Multi-level governance, modal thinking, and engaging with insights from ITEM after it’s over

Posted on November 17, 2024 by HD Budnitz

The ITEM (Inclusive Transitions to Electric Mobility) project technically ended on 31 August when its ESRC funding ended and I (have had to) move on to other funded projects.

Yet it is unusual for all a project’s outputs to be published within a project’s funded timescale, never mind to see engagement with the outputs or related impact in the short term. Journal articles in particular can be slow to appear, such that publication and publicising findings can often seem detached from the publicity built into the project.

For this reason, it was exciting to see the first comparative article based on primary data collected during ITEM accepted and published in the last couple weeks – and only a couple months after project end. As lead author, I had worked hard to identify patterns in policymaking across our four case study cities, explore the implications of these for more sustainable and just transitions to electric mobility, and highlight the potential learnings for policymakers and practitioners. I may be biased, but I think the article has a lot of exciting insights to offer.

It wasn’t quite published in time to be referenced in the expert comment piece on the University website, which also aimed to publicise the policy brief we produced for Bristol. However, it had just been accepted and the pre-proof published the week I went to Bristol to give a seminar on mobility justice and urban electric mobility at the University of the West of England (UWE).

I was honoured to be asked to present some of the key findings of the ITEM project to fellow transport researchers and students at UWE and beyond. I was able to focus on some of the highlights of the paper, such as the tensions between national pressures to deliver an EV future and local discomfort among transport planners with private automobility – even when it’s electric.

There was some lively discussion on the challenges facing the approaches to increase inclusion that I identified in urban electric mobility policymaking. Could policies to make EV charging infrastructure more affordable and accessible succeed in a competitive, industry-led market? Could shared electric mobility offer alternatives at a scale to make a difference when its uptake remained relatively niche? How could policymakers reach across modal silos and be confident in including diverse groups in decision-making – especially if even when they did so, it is rarely reflected in published policy documents? And how could funding streams be made both more flexible and more fair?

All were valid questions, and I can’t claim to have all the answers. Furthermore, as I said at the start, the ITEM project is technically over, so there is only so much time to go back over the research data we collected during the project and see if there are more answers or insights.

Nonetheless, we do still have other articles to finish and publish. We can still see what impact the project outputs and their findings have. And, having moved on to other projects, we can be creative in linking new data and findings to what we have learned. My research now involves diving deeper into the barriers and opportunities to scaling shared electric mobility and the potential of reaching across not just modal, but also sectoral siloes (e.g. between home energy and mobility demand). As I move forward, I will not forget the insights from ITEM or the further questions it raised that I might yet be able to answer.

Misrecognition in the transition

Posted on May 31, 2024 by HD Budnitz

Urban residents’ reactions to distributional e-mobility policies offer insights into what misrecognition means.

Recognition Justice: Whose issues, needs, values, experiences and understandings are respected in policy and governance?

When we started talking about the different dimensions of social justice to policymakers and stakeholders as part of this research project back in late 2021, we quickly realised that recognition justice was the least recognised.

Matters of distributional justice are often well-integrated – even if not always executed – into planning, design, and appraisal processes. It’s an exercise in identifying costs, benefits, and upon whom they fall.

Now, as we come to the end of the project, we see that whilst matters of recognition justice remain elusive, expressions of distributional injustice in interviews with urban residents offer insights into their experiences of misrecognition… and how it might be addressed by policymakers.

Transport is a spatially organised sector. Spatial and physical accessibility is almost always a key metric for transport infrastructure and service provision. E-mobility is no exception, and policymakers regularly consider the distribution of public charging and shared micro-mobility, for example. Concerns around the affordability of EVs (usually cars and vans, but sometimes e-bikes too) are also widely documented, and policies often aim to make adoption cheaper.

Yet these and other policies to promote electric mobility can misrecognise what would make e-mobility more affordable or accessible to different groups. Our interviews with a wide spectrum of ~100 e-mobility users and non-users in four medium-sized European cities, from Oslo to Poznan, highlight some of the issues and experiences that such policies may need to recognise.

For example, a policy focus on the accessibility of electric mobility and EV adoption is seen by some to distract from the shortcomings of public transport and transport exclusion, misrecognising what certain sections of the population might actually need in terms of transport infrastructure.

Likewise, some social groups would never consider buying or leasing a new car – this can have to do with class and upbringing as much as income. So if grants and loans designed to make EV adoption cheaper don’t apply to second-hand vehicles, then the values of such groups are misrecognised.

Urban residents highlight how policies to improve accessibility for users of services such as shared e-scooters or public charging must be careful not to misrecognise the impacts on non-users. Do these services make other users of the same public spaces less safe? Do the needs of family members, such as children, make the services inaccessible in a way they would not be if the individual were travelling alone?

Restrictive policies like Clean Air Zones can misrecognise who ends up with the most financial burden, as well as how financial incentives could best reduce those burdens. Calls for greater flexibility in the use of loans and incentives highlighted one way to address this inequity, but care is needed.

Different groups understand and react to financial and regulatory policies, never mind their short and long-term impacts, in different ways, threatening further misrecognition, potentially born of poor communication and a perceived gap in procedural justice.

Recognition justice is not the same as distributional or procedural justice, but they all overlap. Through the window of distributional injustice as described by diverse users and non-users of electric mobility, the shape of recognition injustices become clearer. And through more purposive participation, in-depth engagement, and knowledge production, perhaps we can all learn to recognise it.

Making sense of policy mixes

Posted on May 31, 2024 by HD Budnitz

Policy mixes are the complex arrangement of objectives or goals and the instruments or measures devised to achieve them. They are not policy processes, although they develop over time, as outputs from ongoing political and technocratic processes and cycles. They are not policy strategies, although strategy documents often contain lists of goals and references to instruments.
Policy mixes cannot be found in one document – their component parts are spread across strategies and funding bids, guidance and even press releases. Policy mixes are not the responsibility of any individual policymaker – the expertise and resources to prioritise goals and to design and deliver the instruments lie with an array of teams at different levels of governance and across private and third sector, as well as public sector organisations.
Thus, compiling the policy mixes for the electrification of private and shared passenger transport in Bristol and its hinterland was a challenging task. We identified thirty individual policy instruments and grouped them, with some duplication where appropriate, by four modes: private vehicles (including those used for business and taxis), car-sharing, e-bikes, and e-scooters. Each instrument was categorised and listed with its intended goals; its spatial extent and timescale; and its consideration of the distributional, recognition, and participation dimensions of social justice.
The resulting spreadsheet was described as impressive or intimidating – or both! Explaining its contents at our third policy and governance workshop for the ITEM project was not simple. And this despite the fact that all eleven participants were involved with developing policy strategies and goals or implementing policy instruments or lobbying for policy improvements on behalf of particular user groups.
Nonetheless, we not only explained it, but asked the participants to score the policy mixes according to the complementarity of instruments, the coherence of goals, the alignment between instruments and goals, and the implications for distribution, recognition and participation for each mode and all modes together. Academics have attempted to undertake this sort of task to better analyse how policy has driven or could better drive change. We wanted to go one step further and not just analyse as academics, but also encourage action among policymakers. So we guided our participants through the task. We asked them to consider how they could consciously and strategically improve the policy mixes.
One rewarding result of taking this approach was through our work – and our excessively small-print spreadsheet – they could see that lots of great initiatives were happening in Bristol. Their views were broadly positive that the policy mixes showed consistent goals, with instruments reinforced more than undermined, and that whilst more could be added, there was not so much to take away.
Admittedly, the scores for the justice implications were lower – not all the policy mixes were evenly distributed nor recognised every social grouping nor, in particular, enabled much participation or influence in their planning and implementation. Here was room for improvement: finding ways to listen to new voices above the roar from the usual suspects, relying less on digital tools.
As the discussion moved to strengthening the policy mixes, the ever-present spectre of insufficient funding reared its head. Policy instruments and goals might be strategically focused in principle, but if they were not properly funded, then how could they ever extend to all the places and people needed to be just? Could creative distribution of funds help? Just as evaluating policy mixes rather than isolated instruments reveals synergies as well as gaps, so considering how groups rather than individuals are affected could enable recognition of intersecting needs that might be more efficiently met. Likewise, the policy mixes include carrots and sticks. Participants suggested that seeing both on a single page helped them to consider how to match the carrots to where (or whom) the sticks are targeted.
We will be producing a more detailed, structured report of how we evaluated the policy mixes in Bristol and the ideas and recommendations that will accelerate a more inclusive transition to electric mobility in Bristol. But for now, suffice it to say, the first step, making sense of policy mixes together, was completed with a sense of achievement.

All About Audience

Posted on July 24, 2023 by HD Budnitz

I have not posted a blog for three months, but I have presented my research to five different audiences in that time. It’s been busy – and instructive.

My first audience included colleagues from various departments and disciplines across the University at an event to share research on ‘Behaviour and the Environment’. I focused first on my previous project, Park and Charge Oxfordshire, and results from a Stated Choice experiment on parking and charging preferences and the behavioural questions of EV adoption. I concluded with a short summary of my current research project, ITEM: Inclusive Transition to Electric Mobility, which partially questions the behavioural choice perspective on the transition.

My second audience were part-time students on a continuing education Masters. As the seminar was due to last 90 minutes, I started preparing those slides first, so I’d have plenty of material from which to develop my other presentations. I was still updating them the day before, adding extra slides in case I needed them to fill the time. I agreed to answer questions as I went along, and barely got through all the material I had originally included, never mind the extra.

My third audience was our research participants: policymakers and stakeholders, many of whom I’d interviewed as part of the research data collected to analyse the policy perspective. The presentation parts of the workshop had to be quick, to give plenty of time for moderate structured discussions that still felt almost too short.

My fourth audience was at a professional conference attended mainly by transport practitioners from the public and private sector. I wrote a conference paper, which I knew said all I wanted it to. That was to be circulated after the event, but on the day itself, I spoke at 5:30pm in one of five parallel sessions. The last presenter in the last session of a long day. We were all a bit tired!

My fifth and final audience was at an academic conference, where I presented at the end of the first session, 10am, on the last day. With all the previous presentations under my belt, I was no longer making last minute changes to my slides, I kept to time and received useful feedback for the comparative academic paper I am currently drafting on the policy perspective.

All these presentations took a lot of work, as there are not as many economies of scale as you might think in presenting the same work multiple times, if you are doing so for diverse audiences in a variety of formats. The process was, however, instructive and gave me new insights into both how to present my work and the work itself.

For example, the internal academic audience taught me the value of making connections between past and future work.

The teaching taught me to always build in a wide range of audience participation time if you are planning on taking questions as you go along. You never know how engaged your audience will be or which material will draw comment.

At the workshop, my presentation wasn’t as important as the distillation of some of the findings into statements and activities to facilitate discussion. The research participants gave us insights not only into our analysis of the electric mobility transition in Bristol, but also into wider issues and interactions with other places and other research.

Session assignment at a conference is not within a presenter’s control, but once the programme is announced, it is important to think not only about who you are presenting to, but also when. Nobody is likely to be full of energy and enthusiasm in the late afternoon, so I should probably have aimed for less, but more catchy content.

Finally, I found that a little bit of academic theory, if explained briefly and simply, enhanced the more practical points in my presentation. That’s academic expertise at its best, and could well have done the same for some of my presentations to non-academic audiences!

Tales of Transition

Posted on July 24, 2023 by HD Budnitz

Our project is entitled ITEM – Inclusive Transitions to Electric Mobility. The ‘transitions’ bit is important. This is not just a study of electric mobility as it is now or has been in the past or is forecast to be in the future. It is a study of the process of changing from one system to another and the implications that process has for social justice.

We talk about systemic change, because transitions are multi-faceted. The transitions to electric mobility refer to the change from vehicles powered by fossil fuels to those powered by electricity. At face value, this suggests changes in technology and infrastructure, but socio-technical transitions in societies’ dominant means of movement also requires changes in policy, markets, culture and user practices, as well as interactions between all those aspects.

For transitions to electric mobility to decarbonise transport systems, users cannot simply replace their vehicles like for like, excepting only the propulsion system. For transitions to electric mobility to be socially inclusive, policy-makers and planners cannot treat electric mobility exactly as they have 20th century automobility, with all its consequences for equity of access, safety for all road users, and amenities in local neighbourhoods.

Transitions are also neither linear nor singular, occurring along different trajectories in different places. This is why comparison underlines our overarching objective for ITEM: to understand how to accelerate more inclusive transitions to electric mobility.
Here are a few observations on the multi-faceted, non-linear, and spatiotemporally uneven transitions we are observing in our case study cities so far:

Norway is known for being a front-runner in the sale and use of electric vehicles (EVs). EV uptake has shot up exponentially, so that it has progressed well beyond the purview of wealthy enthusiasts. However, downscaling the incentives that were designed to accelerate the transition is politically challenging, as is reducing access to central Oslo or other urban areas for private vehicles generally. Despite recognition that many city dwellers do not own cars at all, cuts in the government’s vehicle funding schemes are fiercely contested. Meanwhile, other forms of electric mobility, such as e-scooters have attracted a gradual process of increasing regulation from an almost non-existent baseline.

The UK set out its stall for the ‘transition’ to EVs when it led COP26 and declared electrification as the main route to decarbonise land transport of both goods and people. However, targets for public charging aside, grant funding and policy support from central government for urban electric mobility has often been indirect and insufficient. Cities like Bristol are left to find creative ways to meet conflicting needs for charging infrastructure or to enable EV purchase, rather than just petrol upgrades, to those affected by the Clean Air Zone. The success of the e-scooter trial is tempered by uncertainty over their longer-term legal status.

Meanwhile, Poland has one of the oldest, dirtiest private vehicle fleets in Europe, but is also one of the leading manufacturers of electric buses in Europe. And in cities like Poznan, electric trams have enabled clean, easy mobility for decades. This ‘old’ electric mobility is more socially inclusive, and the city also sees itself as a leader in electric micro-mobility, even if it is loathe to be first to experiment with Clean Air Zones. So whilst air pollution is a recognised problem, private EVs are considered a completely unaffordable solution.

These observations are also narratives of transition dynamics between places. Oslo is proud of its place in the process and wants to mentor other European cities undergoing their own transitions to electric mobility. Bristol knows it is lagging in EV uptake even compared to other cities in the UK, despite having a head start on EV charging infrastructure, and is relying on businesses to lead the way to accelerated adoption. And Poznan considers itself a laggard in EV terms, but wants to push for electric public transport systems to be more prominent in the transition story.

Such are the tales of transition we have found so far.

A plurality of policy processes and a pluralist perspective on social justice

Posted on February 24, 2023 by HD Budnitz

Over the last five months, we have interviewed 13 policy-makers and others involved in the policy-making process in Bristol, the West of England, UK.

We have heard about the ideas, evolution and implementation of policies for not only electric vehicles and charging infrastructure, but also the e-scooter trial, e-car clubs, the Clean Air Zone and accompanying grants and incentives, and to a lesser extent the integration of electric modes into public realm and neighbourhood improvements, e-bicycles, e-freight options, and the electrification of public transport.

We have coded, analysed and summarised the interviews, identifying not only the extensive consideration given to distributional justice issues such as accessibility and affordability, but also the greater recognition of diverse needs spatially and socio-demographically. Compared to the policy documents analysed last summer, the increased prominence of recognition justice may be attributed to more participatory approaches in procedural justice terms than was apparent in the published narratives. Our interviewees could and did describe their in-depth engagement with local residents and the establishment of diverse working groups that could inform policy.

All of them, however, local and national policy-makers, shared mobility operators, civic society representatives and experts, still raised concerns about the inclusivity and fairness of electric mobility policies. They asked what policymakers could realistically do to make electric vehicles more affordable to purchase; whether the necessities of commercial viability limited their ability to provide services to certain groups in certain neighbourhoods; and whether limited local government resources and capabilities could be allocated fairly given external constraints.

However, there were clear indications that local capabilities (even if not resources) had grown over the years through learning from both other places and from local people, tapping into national and academic expertise, and gaining professional experience.

On the other hand, our interviewees who were involved in public electric vehicle charging knew little about the e-scooter trial, and those involved in administering the Clean Air Zone did not work directly with operators implementing e-car clubs or expanding other shared mobility. This siloed approach may be limiting the potential for policymakers and operators to make the transition to electric mobility more socially just. Our research suggests it is already limiting their understanding of how just (or not) the transition is in Bristol at the moment and in what ways.

By jointly considering multiple major electric mobility policies and policy processes, the ITEM project is developing a more holistic understanding of how these policies and processes involve different groups, meet diverse needs and variably affect experiences of mobility and public space in and around Bristol. In other words, the research assesses the implications of a plurality of electric mobility processes for the multiple dimensions of social justice in our pluralist perspective.

By comparing the policy approaches and the dynamics of the transition to electric mobility across our four, medium-sized, case study cities in Europe, each at different stages in that transition, the ITEM project is also investigating how real and perceived constraints to accelerating a more inclusive transition can change and be addressed over time. That, however, is a topic for another blog.

Public Realm Resource

Posted on November 28, 2022 by HD Budnitz

The thorniest topic at the UN’s COP27 on climate change this month has been finance, or the lack thereof, to lower income and more vulnerable countries. Affordability is front and centre of the debate to not only tackle climate change globally, but also to do so justly.

Similarly, affordability is a word that has been on the lips of many policy makers and stakeholders as soon as we started researching inclusivity in the transition to electric mobility in Bristol. Electric vehicles (EVs) are seen as unaffordable by and for many people. Even retrofitting or upgrading to a vehicle compliant with the Clean Air Zone (introduced today!) is considered financially out of reach for some of the most vulnerable and vehicle-dependent.

Furthermore, for cash-strapped governments, there is debate as to whether limited public monies should be spent on installing public EV charging infrastructure, rather than leaving it to the private sector? Public sector public charging might improve inclusion by enabling EV adoption by those without an off-street parking and domestic charging option, but if only wealthier households (whether they have private parking or not) can afford an EV, do they really need public charging infrastructure to be subsidised? Especially as electricity prices go up, and providing as well as using public charging becomes less affordable.

There are arguments the other way, of course, as lower income households might still drive a company car or van. They might be able to access a second-hand or shared EV.

And there are other forms of electric mobility. E-scooters and e-bikes not only can improve accessibility, but also can be considered a reasonably affordable transport option, especially for medium-length journeys where public transport is limited. Besides, many e-scooter trials have included discounts for low income groups to make sure the scheme is affordable.

But affordability and how public monies are used are not the only topic up for debate when considering whether the transition to electric mobility is progressing in an inclusive way. Digging a little deeper, another inclusion / justice issue is around the rights of different people to use the public realm in different ways and how their different ways of moving are accommodated in public spaces.

A number of the policy-makers and stakeholders we spoke to described how the allocation or reallocation of space on the public highway or footway is one of the most contentious interventions they can propose. Even in terms of people moving through space, there are the ever-recurring problems of congestion, crowding, and the use of space of different modes. Then there’s the space taken up for parking, deliveries, sign posts, bollards, traffic signals, cycle stands – so much of our public realm is used for dormant vehicles or the smooth running of the transport network, never mind for other things like retail or socialising.

The addition of electric mobility infrastructure such as EV charging and e-scooter parking places new demands on the scarce resource that is our public realm. Electric mobility also raises questions about how that resource is used – which modes are sharing which spaces, whose space is reallocated, who will face new challenges using public space, and will there be new conflicts and safety concerns? Basically, how efficient and fair is the use and allocation of the public realm once electric mobility is added into our transport systems?

Unsurprisingly, the policy makers and stakeholders we spoke to did not all have the same answers or perhaps any answers to these questions. And yet, they were asking the questions. They realised that social justice is not all about affordability or accessibility, but also the diverse needs, rights, experiences, and expectations of the public realm resource. That is an important step in not only our developing research, but also in achieving an inclusive transition to electric mobility.

Quality in Qualitative Methods

Posted on October 4, 2022 by HD Budnitz

As we describe in the ‘About ITEM’ section of our project website, ‘Work Package Two’ reviews policy documents and holds workshops and interviews with policy-makers and stakeholders in each of our case study cities in order to review how the different dimensions of justice are accounted for in the policies and decisions that govern the transition to electric mobility, why this is, and whether policy processes can be improved.

We use qualitative methods because this research question is all about answering how and why the transition to electric mobility is happening in certain ways, not just who is(n’t) using electric mobility and where electric mobility infrastructure and services can(‘t) be found. Which is not to say we are not asking questions about people and places, but these questions too are formulated as how and why.

For example: How are different people expected to use or respond to the transition to electric mobility? Why are some groups, but not others, involved or recognised in the policies and decisions that govern that transition? How are different places imagined when planning electric mobility interventions? Why are some places identified as needing more, less or different interventions?

Qualitative methods are well-placed to answer how and why questions rigorously, and help us find ways to make use of those answers.

For Bristol alone, we have iteratively read and coded 16 policy documents, from the city, combined authority and national levels. These have included transport and climate changes strategies at urban and national scales, bids and business cases prepared for central government review, and central government guidance prepared to assist local authorities. Hundreds of pages resulted in thousands of references. Our coding worked both top down and bottom up.

We created 11 ‘parent’ codes from our analytical framework, covering five dimensions of justice (capabilities and epistemic justice formed separate parent codes) and six central aspects of policy and governance:

sources of knowledge;
policy interventions;
their strategic programming;
the problems (and opportunities) policies address;
the people / subjects identified or implied; and
the places / territories addressed or characterised.

Within these, a close reading of the texts led to child, grandchild and even great-grandchild codes that help us understand:

how dimensions of justice manifest in policy, in concepts such as accessibility or affordability;
why certain sources of knowledge or evidence are foregrounded, e.g. when it is politically expedient to show generalised public support or expert advice;
why different policy interventions or strategic packages are targeted at certain places and people, e.g. because they are seen as needing more intervention; and
how local residents or businesses are expected to respond, including as rational actors who will choose the most attractive and efficient mobility options provided.

Thus, qualitative analytical methods help us recognise patterns of meaning within the narratives these documents present about the transition to electric mobility, its role in wider policy debates around sustainable transport, climate change, and public funding. They also help us consider what is not said, especially in our hunt for indications of inclusivity in policy decisions and delivery.

These methods can also be used to analyse, quite literally, what is said, as we interview policy-makers and related stakeholders. We can ask them directly which and whether aspects of social justice are accounted for in their work. We can then use the same coding methods to see whether the answers to those how and why questions are the same, how the narratives compare, and why knowledge, approach, perspectives vary.

In summary, the research in this work package aims not only to understand how and why in the past and present, but also how and why policy and governance may accelerate a more inclusive transition to electric mobility in the future. And we will continue to use qualitative methods to not only search for answers, but also apply them.

Go-How

Transport Planning and Research by HD Budnitz

Tag Archives: electric mobility

Making sense of policy mixes

Tales of Transition