Worth up to £500 million in funding to 2030 for transport infrastructure to boost economic growth, the Greater Cambridge Partnership is the largest of several City Deal programmes currently taking place in the UK. Greater Cambridge expects population growth of 28% by 2031 which, if everyone travelled as they do now, could see an extra 26,000 daily car journeys.
Strategy and Partnerships Manager, Dan Clarke, joined us at TRANSPORT Smart Class, London & South East England 2022 to explain how the Greater Cambridge area is harnessing new technologies and data to address this challenge and support the City Deal programme of transport improvements. “We need to double the size of the bus network and triple the number of passengers. To run better public transport and reduce emissions we need to reduce traffic by 10-15% on 2011 levels, which means we now need to reduce traffic by 20-25% on 2019 levels and by 15% to create manageable levels. We need to encourage more people to walk, cycle or use public transport, and we want to do so through improved services and better facilities for walking and cycling”.
Dan outlined how the ‘Smart’ workstream has been working to ensure that data is at the heart of decision making and scheme appraisals in addition to harnessing transit data to support travellers in making more sustainable journeys. His keynote also addressed the application of technologies such as autonomy to future proof the transport system; how digital twins can support more holistic decision making; how the GCP are moving from trialling new technologies, to deploying at scale; and setting out a future roadmap to harness new technology developments to help the GCP deliver a ‘world class transport system’ along with other critical objectives such as net zero.
The scope of his presentation included:
- The City Deal objectives – “Transport, Skills, Housing and Smart”;
- The challenge for Greater Cambridge;
- Transforming the bus network: investing in services;
- City Access – the need for Space (“to reduce congestion so we can run faster, more reliable buses and improve attractiveness of walking and cycling”) and Revenue (“to subsidise an enhanced bus network”), approved consultation on a Sustainable Travel Zone (Congestion Charge), Road Classification Review, Integrated Parking Strategy etc;
- Why we need data – e.g. feed into models, monitoring and evaluation of infrastructure schemes/behaviour change initiatives as they are implemented, provide data that can be used for further analysis to support policy development and funding bids, GCP gateway process, develop travel planning tools – behaviour change, intelligent operation of network etc;
- Vision based sensors – e.g. for classified counts (of pedestrians, cyclists, motorbikes, cars, taxis, vans/LGVs, OGV 1, OGV 2, public service vehicles/buses, e-scooters and micro mobility), understanding how different vehicles interact, assessing junction turning counts, median journey time of road users with number plates, speed to capture travel behaviour, stopped vehicle
detection and identifying queue formation etc; - Vivacity camera monitoring applications;
- Smart junctions – using machine learning and enhanced datasets to make decisions on junction timings; are smart junctions better able to prioritise sustainable modes of transport as well as improving control and coordination of junctions so the network can be managed more effectively?; what does success look like?;
- Collection of contextual data – deploying LoRa WAN networks – support sensor networks; using carrier grade LPWAN – LTE-M and NB IoT; easy to deploy sensors; use cases – air quality sensors, flooding, parking;
- Next generation modelling – combining digital twins and new governance in digital strategy;
- Behaviour change and enhancing the customer experience with a data hub and data driven city management applications – e.g. MotionMap mobile travel app, smart panel lobby screens, smart wayfinding digital information screens etc;
- Autonomy and supporting the public transport system – CCAV2, CCAV3, guided/future proofed busways.
If you meet our regular delegate qualification criteria but were unable to join us at Browns Courtrooms, Covent Garden, for the live in-person event on October 6th, CLICK HERE and complete the short “Download form” (located at the bottom of the post) to receive a unique link enabling free access to the presentation video recordings and slides (including the film footage and slides from Dan’s keynote).
Those qualifying to receive the rich presentation content from this event include commissioning, procurement, trialling and partnering leads, senior influencers, strategic decision makers and planners from local authorities (e.g. city, borough, metropolitan, district and county councils); public transport operators; regional transport partnerships, sub-regional transport bodies, combined authorities, integrated transport authorities and passenger transport executives; highways authorities and road operators; government and supporting national transport agencies; fleet operators, parking operators, prime contractors etc.
