How technology is shaping urban planning in the way of sustainability in response to greenhouse gas emissions, population and economic growth in Western Sydney.
Due to population growth and climate change, the way of urban planning has been shifting, and technology has become important and played a main role in supporting urban system in the way of sustainability. For example, sustainable public transport is becoming one of the primary services of cities to solve issues regarding traffic congestion and air pollution (Baker 2015). This development will move people and support the living standards of communities regarding accessibility and connectivity across cities and demonstrate the positive urban development in the future.
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On the other hand, according to Cox (2010) studied on sustainable transport development, stated that about the changing the way of traveling to public transportation is a challenge of urban planning, because of the private vehicle still represent as a symbol of convenience regarding the door to door services. The aim of this blog will address on how technology is shaping urban planning in the way of sustainability mainly changing the way of people moving from private vehicle to public transport in response to greenhouse gas emissions, population, and economic growth. And what are the advantages and challenges of changing people movement to public transport? Is it the technologies we have right now the possible response to our future transport needs?
The idea of using public transport is to reduce private vehicles that are causing the traffic congestion and pollution to the environment. They are the main problems of urban development that cannot be sustained for both social and environmental term. According to Byrne, Sipe, and Dodson (2014) examines on Australia Environmental planning, stated that people who are living in Western Sydney are a lack of frequent public bus services to train station and the people often find unavailable spaces on the train during the peak hours. These problems lead to having private cars on the roads heavily in term of lacking frequent and reliable public transport. Due to the problems of unreliable public transport, and Parramatta is growing to be second CBD in the next five years (Lehmann (2014), it will rise more people and employment across the Western Sydney, and transport will be one of the major issues for a livable city of Parramatta precint.
In the term of transport issues lead to having the changing movement, and there are questions remain whether we are ready for it or not. The concept of smart cities has rapidly emerged since the early 2000s (Stimmel 2015), focusing on technological advance and innovation to make a city more sustainable, efficient, livable and equitable. These are important to study the role of urban planning strategies in this 21st century to understand on how the growing technologies are shaping our society.
For example, the proposal of the light rail project in Parramatta will be essential to maintain community, economic and environmental protection regarding accessibility and livability across the Parramatta area. The light rail will connect the public with different places and bring benefit both residents and tourists travel around Westmead to Carlingford via Parramatta CBD (NSW Government 2016). The light rail or sustainable transport is going to allow individuals enable to access to information and transport services in smartphones and giving access to travel option and real-time information. People will find it as the easier way in their hand regarding having accurate and timely information for public transport. Moreover, Transport in the digital age will be adopted levels of effective construction of new systems and automation to minimize waste management and energy efficiency.
The ideas of implementing these technologies are to improve the existing urban structures and create new urban opportunities of technology, in order to refine the established concept of car-free in the city. Transport in the advance technology will be building for our future to meet the growing urban needs in the next ten years.
However, even the light rail is represented as a sustainable transport in the future, the concept of car-free will be a challenge for sustainable transport that requires people to change living and working in a walking distance by using public transport. Blecic, Cecchini and Trunfio (2015) addressed in similar ideas, stated that the concept of walkability requires integrating with quality features of urban design for encouraging people’s willingness to walk or cycling.
The functional and well-connected pathways are part of the ideas of creating more livable cities in terms of making public domains and encouraging people walking and cycling by using public transport. In terms of the accessibility, walkability and connectivity of the public transport are essential criteria of the sustainable transport plan, to provide an understanding of how future planning could be solved by reducing car dependency. And the characteristics and functions of the pathway network will be a major part to offer an attractive, comfortable and safe for people.
Regarding the rapid changes of cities and urban structures, knowledge, and information of digitalization play a significant role in the planning profession and the encouragement of walking will involve with safety and convenient movement of pedestrian between buses, the light rail and train stations.
In the safety context, lighting will be a part of improved safety in the public space, but how technology can be a part of planning sustainability? According to Green Building Council Australia (2015) addressed that the creation of solar panels technology plays a main part of sustainability to capture the natural sunlight transfer into power and electricity. For example, the Regional Rail Link project in Victoria applied more than 100 solar panels, on the rooftop of the station, to provide power and energy to each station. It also has sensors automatically switch off the lighting and air conditioning system when they are not required. Moreover, a rainwater harvesting system from the rooftop is to collect rainwater, which is used to flush station toilets, to wash platforms and water consumption for the station garden.
The result of the sustainability strategies on the railway station in Victoria is impressive in terms of producing 40% less greenhouse gas emissions than a standard station design, use 60% less water and 30% lower for electrical demand. The success of sustainability in the Victoria railway project, it is an example of what is possible in technology design influence on our future transport. In the future context, technology development in planning seems to be about developing on resources efficiency due to the population growth and running low on our natural resources in the future. It can be said that the ideas of creating smart city are involved with an effective integration of smart construction ideas, well performance in energy and water efficient and also deliver safe and walkable neighbors. The increase of technologies in our society has shaped urban planning in the way of sustainability.
According to Forster (2004) addressed in a similar ideas stated that the development and change of technology will guide us to make the urban system better in terms of our human physical limitation in response to economic, social and environmental aspects. The adoption of technology will enable us to find a new way and solution for smart mobility in our urban environment. The vision of this blog is to take advantage of these movements to raise the ideas integration between different ways of transport to achieve smart city, particularly improve the public’s travel experience. And it will contribute to providing a better understanding of how future development should emerge with sustainable concept and technology development to minimize social and environmental impact, especially maximize environmental and social opportunities.
However, questions are remaining whether sustainable transport will be the demand for the community. As the requirements of using public transport need a major reform of people’s practice of movement and the movement of persons is involved to the idea of accessibility and connectivity that public can assess to desired places and services in a walking distance.
There are barriers to encouraging people to walk regarding safety, distance, and changing people behaviors, which are the difficulties for supporting sustainable transport. In that context, emerging technology is a challenge that involves with further research and development to make transport safer, more productive, and more efficient for social changes. And I believe that technology will be continuing and moving us in a way that able to sustain the ecological system and meet our future demands.
To conclude that, the sustainable transport development will connect residents, employment, investments, recreation space, and culture with a reliable public transport in Western Sydney. It can be seen that the change has already arrived in transport and technology has a major role in the transportation sector improvements to the car-free concept. It has been shaping decision-making and investment to deliver many improvements to transport. In order to provide smart city for resource efficient while providing a high quality of life to the community at the same time. The requirement of new capital programmes will be needed to involved investment in technology to ensure that urban planning can achieve sustainable outcome and build intelligence to the public.
The Community will find using public transport as the easier method in terms of having accurate and timely information. These show that how communities could become smart and how cities could be designed to integrate information technologies. According to Albino, Berardi and Dangelico (2015) defined that the use of smart technologies is to improve the critical infrastructure elements and services of a city by providing more information to citizens.
Thus, the future development and character of Western Sydney will mainly be shaped by the services of economic restructuring and technological development. And Western Sydney is sprawling and car-dependent for years that is a challenge of changing their lifestyle and behavior into public transport.
However, the ideas of new technologies will bring benefit to the public and also aim to reduce energy, raw material consumption and private vehicle. It is involved with smart supply and disposal system that is the importance of urban planning as the process of movement changes, technological development, and smart energy consumption. The improvement of existing urban structures will create new urban opportunities of technology to refine the established concept of car-free in the city. And the requirement of sustainable transport will need a significant change of people’s practice of movement, and the movement of individuals is related to the notion of accessibility that community is able to assess to places and services in a walking distance. And smart mobility will need to embrace with new technology to integrate transport infrastructure and movement for maximum energy efficiency, convenience, safety and affordability of transport structures.
References
Albino, V, Berardi U, Dangelio, R, M 2015, ‘Smart Cities: Definition, Dimension, Performance, and Initiatives’, Journal of Urban Technology, Routledge, Canada, viewed 23 September 2017, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10630732.2014.942092
Baker, S 2015, Sustainable Development: the environment and sustainable development, Taylor & Francis, Abingdon, Oxon. Viewed 20 September 2017, ProQuest Ebook Central, http://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/UWSAU/reader.action?docID=2194946&ppg=22
Blecic, I, Cecchini, A & Trunfio, G, A 2015, ‘Towards a Design Support System for Urban Walkability’, Computer Science, vol. 51, pp. 2157–2167, viewed 23 September 2017, <http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1877050915012971>
Byrne, J, Sipe, N, & Dodson, J 2014, ‘Australian Environmental Planning: Challenges and future prospects’, Urban Environmental processes: transport planning, Routledge, New York, pp. 146–157.
Cox, P 2010, ‘Sustainable development and ecomobolity’, Moving people sustainable transport development, Zed Books, New York.
Forster, C 2004, ‘Australian cities: continuity and change’, Urban Future, Oxford University Press, Australia, pp. 193–210.
Green Building Council Australia 2015, ‘Regional Rail Link project’, http://new.gbca.org.au/showcase/projects/regional-rail-link/
Lehmann, J 2014, ‘$8 billion boom as Parramatta reaches for the sky: high-rises to transform the west capital’, The Daily Telegraph, viewed 23 September 2017.
NSW Government 2016, Parramatta Light Rail Industry Briefing, Viewed 23 September 2017, <http://www.transport.nsw.gov.au/sites/default/files/b2b/projects/parramatta-light-rail-industry-briefing-march-2016.pdf>
Stimmel, CL 2015, Building Smart Cities: Analytics, ICT, and Design Thinking, CRC Press, Portland. ProQuest Ebook Central, viewed 23 September 2017.
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