No climate-resilient society without a resilient transport system

Abstract

Transport systems are a barrier to climate-resilient societies. Their crucial societal function to provide access is outweighed by the effects transportation has on society through its nexus with public health and the climate system. These range from greenhouse gas emissions via air andnoise pollution to accidents and reinforcing harmful sedentary lifestyles. Removing the barrier needs a transformative understanding of resilience as opposed to resilience as withstanding and adapting to pressures. This chapter entangles the relationships between transportation, public health, climate, and society in a nexus framework and explains why transport systems as barrier to climate-resilient societies will prevail as long as conventional approaches to change cause further lock-in and rebound effects. It provides an understanding of resilience allowing for transformational change. In addition, two approaches that contribute to transformative resilience are presented. Firstly, people-centered mobility puts humans and their needs before infrastructure and means of transport. This is a prerequisite for deconstructing transport systems as a barrier to climate resilience. Secondly, the pricing of externalities has the potential to completely change transport systems as we know them today, by closing the gap between prices paid for transport by individual users and actual costs incurred on a societal level. Transforming the transport sector needs to be a key element of any strategy to strive toward societal resilience. Without it, negative effects of transport systems can neither be avoided nor reduced in the required order of magnitude. A climate-resilient society cannot be reached without changes in transportation. © The Author(s)