 2030 represents a government response to the objective means of society going forward over a range of possible futures. As the vision limits itself in terms of governments influence upon society it is therefore fairly limited in terms of addressing sustainability; if society continues to pursue a hedonistic consumerism then that is that. As a fundamentally responsive vision is easy to see flaws when it comes to environmental protections. It doesn’t seem to be able to account for the aggressive cuts in resource usage required for a sustainable future. (WCED, 1987) And especially remains committed to the idea of indefinitely sustained economic growth in a closed system, which for one seems unsustainable on the face of it (Meadows & al., 1972) and may not in fact be necessary. There are certainly those who argue that unlimited material growth should not be an end in itself (Various, 2012) and that other models are possible without any real sacrifice in well-being (Zehner, 2012).

That is not to say the vision is toothless; ‘Green corridors’, including pursuit of more renewable materials and the use of noise barriers and biodiversity conservation measures such as wildlife bridges to reduce the impact of the roadway, are within the remit of the highways authority and are a common feature in all possible futures.

The vision also, like most presented visions, foresees the very likely benefits of automation; although increased efficiency does tend to increase overall demand (Bauer & et.al., 2009), the expected benefits to safety from automation are thought to be applicable to the vast majority of scenarios.

More interesting though is a vision of proactive land-use planning. The case is made that a far thinking government can influence people’s patterns of behaviour without resorting to coercive measures via proactively defining the environment in which choices will be made, a practice more precisely defined as ‘libertarian paternalism’ (Thaler, 2012). Properly applied, this can be shown to have a massive influence on people’s choices (Thaler, 2012), while being shown as a reasonable practice for ‘free’ societies (Banner, 2012). Also along this theme in the vision is aggressive management of demand and supply, along the lines of controlling vehicle to vehicle communications (V2V) and a aggressive campaign of advertisement. These measures could conceivably reduce the impact of transport; carbon, pollution, and physical disruption to sustainable levels essentially whatever happens, and without overstepping Highway authority bounds.

When applying a PESTEL analysis for feasibility the intentional limits become a strength. The vision is fundamentally within the scope of authority of the current highways agency. Combined with the deliberately ‘wide net’ of scenarios it is therefore largely feasible. The fundamental constraint seems to be in terms of leadership; as marshalling the political will to be forward thinking, to proactively plan infrastructure development and aggressively integrate promising technology is quite a task but has precedent.

Visions for a walking and cycling focussed urban transport system is explicitly focused on walking and cycling transport modes that are typically ignored in other visions of the future, probably because of their general decline as societies develop. The paper notes the general decline of these modes but points out that there are local reverses and it contends that the decline is a result of public policy (Tight, 2011) that ought to be reversed to provide for a more sustainable future. While not much use for freight the huge majority of roadgoing vehicles are personal (licencebureau, 2017) and so this is not much of a detraction.

European best practice applied in the UK would soon moderate increases in walking and considerable increase in cycling, as well as a high use of public transport. The depression in the use of cars is an intentional effect, achieved through ‘paternalistic’ use of public policy much like as mentioned previously; informational campaigns, and a legal mandate to apportion spending for cycling and walking, and a mandate to implement both a ‘core network’ of cycling paths and quality walking spaces. Again, this sees some opposition, but is usually judged to be a reasonable use of public policy.

The fundamental differences from now include properly implemented walking and cycling networks; more complete and safer bike parts, and more attractive pedestrian environments. There is improved signage. Land use policy keeps urban areas dense and enables walking and cycling to be practical. The land use seems relatively more intense than today, as there are several parallel, delineated networks. The physical aspect is also important for design and it is a valid worry that the vision might accelerate physical loss of habitat, especially in dividing habitat, and the complexity would also likely pose a challenge the young and the vulnerable. It is not necessarily an inclusive vision.

Public transport is designed to integrate with the system closely and enable longer journeys. However, the vision is limited in scope to 250,000 people (Tight, 2011) and there is reason to believe that peoples willingness to travel under their own power falls off very quickly with distance (licencebureau, 2017). Given the number of people living in large conurbations, especially going into the future, this may become instead the vision for public transportation.

However, there is a clear overall improvement in health, a better track record of accidents (independent of projected improvements in autonomous vehicles), a large decrease in carbon emissions (again independent of technological gains) and associated consumption of depletable resources above that offered by other visions. While it may not be preferable for all cases, provisions for special cases entirely possible.

Despite in many ways positing a vision of the future farthest from our current course overall, the vision advances a convincingly thought through scenario, considering the possibilities over five different urban areas. Current data confirms that many current journeys would be feasible without powered transport (Tight, 2011) and the situation in northern Europe, where a far greater proportion of journeys are taken by bicycle, both confirm that it is technically feasible.

The vision however is required to be anti-car. This is not in itself impossible, I find it comparable to historical examples of the government weighing against destructive industries, such as tobacco or, lately, alcohol. Car the car industry is however even more significant than the these and mustering against it would require far larger a concentration of political will that the previous vision.

Vision 2050 is from the perspective of a coalition of business groups, and as such offers a much more specific vision of the future as there is no need to adjust to a variety of outcomes; the vision is the goal. As a business orientated vision there is considerable emphasis on the opportunities inherent to redeveloping society, such as creating these more efficient transport technologies and developing ‘closed cycle’ resource systems to ease pressure on non-renewable resources. An interesting point is the economic mobilisation of vast swaths of people, especially previously underutilised groups, through access to human development such as education and mobility “human creativity is an infinitely renewable resource.” This is clearly an extremely technological future.

Governments reformat themselves to become efficient; devolving as necessary and banding together as necessary. Key to the vision is the government redefining the business environment in pursuit of ‘true value’ economics, were identified externalities are internalised to business decisions, through use of the tax code. Vision 2050 makes the case that the current unsustainable practices are the result of classical market failure and that adjustment is required. The clear drawback to this is the possibility of establishing radically different business environments for different polities. A key secondary component is therefore this considerable cooperation on the international scale.

There is also a consistent thread of close general cooperation between government and corporate actors, the vision also emphasises cooperation when it comes to the design of infrastructure, research and development of new technologies. While this may seem worrying to some it is not dissimilar to historic instances such as the development of copyright law (Rose & al., 1993) or governments role in fostering railroads (Finslow, 1965)

While a coherent vision is better than simple mitigation, it still may not be the best route considering the significant resource shortages the report itself acknowledges. The Vision is business-as-usual, not optimised around sustainability and may not deliver the necessary improvements to biodiversity. Similarly too vision 2030 it is possible that alternatives to consumerism may be necessary (Zehner, 2012). Furthermore, while the Vision offers more far reaching change than others, it is vague in the specifics. Much transport policy is clearly left up to local governments.

Again like the previous Visions seen previously, these business led environments would be the most like our current situation, requiring the least transit compared to more revolutionary ideals (Various, 2012) and is therefore the most plausible the easiest to consider in real depth, as there is a living, breathing model already available to us.

To conclude; these visions are entirely feasible for current social and political frameworks (although whether society can or will achieve them remains to be seen). While the actual shape of society is not common among them, but I also note that they are not mutually exclusive visions either. Common threads include a relatively proactive government working in cooperation with (almost leading) businesses. The visions describe both government action and private action and are by no means mutually exclusive and may contribute to a unified vision of sustainability. While there is some doubt about whether a combined Vision will be able to deliver a sustainable society, there can be little doubt that the vision is the most feasible and least liable to collapse on itself. Certainly, any successful government only approach would require a far larger imposition then is practical.

References

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