Project

The future of transportation and spatial development

Launched by the Swiss Federal Roads Office (FEDRO), the aim of the Transportation of the Future 2060 research initiative is to encourage scientists to take an extended look into the future. For its part, EBP has examined the long-term interdependent development of transportation and human settlements.

The technological and societal framework for transportation and spatial development

Technological developments such as digitalization, automation and electrification can be expected to have a profound impact on the transportation sector in the coming years and decades. Changes in the demand for mobility (e.g. resulting from demographic shifts and a trend toward transportation sharing) will also play a role. In light of these developments, the Swiss government launched its Transportation of the Future research initiative to equip itself with a visionary view of the long-term development of transportation, a view that extends beyond mere quantitative forecasts. To this end, three main scenarios based on different technological, societal, and economic assumptions were developed. Various related issues are examined in seven subprojects.

Impact network joins transportation and space expertise

EBP examined the long-term interdependent development of transportation and human settlements. In an interdisciplinary project team with extensive transportation and spatial-development expertise, we created an impact network that embeds cases of interdependence inside superordinate societal and technological developments. The impact network enables one to: examine the different courses of transportation and settlement development within the scenarios; assess the interrelationships revealed by the results; and derive a basis for transportation and spatial planning. We conclude our assessment by specifying for each scenario the available and needed space for three settlement types, as well as the traffic volume and infrastructure capacity for passenger and freight transportation according to mode of transportation.

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