Editor's Blog - October 2019

Toowoomba $1.6b bypass

AITPM’s David Sulejic sent in an article from the trucking magazine Big Rigs with a glowing report about the opening of the Toowoomba bypass. It said in part:

After being a dream for more than 50 years, the Toowoomba Second Range Crossing is finally open.

"We have just opened the eighth wonder of the modern world, indeed it truly is,” Deputy Prime Minister Michael McCormack said at the official opening yesterday.

The old range is now known as the Toowoomba Connection Road. There will be no toll for the first three months.

I found it interesting, and I hope encouraging, that after the free trial period, truckies will pay $22.85 to use the road. It will be interesting to see how many road users, including freight vehicles, use the toll road as time goes by.

Salesforce builds Australia's biggest bike shed

There is a nice story about the tech giant Salesforce, who will open their new $1.5 billion Circular Quay headquarters in 2021, which will incorporate the country's biggest underground bike shed in the basement. 

The move will encourage active transport for their staff but it goes beyond that. The builder, Lendlease, plans 700 secure bike parking spots, stating that 250 of these will be available to the public via "Sydney's first public bike hub" run by the City of Sydney.

I wonder if this is a good example of how supporting and encouraging good corporate citizenship might be the most valuable way of promoting sustainable transport.

Pedestrian Detection Systems Don’t Work When Needed Most

New research from the American Automobile Association reveals that the pedestrian detection aspects of automatic emergency braking systems perform inconsistently, and proved to be completely ineffective at night. 

In America 75% of pedestrian fatalities occur after dark. 

The systems were also challenged by real-world situations, like a vehicle turning into the path of a pedestrian. AAA’s testing found that in this simulated scenario, the systems did not react at all, colliding with the adult pedestrian target every time. 

There is no intent to remove these devices but there is a need for continued development of pedestrian detection systems.  This also raises issues of informing the public about variations in systems and their overall limitations.

On average, nearly 6,000 pedestrians die on American roads each year, accounting for 16% of all traffic deaths, a percentage that has steadily grown since 2010.

Translations of transport modellers 

I had the audio presentations from the AITPM Webinar “Using mobile phone and big data in transport” transcribed and as there were a number of interesting accents the transcription produced some unexpected results.

“Mode share” was often interpreted as “Motors”; “Matrices” became “Mattresses”; “Transport modellers” at one stage became “House of mothers”; but the most common one was “Trips” became “Chips”.