Planning public transport networks in the post-petroleum era

Oil depletion scenarios suggest that public transport powered largely by electricity, together with cycling and walking, will be the mainstays of future urban mobility. This paper argues that there is great scope, in a time-scale of years rather than decades, for transport planners to increase the number and types of trips for which public transport is a convenient option. Our argument begins with a snapshot of Melbourne during the last period of intense and sustained constraints on oil supply and an overview of the performance of various transport modes in the three decades from 1976 to 2006. The decline of public transport since 1950 occurred at a faster rate than changes in density and can be reversed without the need for widespread re-creation of the urban form. The key to making these changes lies in the approach to public transport planning used in successful European and North American cities: service-based network planning. This model offers hope for greater public transport use in Australian cities, and is outlined in the central part of the article. We conclude with some comments on the forms of transport governance required to deliver ‘networked’ public transport services.