Changing Mobility in the UK

25 May 2020

On the 10th-12th May, the UK government announced its plan to gradually lift the lockdown.

So far, we have not seen any drastic changes, as the plan takes a step by step approach with conditions such as the COVID-19 infection rate and progress of various measures.

However, one of the guidelines triggered an interesting change:

• Continue to work from home as much as possible.
•  Where work can only be done in the workplace, it is encouraged to go back to work  as long as safety measures are applied.  In such cases, however, avoid public transport and commute by cycle and foot, or by car. 

Accordingly, London released a plan of closing some of the main roads to cars to allocate to pedestrians and cyclists only (the photo below is a part of the plan in central London:  The Guardian).   The plan also includes dedicated cycle lanes from outside of London to the city centre.  

On the 24th May, the Mayor of London announced that “116km of protected cycle lanes are now complete or under construction across London.”, which doubles the length of routes available to cyclists.

Other towns and cities in the UK have also released their plans to widen pavements and to build dedicated lanes for cyclists.   Some cities such as Newcastle plan to change road layout in the city centre (below photo).

Considering that UK cities and towns have suffered serious air pollution and road congestion issues, many of these changes will be applied permanently.

We think these will trigger further development and introduction of not only new infrastructure but also software such as MaaS (Mobility as a Service).

At OBM, we closely watch how the UK mobility is changing and business model shift accordingly.  If you are interested in researching or launching a project in this area, please let us know.