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SUSTAINABILITY

Rethinking Movement: But London’s vision goes
Data, Design and beyond moving people efficiently
- it’s about making the city
Inclusion cleaner and fairer. What stands
out is how equity and inclusion
Prof. Aruna Sivakumar,
Professor, Department of Civil are woven through every plan,
and Environmental Engineering, with well-thought-out plans
Imperial College London, UK called Equity in Motion. With
successful collaborations,
Take the London Tube charities and nonprofits work
- a sprawling, century-old hand-in-hand with authorities,
subway system that’s both creating a strong community
an engineering marvel and a around sustainable mobility.
massive operational challenge.
Professor Sivakumar guides us Policies like congestion pricing
through what it takes to bring and low-emission zones hold
this giant into the modern era. significant promise for Indian
Narrow tunnels, ageing signalling cities, as acknowledged by
systems, and addressing air Professor Sivakumar. However,
quality issues are important. By she emphasizes the need for
2041, the network is expected careful and context-sensitive
to handle 15 million trips per implementation. The challenges
day, making modernisation are substantial: even where public
urgent yet complex. What transport networks are relatively
makes this transformation robust, they often struggle to
remarkable is its complexity: meet the needs of the broader
replacing infrastructure piece population. This reflects deeper
by piece, often during limited issues in systematic planning,
weekend hours, while minimising integration with land-use policies,
disruptions. Here, technology plays and the absence of data-driven
a pivotal role. Sophisticated AI and decision-making frameworks.
data analytics are where the trick For such policies to be effective
is, which keeps the system running and equitable, safety, public
smoothly. But according to health, and equity must be at
Professor Sivakumar, the ultimate the heart of urban planning
goal is not just efficiency—it’s efforts. These principles,
equity and sustainability. supported by reliable data and
robust modelling, can help
cities navigate the complexity of
In the end, it’s a story of transitioning to more sustainable
transformation—of historic and inclusive mobility systems.
cities reinventing themselves As the conversation closes, she
and fast-growing urban highlights how the future depends
centres striving to leap not only on latest technology
ahead. At the heart of it all, but also on basic urban planning
intention matters: the will principles: data and planning. The
future she envisions lies at the
to design cities not just for intersection of technology and
movement, but for meaning, thoughtful urban design, where
equity, and resilience. tools like AI and machine learning

– PROF. ARUNA SIVAKUMAR will play a transformative role.
From optimising transit routes,

www.trafficinfratech.com / June 2025 / TRAFFICINFRATECH 35