A walk in the park: has the Covid-19 travel response opened the door to a new direction on climate policy?

New research led by Professors Greg Marsden and Jillian Anable from Leeds Institute for Transport Studies explores how people in England and Scotland changed travel behaviour as a result of the pandemic.

The new data, from a large panel based survey, confirm that people have walked and cycled more, and worked and shopped more online than ever before. Car use has not fully recovered and car sales are down, despite very low public transport use. The researchers make the point that the shifts to active travel (walking and cycling) could be consolidated and extended to meet the UK’s net-zero carbon goals. They recommend that the Governments’ investment plans should be altered to focus on creating high-quality neighbourhoods where people can walk and cycle to work, shops and services, and safe routes to schools and town and city centres.

To read the full report click here