With over one billion tube journeys a year, 8,000 buses and 580 kilometres of
“red route” road network, planning London’s travel needs is extraordinarily
complex. as managing director of planning at transport for London – one of
atkins’ most valued clients – michèle dix gets to do it every day.
the joUrney planner
Q how do you try to address our transport needs transport modelling, using data on population and the more people that we can encourage to walk,
today, while planning ahead for the future? employment growth, is used in predicting future demand when it’s a viable option, the better – it’s healthier for
We work closely with the greater London authority for transport. but stakeholder involvement is also very them and it can put less pressure on the network.
and the mayor’s office to determine the capital’s important in planning. We’re engaged with a wide range Information is incredibly important and technology is
transport priorities. of stakeholders across London’s boroughs and who enabling that.
represent different groupings and
particular modal interests. Q tell me about “smarter travel”…
It’s also very useful to look our smarter travel unit targets people, businesses
back at past experience and trends and schools, and aims to get them thinking about
and ask what impact policies had how they travel, and whether they could do so in
and how effective they were. a more sustainable way. While there is a certain
the emphasis is on making the percentage of the population who take global
transport strategy future-proof, warming, and the need to change, as a given, there’s
and flexible enough to adapt also a hardcore sector who won’t change unless they
to changing needs and new have to. We need a range of measures to incentivise
technologies as they come along. certain behaviours and discourage others. 31
Q is technology becoming Q are there any transport initiatives in the UK or
more important in managing elsewhere that you are particularly excited about?
the traffic? I’m excited to see how road pricing pilots develop in
absolutely. It’s exciting that so other cities. If they go well, it could signal to national
much technology is becoming government the need for wider national charging.
available and is changing that’s certainly something we’re keeping an eye on.
the way that we operate our also, I’ve just come back from Zermatt in
transport systems. It allows us to switzerland, which is a no car zone. all of the vehicles
communicate better and to get as are electric – taxis, buses, delivery vehicles. I find it
much value as possible from the exciting and wonderful that you can do this in small
existing network. areas, although there would be practicality issues in
For instance, technology has doing something like that in a city the size of London.
been vital in enabling us to provide the most important thing is that transport
the public with high levels of and transport planning moves forward. that
information. this means people can won’t necessarily be determined by technology or
make real-time choices. engineering. I think it will be more successful if we
our smarter travel unit is at improve our communications and are able to explain
the leading edge in this area. For to people what we need to do. Developing our
example, we’re keen to inform social engineering skills will be important in bringing
people in London about the people with us. you should never rely on technology
walking times between stations. or engineering alone. there is a social change
not many people would realise that required. there’s a human dimension.
it’s actually quicker to walk from
bond street to piccadilly Circus than As managing director of planning at TfL, Michèle Dix
it is to catch the underground. works on a job-share basis with Malcolm Murray-Clark.
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