Instead of free parking, our post-COVID CBDs need a big vision to become attractive destinations that aren't car-friendly at the expense of being people-friendly.
COVID led to commuting time savings worth over $2,000 a year for each driver and $5,000 per public transport user. But as workplaces reopen, we may need road user charges to keep traffic flowing.
CBD retailers were already struggling before the pandemic. The contrast in fortunes with suburban retail activity is stark, and there are good reasons to think the shift could be permanent.
Conventional transport infrastructure planning has been based on wholesale commuting to and from the city centre.
Taras Vyshnya/Shutterstock
Coronavirus has changed population projections and behaviours across society. With fewer commuters we need to shift transport planning based on a hub-and-spoke network to focus on more local travel.
Car use and cycling have soared to above pre-pandemic levels in our biggest cities (Melbourne is an obvious exception). Walking is not far behind, but public transport is being shunned.
Commuting’s not all bad.
XiXinXing / Shutterstock.com
Education fuelled extraordinary growth in Western Sydney's professional services workforce, but their jobs aren't local. More than 300,000 commute to work outside the region.
Do we really want to go back to daily commuting as the default way of working?
David Moir/AAP
The change in our behaviour in response to COVID-19 has created an opportunity to build on this moment and transform our local neighbourhoods into vibrant mixed-use centres of activity.
Between home and work is a window of time and space where we can choose our distractions. Staring out the train window, scrolling the news or perhaps listening to podcasts. We miss it.
A cyclist uses New York’s bike-share program.
Noam Galai/Getty Images
Low-income and minority groups are often reliant on cheaper modes of transport, but many find cycling to work problematic.
Some of the highest coronavirus hospitalization rates in Denver are in neighborhoods near Valverde, a community that was once redlined.
RJ Sangosti/Denver Post via Getty Images
Neighborhood characteristics like pollution from busy roads, widespread public transit use and lack of community-based health care are putting certain communities at greater risk from COVID-19.
Some new habits we've seen emerging during the pandemic could help us solve tricky problems like traffic congestion, which have challenged our cities for a long time.
After the 'world's biggest work-from-home experiment', many people (and their employers) might decide they needn't commute every day. If even a fraction do that, infrastructure needs will change.
In the rural South, chronic illnesses are common, the population is older and health care options have been declining as hospitals close. All put the population at higher risk from COVID-19.
AP Photo/Rogelio V. Solis
Mohja Rhoads, California State University, Dominguez Hills and Fynnwin Prager, California State University, Dominguez Hills
More workplaces are allowing employees to telecommute, but there are still barriers to more flexible arrangements.
In cities like Copenhagen that have good infrastructure for cycling it’s an established commuting option alongside road and rail.
Heb/Wikimedia Commons
A breakdown in the road or rail systems often causes commuter chaos in Australia. Some overseas cities are more resilient because they have other options – and our bicycle network could give us that.