Abstract

First paragraph: The COVID-19 pandemic has brought previously unimaginable change to the level of mobility in the economy almost overnight. People who have never before worked from home before were obliged to do so immediately, and business travel stopped almost completely in a matter of weeks. After the slow restart of many transport services, attention turned to understanding the implications of the unprecedented uncertainties about future travel demand exposed by the pandemic. Most obvious is the issue of how long some form of social distancing restrictions and/or other mitigations such as the wearing of face coverings will have to remain in place (and potentially be reintroduced in future) in advance of a reliable vaccine and/or therapeutics becoming available. These restrictions have profound effects on the capacity of many transport services, wider travel demand, and in turn the financial viability of the transport system as we know it. From these critical issues emerge subsequent questions including what a significant loss of confidence in the safety of public transport means for usage far into the future, whether the business model underpinning low-cost aviation can survive, and what the experience of working remotely en masse means for the future of commuting and the structure of our cities.

Rights

This item has been embargoed for a period. During the embargo please use the Request a Copy feature at the foot of the Repository record to request a copy directly from the author. You can only request a copy if you wish to use this work for your own research or private study. Publisher policy allows this work to be made available in this repository. Published in Productivity and the Pandemic: Challenges and Insights from Covid-19 (ed. by Philip McCann and Tim Vorley), copyright Edward Elgar Publishing. The original publication is available at: https://www.e-elgar.com/shop/gbp/productivity-and-the-pandemic-9781800374591.html The only uses of this work permitted are private study or research.

Cite as

Docherty, I., Marsden, G., Anable, J. & Forth, T. 2020, 'Transport, the economy and environmental sustainability post-COVID19', Productivity and the Pandemic: Challenges and Insights from Covid-19.. http://hdl.handle.net/1893/31936

Downloadable citations

Download HTML citationHTML Download BIB citationBIB Download RIS citationRIS
Last updated: 03 September 2022
Was this page helpful?