| Summary: | Significant changes must occur in human interaction with the natural environment
if the world is to move towards a state of sustainability. While the need for such change
is widely recognized, planning in many sectors continues to lead to development that is
unsustainable. Urban transportation planning is one such sector.
Little attention has been given by sustainability-oriented researchers to the problem
of resistance to change. Conversely, little attention has been given by organizational
change theorists to local government planning organizations’ indifference to the
sustainability imperative. As a consequence, while a great deal of research has examined
the need to control the automobile in urban areas, little has been written about why such
control still does not happen -- even when policies call for it.
Vancouver, British Columbia is recognized for its progressive attempts to move
towards sustainability. This progressive situation creates an environment in which barriers
impeding change towards sustainability can be studied. While Vancouver’s municipal and
regional policies explicitly call for a reversal in priorities which have traditionally
favoured automobiles over transit, bicycles and pedestrians, operational decisions still
favour the automobile. Most significantly, roads continue to be widened and new
expressways are built to accommodate more automobile traffic.
A qualitative case study approach was used to inquire into transportation planning
in Vancouver. An analysis of documents and of interviews with key informants suggests
that a system of institutional barriers exists which has structural, cultural, and human
resource dimensions. Unsustainability is a function of organizational inertia which is not
only supported by, but also takes advantage of and fosters, the wider political
individualistic culture.
Specifically, there are several reasons for the disjunction between Vancouver’s
transportation policies and the decisions which are being made in transportation
infrastructure development: an institutional structure which separates land-use and
transportation planning, impedes comprehensive decision-making, and lacks mechanisms
to publicize and assess cumulative environmental impacts; the existence of an
organizational culture which seems to condone the use of subversive tactics to promote an
informal transportation plan which perpetuates traditional, automobile-oriented values,
beliefs and assumptions; and the lack of conceptual knowledge and skills necessary for
organizational change to occur.
The practical implications of these findings are that, in cases like Vancouver’s,
sustainability can be fostered by three categories of mutually reinforcing actions:
education, structural change, and planning practice. The actions in each category can
build momentum towards second-order change using a social learning process to overcome
societal values, beliefs and assumptions which promote an automobile-dominated
transportation system.
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