A research team led by Prof. Leung Yee, Director of the Institute of Future Cities at CUHK, has conducted a comprehensive research titled ‘Best Practices and Strategies for Low-Carbon Urban Transport System’ on low-carbon transport practices and policies, and has come up with recommendations for Hong Kong’s future low-carbon transport system initiatives.

The team investigated the feasibility of adopting other countries’ successful initiatives and used questionnaire survey and in-depth interviews to gauge the opinions of the general public and experts on low-carbon policies. 1,200 people were interviewed on their travel behaviour, car ownership and driver’s license and their opinion on transport strategies and policies, and in-depth interviews were carried out with the experts on low-carbon transport policies and proposed solutions to traffic and environmental issues.

Research findings show that the general public and professionals have relatively different views on the effectiveness of various low-carbon transport policies, like implementing a vehicle quota system and the Electronic Road Pricing System. Some strategies recommended by the team include:

• Increase and improve urban space and infrastructure for pedestrians and cyclists to encourage active travel;
• Extend the MTR network, improve the level of service and the intermodal connection and provide public transport a higher priority in right of way to maintain a high level of ridership;
• Provide incentives for electric vehicles and improve charging facilities;
• Implement the Electronic Road Pricing System to reduce traffic congestion and roadside pollution.
• Experiment with bike sharing and car sharing programmes to provide more travel choices to individuals;
• Share transport-relevant data on an open informatics platform so that people/companies can develop suitable applications to encourage informed travel behaviour.

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