Sea terminals for passangers

Versión en español

The sea terminals for passengers are harbor terminals specialized in the passenger transport. They can be classified in three major groups according to the kind of traffic they are linked to and the type of vessel which conducts the service.

Mobility in ports (1): container terminals

Versión en español

Port of Barcelona

Productivity and safety are two fundamental factors in the processes that are being executed in commercial harbours. Productivity because they are installations which basically have to generate benefits if they function correctly, but also safety, because the harbour activities have one of the most elevated indexes of occupational accidents, which have to be corrected with tenacious occupational prevention politics. Security is also potentiated, because the ports are deposits for goods where fiscal and customs inspections are being carried out.

The revolution of containers in cargo transport

(Ver versión en español)

When in 1956 the North American citizen Malcom McLean, owner of a truck company, conceived his first maritime container, I would like to know, if he already imagined the revolution which his design would cause in the transport of goods. The first shipment which was realized with this kind of cargo was made from Newark (New Jersey) to the harbour of Houston (Texas). The first intercontinental crossing goes back to 1966 (New York, Rotterdam, Bremen, Grangemouth). Since then the growth of its journeys has been exponential, and nowadays, the containers which travel through the world are counted in billions. The transport of containers by sea, added up to 13 % of the worldwide shipped traffic in 2012, as most of the products transported by ships are petroleum derivates or bulk freight. (UNCTAD/RMT2012)

Transit places, hypermobility and anonymity of postmodern citizen

Versión en español

Frankfurt International Airport

Globalization proposes an urban model based on the “meta-city” (city of cities), supported by a worldwide web of transport and communication means with megalopolis distributed all over the surface of the world which act as points of intersection in said network.

The anthropologist Marc Augé years ago elaborated a conceptual framework about the space that human beings use, a concept that interested me as geographer. I refer myself to the book “Non-Places: Introduction to an Anthropology of over-modernity. Los no lugares. Espacios del anonimato (una atropología de la sobremodernidad) GEDISA editorial (2008) (1ª edición en 1992)” In this essay the anthropological space is described as a place, where our experiences take place in accordance with the environment that surrounds us.

Sustainable Security. Prevention and road security in the Netherlands (english version)

Homo omnium rerum mensura est.

(Man is the measure of all things).

Protágoras

The Netherlands have been working since 1991 in a new sustainable security concept.

What is sustainable security?
As “Sustainable Security” we can define the totality of measures for the prevention of traffic accidents that cause important injuries or deaths. We refer ourselves to a secure traffic system with infrastructures adapted to the human limitations, vehicles equipped to simplify driving and the protection of persons and users with the necessary education to dissuade individualist and inadequate behaviour.

Simplifying we could say that the central axis of sustainable security rests on the famous quote of Protágoras: “man is the measure of all things” referring itself to mankind in general and not to a specific individual. It recurs to the perception of the antique Greek philosophers about the “Homo mensura”, but is adapted to a new form of traffic planning.

What are the principle accomplishments of the new concept of sustainable security?

If we take as a fundamental assumption of this security policy that the user is the centre of the road network; the infrastructures, the cars and up to the manner of driving should adapt themselves to the limitations of each user: the human beings. This central idea is based on three elements:

• Protection of the vulnerable users (pedestrians, cyclists and motorists)
• The design auto-explanatory roads, which induce the users to a more secure driving style
• Establishment of a hierarchy of the urban and interurban roads of the complete road network according to its function and usage

For this reason specific actions were defined in order to obtain a secure traffic system:

First of all a reclassification of the road network according to its functions was carried out. With a first level for traffic flow at high velocities, large distances and big traffic volumes; a second level for the distribution of traffic with disperse destinations and a third level for those roads which give access to any place of the territory.

Secondly, a stricter speed control was exercised in the system in line with the defined function in the hierarchy of the road network. As an example, in the Dutch transport system two thirds of the lanes have a residential function and are candidates to convert themselves in traffic calmed zones with speed limits of 30 h/km. In 2001 half of their road network was already subject to those speed limits.

The Dutch transport system is centred in the coincidence of the function and the use of its roads, for which reason the infrastructures have to be designed with consideration of the human limitations and according to its usage, the vehicles have to assure protection (with active and passive elements of security). Also special attention is put on instruction in order to mitigate the dangerous attitudes of the drivers circulating on the public motorways.

How was the sustainable security system implemented in the Netherlands?

The Netherlands have been working since 1991 in a new sustainable security concept, which the public authorities finally signed in 1998. In this same year a programme of sustainable security designed by the Institute for Road Safety Research (Stichting Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek Verkeersveiligheid - SWOV) with the support of the Dutch Transport Ministry was presented. This security plan converted itself into one of the state policies which the different governments will be obliged to obey during the next decades, with the specification of some concrete objectives until the year 2010, as are: the decrease of deaths on the road in 50 % and of traumatic injuries caused by traffic accidents in 40 % versus the values obtained in 1986.

For the acceptation of this security policy 2 phases were established for its implantation. In the first phase between 1997 and 2001.

• The road network, roads and motorways were catalogued and a hierarchy was established
• All give-way regulations were revised
• Speed limitations were established. 30 km/h for residential zones and 60 km/h for rural zones
• New give-way preferences were established in the roundabouts to give a higher priority to the cyclists
• Audits for road security were established

With these measures they accomplished to set the basis for later interventions, which would be developed in a second implementation phase the so-called “National Plan for Traffic and Transport” during the period 2001-2020 which is currently still being implemented.

The Dutch projected road safety as something to be provoked, with the objective to avoid that traffic converts itself into a problem of public health, as happens in other less advanced societies. They realized that the road safety needed the political and institutional support for its successful execution. And so they did by converting it into a state policy. Today we study the Dutch and the Swedish case as best practices for road safety.

In conclusion of this post I mention an example I have found in the blog of Samuel Santos García autovias.wordpress.com dedicated to the transport infrastructures, in which the characteristics of a Dutch road are detailed where the speed limits originally have been at 80 km/h with an average traffic density of 3.000 cars, and which has been adapted to the contents defined in the policy of the sustainable security of the National Plan for Traffic and Transport.

The principal characteristics of this road are:

• Zone 30 and zone 60
• Elevations at the crossroads
• Sections with prohibition to drive for circulation of bicycles
• Width of the lane of 5 m with narrowings and installations of side bollards
• Sinuous pegging
• Punctual narrowing of the lanes including road cushions
• Fixed right-of-way regulation for one lane. No drawing of medial strip
• Bend of the axis of the road in intersections
• Central traffic islands in straight parts without intersections

Source:Youtube

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Fatal road accidents can be avoided:Principal elements of "Vision Zero"

Autobahnen:The myth of velocity

Autobahnen: the myth of velocity

The German motorways have an acknowledged fame worldwide for different reasons. The BAB (Bundesautobahn) is the greatest and most advanced network of motorways of the European continent – where cars still don’t pay a toll. 50 % of this network has conditional or local speed limits, the rest (aprox. 6.000 km) still don’t have any speed limits although the German government recommends circulation at a maximum of 130 h/km.

In fact, Germany is the only country in the world, where there are still motorway sections without any speed limits. And this is why the myth was born, which has extended itself among many drivers, some of which make pilgrimages to the Teutonic countries only to enjoy driving a high top class car without speed limits. This kind of tourism is quite significant among North Americans and Asiatics. We cannot ignore that for some persons, the emotion to go on full throttle is seductive, they feel a certain liberation and satisfaction when they reach speed limits that provoke high adrenaline levels; and this necessity is what has created the myth.

In this post I will try to de-mystify an idea which is quite common in many persons who either haven’t circulated in Germany or who haven’t informed themselves sufficiently about the characteristics the German traffic has on its Autobahnen.

The history of the Autobahnen goes back to the beginning of the last century – during the decade of the 20s the Germans were considering a change in their existing mobility model for the inter-urban traffic flows, when they passed a great part of the traffic from the railways to the roads. Highway engineers like Robert Otzen or Piero Puricelli have established the first designs and concepts on which the future Autobahnen would be based. The first motorways to connect the country were the A5, the A7 and the A9 from North to South. A curiosity of the German methodology is the sense of the numeration, as the motorways with odd numbers have the direction North-South whereas the motorways with an even number have the direction East to West. The association which headed the development of these infrastructures was called “Autobahnprojekt Hamburg-Frankfurt-Basel” (motorway project Hamburg-Frankfort- Basel) which in 1933 had been dissolved into the “Gesellschaft zur Vorbereitung des Reichsautobahnbaus” (association for the preparation of the motorway construction of the Reich) with the objective to adapt itself to the model of motorway construction proposed by the national socialism: the “Reichsautobahnen” which was headed by the German engineer and military professional Fritz Toth. After World War II, the reconstruction works were initiated and the most modern and reliable motorway network of Europe was created.

Why can we circulate so fast on the German motorways?

The answer can be found mainly in three aspects: in their design, their execution and their maintenance. The pavement of the German motorways is of high quality. Here its thickness has to be distinguished, which can ranch between 50 and 85 cm and which has a special pavement to support the heavy traffic, for which reason it is of a considerable stability and durability. The asphalt is also of a high quality with characteristics that bestow it with a longer durability compared to those used in other countries. The asphalt in these platforms have an excellent drainage especially designed against the erosion caused by rain and ice, which are very common in these latitudes. The pavements use to have an inclination of 2,5 % to one of their exterior sides and so canalize the water to a water basin where it is stored for a better environmental control. The average profile of these motorways has a very flat levelling which generally does not exceed 4 % and its curves have wide angles suitable for high speed.

The German motorways dispose of excellent traffic control systems: television cameras, pillars with electronic displays, radars, motion sensors, meteorologic sensors, intelligent transport systems which can modify the speed at the access roads to the big cities or because of an accident on the road or simply to inform the drivers about the incidents that produce themselves in the network.

Major thermal contrasts and the hard climatology oblige not only to an excellent execution of the construction works using good materials but also to an impeccable maintenance which guarantees the maximum security in extremely adversary conditions of snow, ice and rain. The maintenance of a motorway network with such a density of traffic is very complex and obliges to carry out constant repairs, the trimming of the vegetal elements and the prevention of the consequences of a complicated meteorology with for example such measures as a speedy distribution of salt on the driving surfaces. In Germany more money is invested per km of motorway than in the United States of America.

However, let us demystify…

Whoever goes to Germany thinking that once he has passed the frontier he can accelerate at a maximum will experience a great disappointment, because the German motorways also have speed limits on approximately half of its motorway network. For one or the other absent-minded driver it can be a problem to adapt to the sections of limited speed after driving over the sections without speed limit (which are indicated with a grey disk on white background notifying the end of the speed limit of 130 km/h). The speed limits ranch between 60 km/h and 130 km/h, although they can be lower on the sections of construction works or alternative routing. In Germany the traffic signs are respected (many foreigners are surprised by this behaviour, and to be honest, the Spanish are the first to do so…). Road safety is taught a lot in the schools and the result makes itself shown.

Let’s go on with the demystification; also the radars abound on the sections with speed limitations and make high quality photos of the driver and the number plate of the car, independently of the actual speed at which they go. The police cars usually are upper class vehicles (Mercedes, BMW, AUDI…) with engines that might be without the usually applied speed limitations and thus can exploit the complete engine power to pursuit the pilots of the amateur races.

The enthusiasts of high speed – as well as the rest – find themselves more frequently than they would desire within the annoying phenomenon what they denominate among themselves as “Stau”, congestions or traffic jams at the entryways to the big German metropolitan areas, although those also appear when there are construction works, or accidents or when one has the bad luck to coincide with a mass locomotion in the holiday period (luck that the holiday periods are different in the different German states). When we are in the middle of a “Stau” (a frequent situation on far journeys), the high velocities can achieve a magnificent 20-50 km/h if we are not halted completely.

In Germany's motorways are more frequently construction works.

Germany geographically is in the centre of the European Union and its motorways endure the greatest density of heavy road traffic on the continent. Those who have circulated on them know the “elephant races”, large queues of trucks overtaking one another which interrupt the traffic flow in the lane if there are few lanes. We also know those who request to pass on the left hand lane signalling with the light of their headlights (something completely forbidden), and something that goes together with the phenomenon of the rear-view mirror, where you see a motorist at some kilometres distance and after looking the other way for a few seconds, you are startled to find him at only a few centimetres of your wheels requesting to pass. The danger of high velocities is evident, it requires a high degree of concentration and produces a higher level of physical and mental fatigue. At such velocities braking is a lot more dangerous, the total braking time is much longer and increments itself nearly exponentially and deviations from the track are more common. The kinetic energy which accumulates itself at such velocities is catastrophical in the case of an accident even if one drives a high class car. In smaller cars at least from 160 km/h onwards the vibrations and the bad engine insulation cause the driver to lift his foot from the gas for fear that the car will fall apart.

Finally I would like to put to mind that when we floor the accelerator in a frontal crash at 200 km/h neither the airbag nor the seat belt are of any use whatsoever and the disaster is guaranteed. Driving at high speed normally is stressing, dangerous and also expensive, but… how can one convince a sentiment?

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2012 the European Year for Active Ageing. The Safe Mobility an Intergenerational Challenge

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Fatal road accidents can be avoided:Principal elements of "Vision Zero"

Tourism and urban mobility "ad hoc"

Three viewpoints about human mobility (english version)

A road on Tenerife Island

Recently I have read an article in the magazine Ciudades signed by Blanca Rebeca Ramírez Velázquez of the “Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana-Xoichinilco (México)” which refers to the different approaches and dimensions which mobility can have conceptually. In this post I will share some of the ideas put forward in this interesting article, adding nuances and examples which support them.

The “Real Academia de la Lengua Española” (Royal Academy of the Spanish Language) defines mobility as: Quality of moveable, whereas moveable comprises all that is moveable on its own or is capable to move by external impulse. The 13th article of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights establishes that all people have the right to circulate freely and to choose their residence within the territory of a state. The “Movilia” survey which is elaborated in Spain, defines mobility as a strategy of the persons to organize their daily activities and which has as its prime objective to achieve the highest efficiency in their use of the different transport infrastructures. The law 9/2003 about mobility of the “Generalitat de Catalunya” defines the latter as the totality of movements of people and goods for labour, training, sanitary, social, cultural or private reasons or any other reason not stated here. Yet another and more simple definition, we find in “El libro verde del Medio Ambiente Urbano (2007)” (The green book of urban environment, 2007), which refers to mobility as a medium of access to goods, services and people.

Blanca R. Ramírez understands mobility as an attribute or a quality regarding the capacity to move, as explains the definition of the Royal Academy of the Spanish Language. The mobility associated with persons and their activities is defined by historical evolution of technology, culture and society itself. Marc Augé introduced the concept of “supermodern mobility” when he talks about the current mobility of human beings, with a degree of complexity that overburdens us with its causes and multiple parameters to be kept in mind when we want to analyse it.

In her article B. R. Ramírez envisions three approximations to the concept of mobility in our society.

In the first place she differentiates between mobilities that are carried out the same day and those with a more permanent character, defined as migrations. This would be the first criterion for differentiation: the permanent or not-permanent character of mobility. The apparition of the various statistic techniques have been narrowing this line between the movements the population undertakes daily and the migrations human beings make. The spacial and temporal scale will determine when we speak of migration and when of mobility. And for this reason they observe the characteristics of the movement (interstate or intrastate, interurban or intraurban...) and their frequency in time.

The second criteria offered by the author of the article is that mobility is an attribute to the persons and their activities and not so much of the places. The delimitation would come with two different concepts: on the one hand there is mobility that actuates on persons (I would also add the goods that the will of persons wants to move) and on the other hand the transport which refers to the media which permit persons and objects to circulate from one place to the other. If we suppose that mobility is an objective with a finality (a right, a necessity, a pleasure), we understand that there are different strategies to carry it out, for example the design of the infrastructures which are built or different tactics for their use with reference to the necessary vectors for their execution, i. e. the transport means. The totality of these strategies and tactics of use will determine the final type of mobility, which generates determinate processes of appropriation, transformation and use of territory and which will change it constantly.

The third approximation to the concept of mobility concentrates on the accessibility and connectivity, which determine the frequency in which the traffic of the different media is generated. To understand the concept of accessibility we view the verbs “enter” and “leave”, as accessibility is an attribute proper to places, defined by the transport means that accede to a building, a district, a town, a region… The diversity, the quality, the frequency of the infrastructures and of the media, will improve or deteriorate the accessibility level of the place. The concept of connectivity we understand better if we view the verb “unite” as connectivity refers to an attribute proper to networks, which in our case is formed by the combination of infrastructures and the transport means. Today mobility in modern societies disposes of a level of connectivity to an extent that it is able to generate interactions between different places without the necessity of a physical accessibility of the same. Telephony, internet and all the telecommunications in general do so. The rural areas are an example for this change or as an extreme case the mountaineers who from the top of a peak they have conquered they call a relative or friend by mobile to tell them that they have arrived. A greater extent of connectivity means a lesser extent of accessibility?

As we have seen, mobility has a polyhedral nature proper to whatever human attribute. The investigators classify and dissect it to better understand this phenomenon. Concepts and attributes that we see change with time and that make themselves more complex. However, we must not forget, that mobility also has ideologies due to its proper finalist nature, but this will be material for another post.

We perceive mobility since ours first games.

For more information view this link:

BlancaRebeca Ramírez Velázquez: “Alcances y dimensiones de la movilidad: aclarando conceptos.” Revista Ciudades nª 82 (2009)

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Fatal road accidents can be avoided. Principal elements of the "Vision Zero" (english version)

The “Vision Zero” is a policy for driving safety, which was developed in the 90s of last century in Sweden. The Vision Zero was approved in the Swedish Parliament in 1999 and is based on the definition of basic elements on top of which a conceptual body and measures are built in order to avoid that road traffic produces deaths or heavy disability in the people that use it.

The Vision Zero was approved in Sweden in 1999

The principal elements of this driving safety policy are the following

The first element has an ethical character: Life and health are superior values. For the Zero Perspective they are not negotiable and are above any changes that favour mobility; such as speed, accessibility, comfort, efficiency, respect for the environment…all these have to submit to the ethical value of this policy. The loss of a human life is inacceptable.

The second element is based in the global concept of responsibility. Up to now responsibility for the collisions in traffic was principally and uniformly attributed to the users of the public infrastructures. The Vision Zero defends the concept of shared responsibility between the providers of the service, the users, their designers, the authorities of the transport infrastructures, the automotive industry as well as the police. They all are the responsibles for the correct functioning of the system and that the traffic rules are respected. With this policy it is no longer only the users that have the responsibility that the rules are obeyed, it is also the designers, the authorities and the security corps that hold the responsibility for the voluntary and induced compliance of these rules. Also the automobile producers are responsible to comply with certain production parameters which contemplate minimum security standards in defence of life and health. 

The third element is the establishment of a security culture which comprises the whole of society and which contemplates the human factor of the phenomenon. The exclusive responsibility of the user of the public infrastructures disappears and a new focus on two new premises is established: the first of these is the human factor. Human beings commit mistakes. People can misjudge, distract themselves, fall ill,... and so its a logical consequence that we make mistakes, however, the traffic system must not fail. For example, today the system still permits that we reach 140 km/h driving at a minimum distance to another vehicle that circulates in front of us. The system should impede these situations. The second premise is the critical limit, when once exceeded, the survival and the recuperation of a traumatism is no longer possible. We have to respect the biomechanical tolerances of our bodies, which the road system should protect. We know that the transport system combines human beings with heavy and speedy motorized machines which are controlled by people. For this reason the instability is inherent to our transport system itself, as it is based largely on the human factor.

The Vision Zero has to take into account the human factor, as “error” is integrated in the ADN of the transport system. For this reason the design of the transport system has to be laid out in such a way that it avoids heavy injuries or deaths, although a certain level of collisions with light traumatisms might be assumed. The essential objective of this security policy is to avoid the chain of incidents which result in severe collisions which cause deaths and permanent disability. In the transport system people should not subject themselves to kinetic forces which exceed the human tolerance level and which put their health in danger, however, while the technology permits it, prudence and training should guarantee the integrity of the person.

What measures have been adopted in Sweden since the introduction of the Zero Perspective?

Regarding the technology of the vehicles: 

• Wide support of the Euro-NCAP programme (European New Car Assessment Programme)
• Use of restraints in all vehicles. Use of retention systems in all vehicles. The intention is to guarantee a generalized application
• Generalization of the active and passive security systems in the vehicles
• Generalization of the air-bag technologies
• Implementation of the automatic break
• Improvement of the technologies for energetic saving

In the infrastructures: 

• Encourage the local authorities to establish 30 km/h zones in the high risk areas for the less protected users
• Increase the number of cameras for detection of excess velocity
• Change of perspective in the design of the infrastructures and the speed administration with new engineering concepts in which security predominates

In control and monitoring: 

• Increase of the random breath and drug testing of the drivers (Alcolocks) 
• Promotion of road safety as a competitive factor between companies for the adjudication of transport contracts
• Promotion of evaluation systems with procedures for information intake and processing generated in the system
• Implementation of intelligent traffic systems
• Establish controls in the web to collect determined atmospheric parameters which generate better information and which facilitate the decision making of the authorities and the drivers

In the service sector and education: 

• Promote security as a competitive factor in the transport contracts. New social responsibility policies for companies which are generalizing themselves in the professional world: (CSR) Corporate Social Responsibility
• Tax incentives for road security
• Promotion in the media and in the training centres of the values in which the Vision Zero is based

Avoid fatal accidents on the roads is possible.

There are places, where road safety is taken seriously. In this post I explained what has been achieved in Sweden. In Spain there are still many people who think that traffic accidents are the price we have to pay for modern mobility. Nothing lies further from the truth. The idea that road accidents are inevitable or unforeseeable is proving false. We should be less tolerant to have fatal accident victims. Vision Zero is an ambitious goal, but not impossible to achieve. 




Bibliographical sources consulted: 
http://www.visionzeroinitiative.com/ 
WHO (2004) World report on road traffic injury. 

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Using Twitter in Public Transports (english version)

In an article published in the daily newspaper La Vanguardia by Joana Bonet titled “Burbujas con pin” (bubbles with pin), the important changes which smartphones, eBooks, ipod and other electronic devices have on our manner to communicate and to relate ourselves with other human beings are mentioned. In this article three of these changes were pointed out:

The protection these devices provide us, with regard to strangers who share the same space with us (like metro or bus stations, corridors in public installations, etc.) where “people don’t look themselves openly in the eyes any more, but take refuge in their screens”. This vision clashes frontally with the one defined by George Amar and his concept of “religance” in transportation, which has been explained in a number of articles of this blog. This term maybe responds to the multifaceted vision of a human phenomenon sufficiently complex as to explain it with a single paradigm.

Significant is the autosufficiency which we gain with the use of these devices, as we no longer have to ask a stranger how to reach a certain place or our current location. The GPS and all its applications have given us access to the immediate knowledge of our position in a system of worldwide reference. But it also has been a great progress for conjugal live, of which I can bear witness, as I’ve made a lot of kilometres on the European roads accompanied by my wife. First with a voluminous atlas and later on with the GPS receptor Tom-Tom: its many hours of stupid discussions over interpretation and execution that this little electronic commodity has spared us. It’s obvious that – although put aside – we have not abandoned the old Shell Atlas, as the technology sometimes still succumbs to various incidents which this traditional road book can endure.

And in the third place, the article highlights a new “private bubble”, expression created by the Israeli city planner Tali Hatuka to name the isolation from the phisical world, these technologies provide for us. They seduce ourselves with new forms of communication and entertainment which occupy our time, especially the time we need to move ourselves. Now we find ourselves in the strange circumstance that while travelling we can be at 20 cm of another person and easily ignore him or her. The small device creates an invisible bubble around us, which isolates us from the other passengers, more or less anonymous companions of our commute flows to and through the big metropolis.

Barcelona's underground

A few months ago I had the luck to assist to a conference organized by AMTU in Martorell, in which Sanderijn Baanders was explaining in her speech "Impact of social media in public transport. Use of Twitter in The Netherlands" some of the conclusions from the studies about the impact of the use of the social networks in the public means of transport.

Communication via internet has diversified notably: from the more conventional means as websites, newletters, electronic mails or SMS, over social networks (Facebook, Linked-In, Twitter and Youtube) until the most recent applications apps disigned for use in smartphones, as for example the QR codes. It is interesting to observe, what influence for example Twitter has on the transportation (in the conference the case of the Netherlands was explained) with the flow of information that circulates between operators with passengers and vice versa or between the passengers of public transport themselves. The speaker pointed out that depending on the kind of fluctuations, the type of information interchanged also varied. Sanderijn Baanders classified three groups of information interchange:

Of the operator to the users:
The information given in this flow of information is basically about the stops, time-schedules, news about the operating company, incidents, delays, interruptions of the service or answers to the most frequent questions of the clients.

Of the users to the operator:
The information basically refers to complaints about the service rendered by the operator, concrete or general questions, information about vandalism and to a lesser extent about suggestions for the improvement of the service.

Between the users:
The information usually are messages of sympathy, compliments and encouragements, also information interchanges about ticket controls, discussions of passengers and information about events, incidents, flash mob, even accidents that might produce themselves in the infrastructure of the transport network.

Baanders gave data of two Twitter users: @NS_online  (National Railways) Dutch train operator, now  while I'am writting this post has 46.000 followers with an average of 500 – 1.000 tweets per week and @TotalOVNL a user who informs about the ticket controls via Twitter with 11.900 followers and an average of 250 – 1.200 tweeds per week. At the end of the speech different operators present confirmed that also in Spain information systems about ticket controls to users had been detected. Nowadays, information no longer is an exclusive good for only a few, the new technologies are at the disposition of everyone (and reasonably priced); there will always be new tools for the old objectives.

Twitter is a very easy tool to use, with a rapid growth in wide sectors of the population and in which the messages send by the operators to inform their users about incidents or news related to public transport have a very good reception. Twitter is converting itself into an important information tool in comparison with the low quality of other communication means about the interruptions or incidents in the public transport. Let us keep the evolution of this tool and its utility in the mobility of the human being in mind.

 Twitter user

Do you think that Twitter is a threat for the ticket controls in itinere?

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New values for shared mobility

2012 the European Year for Active Ageing. The Safe Mobility an Intergenerational Challenge

What kind of european policies promote the intermodality in the transport?

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Six goals for the european transport market development (english version)

Intermodal station "Quatre Camins"

The European Commission puts great importance in its strategy to strengthen the political body, which is the union of the European continent, with the development of a potent infrastructure network to join its vast territory of more than 4 million m2 and a population which already surpassed 502 million inhabitants in the year 2011. The working document:  (White Paper) Roadmap to a Single European Transport Area - Towards a Competitive and Resource Efficient Transport Area System, is the most recent report which I was able to read about European infrastructure. Published in 2011 by the European Commission, this report highlights the importance of transport infrastructures for the economic activity: for job creation, the stimulus of Commerce, the improvement of geographic accessibility and the mobility of goods, services and persons which travel through its territory. I think the mentioned document might be quite interesting because of its proposition to project and plan the European Communities’ vision of the future European transport system concretizing the major operative lines to be developed in the next years, which can be classified in three big blocks:

INFRASTRUCTURES:   
Creation of a European transport market on the basis of the infrastructures project TEN-T, the objective of which is the reduction of the current traffic congestions and a substantial improvement of the accessibility to the whole European territory on a small and medium scale level (continental and regional).

ENERGIES:
Reduction of the big dependability of the European transport system on petrol and the design of new contingencies for the foreseeable scarcity of fossil fuel in the near future (Peak oil). In the report the following fact is pointed out: In 2010 the imports of petrol to the European Union amounted to approx. 210 billions. €.

ENVIRONMENT:   
Reduction of the greenhouse gases in order to minimize their effect on the climatic change.

This document proposes quite concrete actions for each of these three fields for the next four decades (comprising a horizon until the year 2050) which I tried to classify in the following 6 major goals as indicated at the beginning: 

1. Reduction of the greenhouse gases by  60 % before 2050 for the complete transport system, with the milestone to reach a reduction of 20 % in 2030 in comparison to the emissions produced in 2008.

2. Change of the transport model: Development of considerably cleaner vehicles, a strengthening of the collective transport where the individual transport only will be used as the “last mile” of the journeys, creation of high speed train lines and corridors for the rail transport of special goods at medium range, thus enabling a sutureless mobility within the territory with a good intermodality between the different means of transport. A change of the transport model based on the intensive use of technology, not only to improve the transfers between the different modes of transport, but also in order to improve its infrastructures (ITS, SESAR, EMTS, SafeSeaSafety, RIS…) and in order to reach with this model a level of economy of scales that permits the apparition of multimodal and multinational logistic operators.

3. Creation of a multimodal transport network between the major cities of the European Union, with train corridors and motorways, by strengthening the intermodal character of the sea ports as well as of interior waterways and by connecting the high speed train network with the European airport network. The creation of a unique European airspace, the creation of a unique train space and the creation of a “blue belt” for the European network for short distance sea shipping.

4. Implantation of a sustainable urban transport system, by using mobility plans in the cities or in the companies and big public installations; by introducing intelligent transport tickets and by using tariff systems by areas and not by mode of transport, by car-sharing, Park & Ride systems near big connecting stations, by potentiating active mobility (like walking, biking,…) and by harmonizing movements of the commuter traffic in the big metropolitan areas.

5. Maintaining the European Union as world leader for road and labour security, by the development of politics of security, responsibility, accessibility and quality of the services and working places in the transport and logistics sector. The European Union has the objective to reduce the number of traffic victims by half until the year 2020 and to reach 0 deaths by traffic accidents in 2050.

6. Internalization of transport costs. Costs on a global scale with the raising of taxes for energy use and with the creation of a market of the emission of greenhouse gases. For the costs on a local scale (noise, pollution and high traffic accumulation) a “toll” for the use of the infrastructures will be introduced and fiscal adaptations in the sector will be made according to the prerequisite: “who pollutes, pays”. This will be established in two phases: In the first phase until 2016, the taxes applied to the sales of cars with combustion engines will be revised. This means, on the one hand, the application of the regulation of the “Eurovignette” (road tax disc) – “who uses, pays” and on the other hand the modification of some of the tributes (those that allow for it) by highlighting the environmental impact they produce to discriminate positively the cleanest vehicles. In a second phase (between 2016 – 2020) this fiscal policy will be consolidated and the costs for pollution and noise level of the harbours and airports will be included. Obviously this document is a lot more extensive and those interested in its content can access to the original via the link which I mentioned at the beginning.

With the ongoing crisis we are informed “through the grapevine” by the media of new reductions and fiscal changes applied to different aspects of our mobility (a right our governments should preserve for us). Many of those measures are more than simply rumours, provoked by economically burdened Governments, and are part of a strategy designed by Brussels to achieve the change of model for our transport and mobility system, which leave little manoeuvring space to the national governments (such as for example delay of measures like the introduction of the “Eurovignette” (Euroviñeta), in the case of Spain, or the modification of the contribution levels which can be applied in different fees). We’ll have to be more and more aware of what is happening in Brussels, as what is decided there, will be more important than what is being legislated in any of the capitals of the member states of the European Union.

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What kind of european policies promote the intermodality in the transport?

What kind of european policies promote the intermodality in the transport?

In Europe the main hub of short sea shipping (SSS) is Rotterdam

For years, the European Union has been trying to potentiate intermodal transport. The policies which emerged in the year 2001 were orientated in passing part of the goods transport from the road to the rail. However, time showed that it made no sense to force reality, as a mistrust and competition between these two modes of transport was generated which prevented the creation of the necessary synergies for a sound development of intermodal transport. Comodality has been an intent to advance with the idea of a transport system that makes use of all the available transport modes in an economic and environmentally beneficial way. The focus of these policies is no longer in which mode has to be potentiated, but in the analysis of the itineraries and in efficient and effective modes which allow for a profitable and sustainable transport no matter which mode has been chosen. 

Over the last 10 years we have had a number of European directives which have tried to potentiate intermodal transport though at the moment not very successfully. The directives 96/48CE and 2001/16/CE indented to activate the inter-usability of the transeuropean high speed rail system and the conventional rail. In these directives the conditions for a secure and continued train circulation were laid down; with a competitive performance and without big technical or operative reglementary differences between the European countries. The attempts we have had in Europe to make the international markets of the rail transport more transparents have not received sufficient support from all the states of the European Union. Recently the European Commission has disciplinarily prosecuted various states for this reason. The first package designed by the European Union consisted of 3 directives which obliged to open competition in the goods rail market. The time for implemention expired in 2003. This package of measures obliged the member states to guarantee the right of access to the international services of the transeuropean net of terrestrial transport (TEN-T). Already in the year 1996 the European Community took the decision 1692/96/CE due to which the transeuropean transport network was created and 30 projects were declared of “European interest”. 

The investment projects TEN-T proposed by the European Commission which affected Spain were the following:

Project 3: Axes for high velocity railway in the southwest of Europe 

Project 8: Moltimodal axes Portugal / Spain – rest of Europe

Project 15: GALILEO network. Tecnology for navigation via satellites for the positioning and synchronisation of various services in Europe.

Project 16: Goods railway axis Sines/Algeciras  - Madrid – Paris. (Over the Central Pyrenean Crossing) 

Project 19: Inter-usability of railways of high velocity in the Iberian Peninsula. The main objective was to overcome the problem of the specific width of the Iberian rails to the construction of new rails with the European width. 

Project 21: Short Sea Shipping (marine highway). West Europe, south-east Europe and Mediterranean.

If we revise these projects, we will see that most of them have been accomplished only partially, some of them even have a considerable delay, but nonetheless they are fundamental in the structuring of the intermodal network of the Iberic Peninsula. 

The new European decree 913/2010, of 22.09.2010, defines the European railway corridors and its administrative organs. In this decree I would highlight the definition that is made of the supervisory boards of the European corridors, which superpose themselves over the stately administrators of the railway infrastructures, in order to achieve the necessary coordination in the inter-usability, a step forward in the potentiating of the European railway transport and intermodality. Of all the routes mentioned in the attachment of the decree, route no. 4 (via the Atlantic Ocean) and route no. 6 (via the Mediterranean) have to be pointed out, which have the 10.11.2013 as deadline for their beginning of operation. Both affect the peninsular territory and are in consonance with the projects of the European Transportation Network.  

Since 2004 the multi-sector association FERRMED, an initiative of the private sector, has been working with the objective to improve the goods transport in Europe. This associations has a variety of proposals, for example the introduction of standards in the railway network with regard to: Voltage, width of rails, the loading gage of tunnels and bridges, the ERTMS (European Rail Traffic Management System) for indication and traffic administration, etc. Furthermore, they propose the design of new concepts for locomotives and wagons and even make recommendations for technological improvements for the automatic connection of the wagons. All these are aspects that open up new possibilities for new automated solutions in the administration of intermodal terminals. This lobby has achieved the support of the European Union and of various member states. The big commitment of FERRMED is the creation of a railways axis which will reach from Scandinavia, over the areas of central Europe of Rhine and Rhone, to the limits of the Western Mediterranean. In the area of Spain it is one of the principal defenders of the Mediterranean corridor.  

The European Union is updating anterior investment projects TEN-T, in which a big part of the claims the FERRMED association has raised are included. Let us hope that the European Commission will implement those projects supported by the member states that are best adapted to those parameters of economic efficiency and environmental benefit, which justify such an important investment in times of crisis. In Spain, as always, the big problem will be to fight with the inter-territorial tensions to reach Brüssel with an agreed on statement. 

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