How it all got started

Paris, 6 August 2008

Ms. Sue Zielinski, Managing Director
SMART (Sustainable Mobility & Accessibility Research & Transformation)
Center for Advancing Research and Solutions for Society
University of Michigan
2398 Perry Building, 330 Packard Street
Ann Arbor, MI 48104-2994

Dear Sue,

On the occasion of your 11-12 June high-level brainstorming meeting on "New Mobility: The Emerging Transportation Economy", you asked me to speak to the topic of networking, research and collaborative partnerships for programs such as SMART -- drawing on our experience with open networking and building knowledge under the New Mobility Agenda for a number of years now. You asked about "building a learning community", but with the qualification that the goal is not to try to build up new structures, but rather to see how to better spot, link and make use of the considerable wealth of programs, sites, sources and resources already at work in our sector.

Almost all of the work under our New Mobility Agenda program has for the last two decades been carried out by and large with the collaboration and support of individuals and groups working in many different countries, types of organizations and parts of the world. Not to put too fine a point to it, we live by networking.

Our domain is, at first glance at least, relatively circumscribed: "sustainable transportation" - but behind the pure movement considerations the broader topic of sustainable cities, and sustainable lives. We talk about "new mobility", a phrase reduces to gaining access to what one needs in ways that are better suited to the strong and very different exigencies and priorities of the 21st century. Which brings us smack up against such closely related areas of policy and practice as: climate, local and global environment, energy viability, resource efficiency, geopolitical considerations, social equity, private and public economics, public health, and then at the end of this long line better, healthier and fairer transportation and access choices for all social and economic classes

When you asked me to report back to you on this in May, I thought it might be a useful idea. Today after a fair amount of work, discussion, and a bit of progress on this, I am even more convinced that this is an idea worth pursuing. And I look forward to doing this with you and the ever growing number of people and groups around the world that share our concerns, values and sense of urgency.

Stay tuned.

Eric Britton

Back to top

Some initial talking points to consider

• Can we find one or two "networks of networks" that we can work with to get started - and possibly egg them on to do more and better?

• A major challenge is how to keep track of the huge and fast accelerating number of bits and pieces that constitute out "product area". (Even in our own sites, which number thousands of pages, it is very easy to get lost, though there is some help provided by the fairly efficient Search engines.

• Then there are the language issues. How to deal with? Role of machine translation, and ways of better using them.

• Note: Most of the basic software and organizational structure used by most of us working in this sector is pretty "old fashioned", meaning that once you work your way beyond the Flash we still are faced with pretty lumpy, isolated sites. (Our included of course)

• If one is to do anything at all in this area, we have to have a firm understand of how people go about accessing and putting all this to work in soon the second decade of this new century. How much detail do they need? How can we bring it to them in layers, tree like structures which give them a bit of information to get started but which then permit them to start to burrow into the topic without having to lose track of all that went before.

• Let's also not fail to ask ourselves, once we get all our thoughts more or less in line on this, if indeed such an undertaking is necessary and useful. What I can say, not so cynically mind you. Is that a lot of work has gone in under various programs to create libraries of this or that but at the end of the day they do not in most cases have much staying power . So when the free money dries up, so too does the program.

• Certainly we need to include full access to films, videos, sound, and images, as well as to games and other learning and playing devices that can be useful to sharpen the mind and bring up new perspectives.

• And communications options (full range thereof).

• In all this, if we are looking for models we would be consummately dumb not at least to try to understand by analogy what a "Google", "Skype', "Facebook", "Wikipedia" approach to this might give.

• Likewise, matters of "free" and "paid" (and how in both cases ultimately financed) need careful attention.

• Famously missing:: Working links, relationships with media (old and new)

Back to top

---

Site optimized for browsing with W3C standards and best viewed with resolution of 1024 x 768
The Commons has welcomed international visitors since 3 July 1995.
Europe: 8/10 rue Joseph Bara 75006 Paris, France, Europe. T: +331 4326 1323
USA : 9440 Readcrest Dr., Los Angeles, CA 90210. T: +1 310 601-8468
Copyright © 1994-2008 The Commons ® Last updated on 16 August 2008