Every part of our transport system is struggling.
I mean all modes of public transport put large numbers of people in confined spaces
which doesn't really work in these times of coronavirus.
So how do we solve the coronavirus transport crisis?
Let's look at the London underground.
How can people use the tube while keeping physical distancing?
Is that even possible?
During peak hours the Northern line, London's busiest line, runs well over capacity carrying almost
1,200 people on each train, really packed.
But on a physically distanced train, people use alternate seats
and no one is allowed to stand.
So each train would carry just 124 passengers - a huge reduction.
So what would this mean for commuters if
demand was the same as before our train would be full before it left the first stop.
So you would need to ration all the passengers boarding trains along the line.
Let's look at Clapham North to see what this might look like.
To take its fair share of commuters,
only four people could actually get on each train.
That means just 96 people can actually travel from the station each hour,
leaving over 900 commuters waiting outside.
And this queue of commuters, physically distanced of course,
would stretch back two stops!
And we'll see these problems on trains, buses, trams, coaches, you name it.
It's estimated that Britain's transport network will be reduced by 90%
across the board.
The obvious alternative to public transport is driving but there's a problem with that too.
Let's take Newcastle for instance.
If 90% of people who usually use public transport drive to work instead,
that would be an increase of 48% more cars on the road
and Newcastle roads are already at their limit.
So in this scenario, you're looking at total gridlock
and it's a similar story all over the country but Boris Johnson has urged
people to get back to work.
So what are we supposed to do?
That poses quite a serious problem for quite a lot of people.
People who need to travel on public transport but have been told that public transport is dangerous
Loads of people have been told to go back to work you can't work.
You can't work from home if you're a cleaner or whatever it is.
If you live out of London and you don't have a car,
you know, it's so crazy.
They're stuck in this position where they've been told to go back to work
but not told how, how do we get there safely.
There's one area of our transport network that we haven't mentioned yet.
And that's active travel or cycling and walking.
In England about 1.9% of all trips to and from work are by bike.
If you were to get that up to just 5% so doubling it a little bit more,
you would suddenly have 1.3 million more people
who were not driving or taking the train or taking the bus
and a certain number of people are going to have to drive, you know, they won't
have any other choice.
So the more people you have who have shorter commutes, who can cycle to work,
then the more space there is for everyone else whether on public transport or
on the roads.
This is significant and it's the kind of thinking that is shaping the way that cities all over the world
are trying to tackle this problem.
Paris has been at the forefront of introducing bike lanes and pedestrianising main thoroughfares.
For the Mayor to be pushing on this stuff for quite a long time,
I think it was in February that she first unveiled the idea of 15-minute cities.
Where you live, you should be able to walk or cycle within 10 or 15 minutes
so you're shopping, schools, let's say work, the leisure center, the parks ...
Obviously you might need to travel further once in a while to do different things
but the idea is to have livable neighborhoods so you're not
forcing too hard to drive 10 miles to this or, you know, five miles to that.
And I think that's quite a powerful idea, it's a simple idea but it's a
powerful idea in terms of reshaping how we organise cities.
And there's a similar approach in other european cities.
Milan, Barcelona, Brussels, Berlin ... And it's not just Europe.
We're seeing these kind of policies in cities all over the world.
So what about the UK?
You've had Sadiq Khan, the London Mayor, announcing one of the biggest traffic free zones in Europe.
No private cars, it will only be allowed to have buses
and pedestrians and bikes.
This is an incredibly ambitious thing and they're going to not only get it done
but get it finished in six weeks.
So this is a complete kind of paradigm shift
and lots of other cities are doing that, Manchester was already building a very,
very big network of cycle and walking routes
but it's now going to expand those very quickly ...
Liverpool is doing the same, Bristol's going to pedestrianise
the historic centre of the city and the Scottish government has announced
£10 million for cities there to bring up these temporary bike lanes and
the thing about it is that it's not as good as a properly designed lane but,
you know, in terms of getting people on bikes, it's good and it's very cheap and
it's very quick.
There's a wider conversation going on at the moment
about how we can use this crisis to readdress how we think about transport.
And this is pushing the question of urban design squarely to the forefront
of policy discussions.
It's not so much that they didn't officially believe in walking and cycling before,
but they never really did much about it.
But now, you know, the tone in terms of the speed and the seriousness has
totally changed.
'I'm announcing a two billion pound package to put cycling and walking at the heart
of a transport policy.'
The public desire for this kind of change is undeniable.
58% of people backed the introduction of cycle lanes on urban main roads
along with increased funding for walking and cycling infrastructure.
It's changed people's perceptions of what's possible.
We're talking about a 40% reduction in emissions to, I think, it was a 10% reduction
in emissions from the most critical particulate matter.
Across Europe there have been 11,000 fewer deaths from air pollution because of the
coronavirus crisis that's in a matter of weeks.
The long-term impact will be even more stark, I would think.
People just recognise the air smells a bit better, it feels a bit nicer,
the sky's a bit bluer.
The figures back it up but people are experiencing this in real time.
So these are having a big real world impact on people's health as well as their experience of
their own cities in terms of cleaner air that they can see and feel.
So it's no wonder that 71% of people are concerned
about the possibility of air pollution returning to pre-lockdown levels
once restrictions are lifted.
The benefits are just amazing, it goes beyond even health,
it goes beyond pollution ... Cities suddenly become much more equitable,
they've become less noisy and become more livable.
And it could be a complete transformation in the way people live
and I'm, you know, really excited about it,
I just, you know, hope it's going to work.
Thanks for watching. Let us know in the comments how your commute has been
affected by Covid.
We also want to hear what your local authority is doing
to improve active travel in your area.
I'll put sources and further reading in the description.
Good luck if you're trying to get to work.