Policy incentives to change behaviour in passenger transport

This paper suggests that there are very many different sorts of behavioural choice, many of which are in continual flux, and subject to a very wide range of different incentives. The evidence base is very substantial, consisting of some thousands of studies which have produced specific quantitative results. The evidence confirms that travel choices include the volume and location of travel, other modes notably walking and cycling, driving styles, levels of car ownership, where to live and work and shop, and the type of activities they participate in. In general it is found that responses are often rather small in the short run, but build up to very much more flexible life-style choices in the longer run, defined as the period 5-10 years and in some cases longer, in which habits are eroded and new ones form. A common characteristic of those interventions on which evidence based on experience is available is that they have mostly been chosen for objectives other than carbon reduction which in cost-benefit terms often bring a benefit greater than the cost of implementing them. Where this is the case, there are carbon benefits for zero or negative real resource cost.