| The “Jinping Xi: the Great Victory of Building Moderately Prosperous Society and Capturing the New Era of Socialism with Chinese Characteristics – Report at the 19 th National Congress of the Communist Party of China” emphasized the high-quality development requirements of social economy;the “Outline for the 14 the Five-Year Planning and 2035 Vision” proposed better travel;the “Outline for Building a Leading Transportation Nation” put forward travel quality improvement requirements from “Travel” to “Travel Well”,and recommended to construct safe,convenient,and comfortable urban road networks,promoting the synergetic development of walking,bicycle,public transit,and car.Overweighing automobile system and ignoring pedestrian and bicycle systems are the significant issues of road networks in Chinese cities.Furthermore,in the time of the proportion of new-built areas goes down,as well as road space restrictions and budget constraints,improving road network quality by planning and design becomes a critical task for enhancing travel quality.However,few studies fully consider the diversities,systems,and relative independence of pedestrian,bicycle,and automobile networks,as well as the details of road sections and intersections.Meanwhile,lacking of empirical evidence also results in theory guiding practice difficult to achieve the expected goals.This dissertation firstly defined the conceptions of road network quality and travel quality,and theoretically demonstrated the city-level quantitative methods of road network quality and travel quality.Then,in perspective of pedestrian network,bicycle network,and complete road network,this paper: ⅰ)investigated the main problems and improvement requirements of road network facilities in the history of transportation development of Chinese cities;ⅱ)assessed the possibilities of promoting travel quality through improving road network quality in Chinese cities,using multi-year experiences and data from multiple countries and cities;ⅲ)empirically explored the impact mechanisms of the key indicators of urban road network quality on promoting travel quality through comparative analysis and statistical modeling;ⅳ)proposed planning and design methods and relevant supporting measures suitable for Chinese cities in perspective of road network,road section,and intersection.Lastly,the paper analyzed residents’ travel behavior and road network quality improving demands in the two selected districts named Fuguo Street and Hongjin Road at Dalian,and proposed improvement plans from the aspects of road network,road section,and intersection using the proposed planning and design methods.The main research contents and research conclusions are as follows:Firstly,this dissertation demonstrated and used traffic mode shares to quantify the city-level travel quality.Travel quality can characterize travelers’ satisfaction on trips.At the city level,travel quality often focuses on travelers’ satisfaction on traffic modes.To the four common types of traffic modes,including walking,bicycles,public transit,and cars,residents in Chinese cities can choose one of them according to their willingness.In this scenario,if travelers choose a special mode as the major or even the only travel mode in repeated urban travel activities,these would indicate that travelers have higher overall satisfaction on trips with the selected mode.The proportion of a special mode is the ratio of the number of trips by this mode to that of total trips,which reflects the travelers’ relative satisfaction on mode choices.Therefore,this dissertation adopted traffic mode shares to measure travel quality at the city level.Secondly,this dissertation proposed the key indicators of city-level road network quality,and quantified their impact mechanisms on improving travel quality.Road network quality,which includes safe and convenience,is the basic intervention for improving and guaranteeing travel quality.Analyzing the characteristics of pedestrian,bicycle,and automobile networks,as well as the psychological perceptions and collision of travelers with different traffic modes,the paper quantified the key indicators of road network quality by applying road rights and the degree of isolation to measure safety,and the provision of road networks(quantified by length,density,and per capita ownership)to measure convenience.Using multi-year data from multiple cities and controlling other influencing factors such as social-demographic characteristics,this research empirically estimated the impacts of pedestrian network quality,bicycle network quality,and complete road network quality on promoting walking,bicycling,and public transit travel.Thirdly,this dissertation analyzed the main reasons for current conditions of active travel and travel quality.The speeds of automobile and road widths are the key factors for determining arterial,collector,and branch roads.When travelling on arterial,collector,and branch roads,the speed of walking and bicycling is relatively stable,while the speed change of automobile can be very large.Moreover,walking and bicycling save travel time through reducing travel distance,which can be realized by providing convenient road networks,while automobile save travel time by using roads with higher hierarchies.The densities of arterial and collector road networks are well controlled during urban planning in many Chinese cities.However,the low densities of branch road networks and the insufficient connections of neighborhood road networks,together with the poor design and management of entrances-exits and intersections,resulting in the unguaranteed road rights(equity)and safety of pedestrian and bicycle networks.Fourthly,this dissertation analyzed relevant cases and pointed out the possibilities of improving road network quality and travel quality through planning and design in Chinese cities.Analyzing the patterns of road networks as well as the design of road sections and intersections of the selected Dutch and American city cases,these cities: ⅰ)expand the number of road networks as the basis and improve the quality of road networks as the core;ⅱ)build ground,underground,and elevated pedestrian and bicycle road networks to increase the provision of the corresponding systems;ⅲ)construct walking-friendly,bike-friendly,public transit-friendly and multi-modal transport-friendly road sections and intersections,and pay attention to the quality of entrance-exit and crosswalks in the middle of road sections.Basing on the residents’ travel behavior and road network quality improving demands in the two selected cases in Dalian,this research proposed the improvement plans from the aspects of road network,road section,and intersection using the aforementioned planning and design methods,providing evidence that Chinese cities can improve road network quality through planning and design.Lastly,this dissertation proposed recommendations,including value orientations and supporting measures,on improving road network quality.The suggestions are as follows:firstly,changing the value orientation on road facility planning and configuration,and adding more indicators,such as the per capita ownership of pedestrian and bicycle networks,and the proportion of high-safety bikeway network,to the basic indicators of road network planning.Secondly,focusing on scientific research and project assessments,promoting the monitor of relevant data and the evaluations of utilities.Thirdly,improving planning systems and paying attention to professional talent training,providing innovative planning requirements in different planning phases and institutional arrangements for timely and effective implementations of relevant policies.Lastly,developing complete facility service platforms and constructing complete facility evaluation systems,building one-stop digital platforms which can provide multi-modal demand-responding travel services,such as“Mobility-As-A-Service”. |
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