The transport system influences everyone’s wellbeing on a daily basis. These impacts are both positive and negative and are borne directly and indirectly at a range of spatial and temporal scales and across different groups in society. Furthermore, they are often distributed unfairly and the people who are least able to use transport networks frequently bear the greatest costs. People also have various transport needs and these needs change throughout their lives. Due to these complexities, there is no straightforward answer as to how we should provide transport fairly. Policies and actions to decarbonise the transport system are urgently needed, but their equity effects are also important. We give a brief overview of distributive justice and equity in transport literature. We then develop a conceptual framework of distributive justice and a set of four principles to guide the application of the framework to transport policy. We then apply these to recent transport policies in Aotearoa/New Zealand, a country that shares common features with most highly motorised countries. We apply the Capabilities Approach to transport policy in a novel way that conceptualises transport policy as a social conversion factor which influences people’s ability to convert resources and opportunities into the things (‘beings and doings’) that they have reason to value. The consideration of transport policy as a conversion factor, rather than focusing on a specific capability, emphasises the role of transport policy as a promoter of a wide range of capabilities and highlights the inequitable distribution of positive and negative effects on people’s health and wellbeing. It also illuminates issues of power structures and procedural fairness in transport policy that are otherwise not covered by distributive justice approaches. Taking a broader view of distributive justice theory in transport provides a clearer picture of the impacts of transport on wellbeing and provides theory-based guidance on the actions to improve transport justice that can be readily integrated into existing policy institutions.
In modern human habitats, the places people reside and the goods, services and people that contribute to their wellbeing are often separated geographically, and transport options confer a health benefit by enabling access. The notion that access for equitable human wellbeing is the purpose of a transport system challenges the current neoliberal transport policy discourse, dominated by a perceived need to move goods, capital and labour for economic growth. In this chapter, we focus on low carbon transitions for land transport in cities that can also promote wellbeing and improve social justice, especially in cities that are currently dominated by the use of private motor vehicles for most trips. We critically review the links between land transport and health using a broad public health framework, arguing that policy processes need to account for complex dynamics and model a wider range of future outcomes in analysis of costs and benefits. Further, that these processes must involve the communities whose transport patterns are expected to change. We provide two real world examples of these principles in action from Auckland, New Zealand, a city with 60 years of urban planning predicated on universal car ownership and use.
In settler countries, attention is now extending to the wellbeing benefits of recognising and promoting the Indigenous cultural identity of neighbourhoods as a contributing factor to more equitable and healthier communities. Re-indigenisation efforts to (re)implement cultural factors into urban design can be challenging and ineffective without the leadership and collaboration of local-Indigenous peoples. Undertaken in Aotearoa New Zealand, Te Ara Mua — Future Street project, demonstrated that co-design has critical potential in the reclamation of Indigenous autonomy, increased local-Indigenous presence and revitalisation of cultural identity. Employing a Kaupapa Māori (Māori-centred) research approach, we focused on the workings and perspectives of mana whenua (local-Indigenous peoples) and community stakeholder engagement in Te Ara Mua. An Indigenous theoretical framework, Te Pae Mahutonga, was utilised in the data analysis to explore perspectives of Indigenous collective agency, empowerment, and wellbeing. Our research demonstrates that developing capacity amongst Indigenous communities is integral for effective engagement and that the realisation of autonomy in urban design projects has broader implications for Indigenous sovereignty, spatial justice and health equity. Significantly, we argue that future community enhancement strategies must include not only re-designing and re-imagining initiatives, but also re-indigenising.
Policies to mitigate climate change are essential. The objective of this paper was to estimate the impact of greenhouse gas (GHG) food taxes and assess whether such a tax could also have health benefits in Aotearoa NZ. We undertook a systemised review on GHG food taxes to inform four tax scenarios, including one combined with a subsidy. These scenarios were modelled to estimate lifetime impacts on quality-adjusted health years (QALY), health inequities by ethnicity, GHG emissions, health system costs and food costs to the individual. Twenty-eight modelling studies on food tax policies were identified. Taxes resulted in decreased consumption of the targeted foods (e.g., −15.4% in beef/ruminant consumption, N = 12 studies) and an average decrease of 8.3% in GHG emissions (N = 19 studies). The “GHG weighted tax on all foods” scenario had the largest health gains and costs savings (455,800 QALYs and NZD 8.8 billion), followed by the tax—fruit and vegetable subsidy scenario (410,400 QALYs and NZD 6.4 billion). All scenarios were associated with reduced GHG emissions and higher age standardised per capita QALYs for Māori. Applying taxes that target foods with high GHG emissions has the potential to be effective for reducing GHG emissions and to result in co-benefits for population health.
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