Active Travel Data Specification
Something is missing in the active travel movement - consistent data to make accurate, sustainable and inclusive decisions. This blog explores one solution that Diagonal is championing and how we are calling for collaborators.
Active travel – everyday journeys made by walking, wheeling, or cycling – has a range of benefits for people’s health and the environment, including being a low-carbon form of travel. The UK Department for Transport (DfT) wants active travel to be the natural choice for shorter journeys in England, or part of longer journeys, by 2040.
We need a consistent, open specification for recording, planning and publishing data about the physical infrastructure that supports active travel. This means we need better data on the UK’s pathways, cycleways, and pedestrian crossings.
At Diagonal we have a purpose and a commitment to supporting positive change, systematically. In partnership with Applied, we are calling for standardisation of pathways data in an Active Travel Data Specification (ATDS). This is why.
Why active travel?
At Diagonal we work with data to help planners and architects who want to make positive changes in the urban environment. We make it easy for people to explore scenarios for change, using data and visualisation tools to democratise sophisticated analysis. We believe in the benefits of safe, accessible, well-designed pathways. So we want to make it easier to design healthy streets and complete streets. To do that at scale, we need consistency in the data behind development proposals.
Research based on longitudinal population study data finds that journeys of walking and cycling maintain and improve physical and mental health across the life course. However, the data also show it is important that means of active travel are easily accessible to everyone so it can become part of peoples’ daily routine.
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To make active travel more accessible requires a detailed understanding of the landscape and currently this is hampered by poor quality, mismatched, differently labelled data. To unlock active travel’s potential we need consistent information about existing infrastructure for active travel and consistent information about planned infrastructure for active travel. We need this type of data to be open and available to everyone.
What’s the problem?
In the UK and internationally, there is no agreed standard for recording or publishing data about where we can safely cycle, wheel, and walk. Data attributes are not aligned. Definitions of path width, surface materials, presence of steps, inclines, lighting or other factors related to the pathway are inconsistent. This makes the data unfit for multiple purposes and multiple systems.
The power of consistent data specifications comes from the power of interoperable data. Data that can be used in a range of tools and applications. Without a specification, anyone exploring trends or analyses of active travel has to consolidate multiple, separate datasets. Further, solutions stay localised, rather than scaling. For example, when active travel data takes a different shape in London, compared with Cardiff, compared with Edinburgh, application developers who want to build routing applications for wheelchair users don’t have a reliable foundation to build with. Or when planning new developments, decision makers don’t have data about the ‘last mile’ that might connect a new project with employment opportunities, healthcare, or education.
And for active travel asset owners, there is no standardised way to collect or share information about their assets. This is unsustainable. It leads to wasted time and effort: re-invention and ad-hoc creation of new datasets which don’t work with existing data. For local authorities and mapping providers this is a problem – they are unable to make use of this data or unlock its social value.
How do we fix it?
We are proposing an Active Travel Data Specification (ATDS), to provide guidance towards a consistent specification. We want to increase everyone’s understanding of active travel infrastructure today, and what is planned in the future. Such a specification could power useful tools for safer active travel pathways.
A data specification for active travel will allow many disparate and dispersed stakeholders and interested parties to improve the ROI on their investment in active travel – ensuring collective knowledge grows and sustainability is ensured by better, high quality, and more comprehensive data..
What will it do?
By creating a reliable picture of the UK's pathways with coordinated data, it will enable better active travel planning, more inclusive routing applications, and greater efficiencies in data management at the local level. Developers and local authorities will be able to use data about active travel to understand multi-modal connectivity – beyond their own local boundaries. Large and small mapping apps will be able to surface information relevant to people with disabilities or additional mobility needs. And stakeholders will be able to access information about active travel infrastructure in the pipeline.
Ultimately the aim of the Active Travel Data Specification (ATDS) is to increase the amount of active travel journeys and to make sure this works best for people with greater need. This includes disabled and older people who will benefit the most from the interoperability of pathways data and more accurate and data-informed decisions.
How will it work?
The world has many transportation-related data specifications and data schemas for things like public transit schedules (like: General Transit Feed Specification – GTFS, Bus Rapid Transit– BRT, and even OpenStreetMap OSM.) So the concept of building consistent data to describe transport infrastructure is not new! Many of these specifications are now widely adopted and transit agencies wouldn’t dream of operating without them. We will take inspiration from these schemas, systems, and codified publishing guidelines. The innovation is in applying these systems to active travel – not inventing a new way to standardise and share information.
Work with us
We can’t do this alone! Applied and Diagonal are currently in the scoping phase of this project. If you are ready to pilot this with us, let’s connect: claire@diagonal.works