Transportation

demand
management

Transportation demand management or

travel demand management (TDM) is the
application of strategies and policies to
increase the efficiency of transportation
systems, that reduce travel demand, or to
redistribute this demand in space or in
time.[1][2]
 Evening traffic on the A1 freeway in Slovenia

In transport, as in any network, managing

demand can be a cost-effective alternative
to increasing capacity. A demand
management approach to transport also
has the potential to deliver better
environmental outcomes, improved public
health, stronger communities, and more
prosperous cities.[3] TDM techniques link
with and support community movements
for sustainable transport.
The Association for Commuter
Transportation (https://www.actweb.org)
defines TDM as the use of strategies to
inform and encourage travelers to
maximize the efficiency of a transportation
system leading to improved mobility,
reduced congestion, and lower vehicle
emissions.[4]

Background

Traffic congestion on Interstate 5, at

Los Angeles, California
The term "TDM" has its origins in the
United States in the 1970s and 1980s, and
is linked to the economic impacts of the
sharp increase in oil prices during the 1973
oil crisis and the 1979 energy crisis. When
long lines appeared at gas stations, it
became self-evident that alternatives to
single-occupancy commuter travel needed
to be provided in order to save energy,
improve air quality, and reduce peak period
congestion.[5]

The concepts of TDM borrowed from

mainstream transport planning in Europe,
which had never been based on
assumptions that the private car was the
best or only solution for urban mobility. For
example, the Dutch Transport Structure
Scheme has since the 1970s required that
demand for additional vehicle capacity be
met only "if the contribution to societal
welfare is positive" and since 1990 has
included an explicit target to halve the rate
of growth in vehicle traffic.[6]

Some cities outside Europe have also

consistently taken a demand management
approach to transport and land use
planning, notably Curitiba, Brazil; Portland,
Oregon, US; Arlington, Virginia, US;[7] and
Vancouver, Canada.
Oil price trend, 1861–2007, both nominal and
adjusted to inflation

Vehicle miles travelled in the United States to March

2009

Relatively low and stable oil prices during

the 1980s and 1990s led to significant
increases in vehicle travel, both directly
because people chose to travel by car
more often and for greater distances, and
indirectly because cities developed tracts
of suburban housing, distant from shops
and from workplaces, now referred to as
urban sprawl. Trends in freight logistics,
including a movement from rail and
coastal shipping to road freight and a
requirement for just in time deliveries,
meant that freight traffic grew faster than
general vehicle traffic.

Because vehicle travel was increasing

rapidly from 1980 to 2000, it follows that
(with a few exceptions) the techniques of
demand management were not widely or
successfully applied during this period.
Small-scale projects to provide
alternatives to single occupant commuter
travel were common, but generally were
led from outside the mainstream of
transport planning. However many of the
techniques in the demand management
toolbox were developed during this period.

The British Government's White Paper on

Transport[8] marked a change in direction.
In the introduction to the White Paper,
Prime Minister Tony Blair stated that

We recognise that we cannot

simply build our way out of the
 problems we face. It would be
environmentally irresponsible -
and would not work.

A companion document to the White Paper

called "Smarter Choices" researched the
potential to scale up the small and
scattered sustainable transport initiatives
then occurring across Britain, and
concluded that the comprehensive
application of these techniques could
reduce peak period car travel in urban
areas by over 20%.[9]

A similar study[10] by the United States

Federal Highway Administration,[11] was
also released in 2004 and also concluded
that a more proactive approach to
transportation demand was an important
component of overall national transport
strategy.

In 2023, the Biden-Harris Administration

released the U.S. National Blueprint for
Transportation Decarbonization (https://w
ww.energy.gov/sites/default/files/2023-0
1/the-us-national-blueprint-for-transportati
on-decarbonization.pdf) . Developed by
the Departments of Energy, Transportation,
Housing and Urban Development, and the
Environmental Protection Agency, the
Blueprint is a landmark strategy for cutting
all greenhouse emissions from the
transportation sector by 2050.

The Blueprint recommends the use of

Transportation Demand Management
(TDM) strategies, policies, and regulations
to increase the efficiency of our
transportation systems. The Blueprint
states, "it is essential to implement design
solutions that increase convenience,
provide better access to clean modes of
travel, and support demand management
policies that make it easier and more
convenient to choose more efficient travel
options".
Terminology

Since 2010 transportation professionals

have suggested that the TDM is widely
misunderstood simply as a collection of
vaguely related initiatives, and that this
misunderstanding is constraining the true
potential of the concept. TDM practitioners
have found that TDM is far more effective
when framed as a philosophical approach
which over time becomes a cornerstone of
sustainable urban transport systems. A
new paradigm in transport planning,
internationally recognised as TDM,
appears to be emerging which embraces
concepts such as "mobility management"
and "active travel management" under its
umbrella.[12]

Crucial to the delivery of a sustainable

urban transport system is integrating the
TDM philosophy into urban transport
planning, as well as the daily management
and operation of transport services and
infrastructure. It appears that managing
travel demand has largely been
compartmentalized as a set of “soft
measures” to promote sustainable travel
options or programs to promote and offer
shared ride arrangements. Demand
management means different things to
different disciplines. For example: to
Information Technology (IT) specialists,
managing demand is new technology to
provide information; to operations
managers, managing demand is
controlling the flow onto highways; to
economists, it is pricing the system to find
equilibrium with capacity; to marketers, it
is promoting innovative campaigns; and to
many policymakers TDM remains a largely
unknown entity.

The concept has become confused as

each discipline has tried to mold the
concept to their set of tools. This “silo”
thinking inhibits the kind of policy
integration that is needed to develop a
sustainable urban transport solution
strategy. There remains much confusion
as to what a sustainable transport system
would comprise. It is helpful therefore to
consider different approaches to
sustainable transport along a spectrum of
viewpoints, ranging from weak to strong
sustainability.[13] Generally efforts to
address the impact of transport on climate
change to date have been largely focused
on technology. The impact of this
technological-led approach has been very
limited in the transport sector. TDM has
the potential to move the transport sector
from a position of weak to strong
sustainability by combining behavior-
change with technology improvements.

In this context transport demand

management is understood as a much
broader concept. Implicit in the use of the
term is the assumption that it is
accompanied by the implementation of
sustainable mobility, introduction of full
cost pricing and organizational or
structural measures to ensure a broad
range of complementary interventions
work effectively together to realize the
benefits of sustainable transport. It is the
unifying philosophy of TDM, not specific
measures associated with it, that underpin
the policy objective of a more sustainable
system of transport. This philosophy of
managing demand accepts that meeting
unfettered demand for travel is impractical
and that therefore the system needs to be
managed. That demand for travel needs to
be managed by:

Expanding the supply and availability of

(more sustainable) alternatives;

Controlling demand for the use

unsustainable modes;

Providing incentives and rewards for

undertaking sustainable travel habits;
and
 Imposing full-cost pricing on the use of
the automobile.

Rationales for managing

travel demand

The need to manage travel demand has

now become urgent for a number of
converging reasons.

Oil prices have now passed the previous

peak in 1980, and 95% of all energy used in
transport is oil. Vehicle travel in the United
States, which has been rising steadily
since records began, started to level out
before the fuel price increases and is now
in decline.[14] Part of this decline is likely to
be people making fewer trips, with
potentially far-reaching economic and
social consequences. Countries and cities
where the car is one of many travel
choices are more likely to prosper, as
people can choose to drive less but are
still able to travel by transit, cycle safely,
walk to local shops and facilities, or
choose to work or study from home.
Transport systems are responsible for
23% of energy-related greenhouse gas
emissions, and are increasing at a faster
rate than any other energy using sector.[15]
Demand management is central to the
effort to reduce greenhouse gas
emissions from urban transportation,[16]

Increases in vehicle travel are linked to a

range of health problems including poor
urban air quality, road injuries and
fatalities, and reduced physical activity.
The World Health Organization stated in
2003:[17]
 We are concerned that current
patterns of transport, which are
dominated by motorised road
transport, have substantial
adverse impacts on health.

The efficacy of expanded roadways in

managing traffic congestion is increasingly
under challenge. Much of the traffic on
new or expanded roads has been shown to
be induced.

A growing sustainable transport

movement is mobilising public demand for
investment in safer, more livable cities with
a greater range of travel choices.
Aviation

UK air travel by income quintile

through time[18]

Air travel demand mitigation or aviation

demand reduction[19][20][21] or air travel
demand reduction[22][23][24][25] is a part of
transportation demand management and
climate change mitigation.[26][27]

Inhibition of a large or general growth in

demand or reduction of demand and need
for flights is considered an important part
of climate change mitigation as air travel
has a substantial impact on the climate.
Changes in "behavioral travel parameters
can significantly impact the projections for
travel demand and the associated energy
use and CO2 emissions".[28]

Demand management
toolbox

There is a broad range of TDM measures,

including:

Transportation management
associations: leverage public and private
funds to increase the use of ridesharing
and other commuting options that
reduce traffic congestion and improve
air quality
Including or improving pedestrian-
oriented design elements, such as short
pedestrian crossings, wide sidewalks
and street trees.

Requiring users of parking to pay the

costs directly, as opposed to sharing the
costs indirectly with others through
increased rents and tax subsidies.

Including and improving public

transportation infrastructure, such as
subway entrances, bus stops and
routes.

Subsidizing transit costs for employees

or residents.
Bicycle-friendly facilities and
environments, including secure bike
storage areas and showers. See Bicycle
transportation engineering

Providing active transportation (AT)

facilities including bike lanes and multi-
use trails.

Providing traveler information tools,

including intelligent transportation
system improvements, mobile and
social applications, wayfinding tools,
and other methods for promoting
alternatives to single occupancy vehicle
(SOV) modes
Flex-time work schedules with
employers to reduce congestion at peak
times

Active traffic management

Congestion pricing during peak hours.

Road space rationing or alternate-day

travel by restricting travel based on
license plate number, at certain times
and places.

Workplace travel plans

Roadspace reallocation, aiming to re-

balance provision between private cars
which often predominate due to high
spatial allocations for roadside parking,
and for sustainable modes.
 Time, distance and place (TDP) road
pricing, where road users are charged
based on when, where and how much
they drive. Some transportation experts
believe TDP pricing is an integral part of
the next generation in transportation
demand management.[29]

See also

Automobile dependency Transport

portal
Bus lane

Change management

Congestion pricing

Discrete choice
Flextime

Fuel economy-maximizing behaviors

Gas-guzzler

GNSS road pricing

Green transport hierarchy

Stefan Gössling, sustainable travel

expert

Hierarchy of roads

High-occupancy vehicle lane

Hypermobility

Isochrone map

James Howard Kunstler

Modal share

Mode choice
Park and ride

Parking

Pedestrian zone

Remote work

Ridematching

Shared space

Street hierarchy

Toll road

Traffic calming

Travel behavior

Travel survey

Urban planning

Urban sprawl
 Woonerf

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External links

What is TDM? - Association for

Commuter Transportation (https://www.
actweb.org/what-is-tdm)
 TDM defined by the Mobility Lab of
Arlington County Dept. of Transportation
(http://mobilitylab.org/about-us/what-is-
tdm/)

Techniques used by the Arlington County

Dept. of Transportation (http://www.co
mmuterpage.com/pages/about/arlingto
n-county-commuter-services/)

Retrieved from
"https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?
title=Transportation_demand_management&oldid
=1174015015"

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