Aim
The aim of the course is that the students should develop insights into:

• The interaction between the development of the society and transportation.

• The driving forces in transportation.

• Variables affecting the effects of transportation.

Knowledge and understanding
For a passing grade the student must

• Have knowledge about the historical development of transportation and its modal split,

• Understand important driving forces, for example economical, technical, political and social, in this development,

• Understand the role of freight and personal transport for the commercial sector, for various public functions and in our everyday life,

• Be able to account for the political transport objectives,

• Be able to describe the basic traffic engineering aspects (accessibility, environment and safety),

• Be able to describe the connection between variables affecting the generation of traffic and the effects of traffic,

• Understand the interaction between localisation of industry/habiation and transportation,

• Understand how models are used to make traffic forecasts,

• Understand different planning principles,

• Be able to describe how traffic varies over time and how this affects the design of traffic facilities,

• Understand how ITS can contribute towards a sustainable transport system

Skills and abilities
For a passing grade the student must

• Be able to apply traffic engineering methods for, among other things, calculating the demand for personal transport with different transportation modes under different basic scenarios,

• Be able to analyse the effects different changes can have on society

Contents
The course contains the following themes:

• Development of traffic: How has personal transportation and freight changed throughout history, what is the situation like today and how do we expect it to change in the future under different assumptions?

• Generation and driving forces: Which variables affect the amount of traffic and its effects? How can we influence the development? The four step principle.

• Basic aspects of traffic: The political objectives in transportation and the basic aspects accessibility, environment and safety.

• Transport modes: Car, bus, bike and walking. How do the different modes differ from each other in a planning perspective? Temporal variation of traffic (day, week, year). Capacity and design. Transportation network. Planning principles: Integration/separation. Forecating models (The four step model)

• ITS: Technical solutions to achieve a safe, effective and sustainable transport system.

• Three assignments and one study visit will be used as support to the different themes:

Literature
Hydén, Christer: Trafiken i den hållbara staden. ISBN: 9789144053011.
Extra literature in form of articles etc distributed during the course.