In this paper, we investigate what the impact of the COVID-19 crisis was on travel patterns and how it could be a catalyst for the transition toward a more sustainable mobility system. To study this, we use the sustainable mobility framework of the 7A's, namely Awareness, Avoidance, Act and Shift, Anticipation of new technologies, Actor involvement, Acceleration, and Adaptation of behavior. For each of the first 5A's, we analyze the changes in mobility brought along in the different periods of the COVID-19 crisis. Our mixed methods approach includes a thematic analysis of online press articles and an analysis of traffic and passenger volume data in Brussels, Belgium. Our results show that the measures to stop the spread of the COVID-19 virus had significant consequences for mobility in Brussels by raising Awareness of the positive impacts reduced traffic can have on livability. The measures decreased travel demand (Avoidance) in general, but especially in the context of commuting and shopping trips which declined in favor of telework and online shopping. The majority of mobility measures that were implemented belong to the Act and shift category and they were especially aimed at promoting active mobility like walking. There was also a positive influence on the Anticipation of new technologies, as internal combustion engine sales dropped and electric vehicle sales increased. However, the data analysis also shows an incremental return to business-as-usual after the 2020 summer holidays. Parts of this can be linked back to a disregard of Actor involvement, resulting in a resistance from stakeholders to several of the measures. We conclude with recommendations based on Acceleration and Adaptation of behavior on how to support a sustainable transition and lasting behavioral change in the post-COVID era.

The goal of this research is to understand the impact of COVID‐19 restriction measures on the change in urban mobility in Brussels, Belgium. With daily data over the past 2 years depicting both the affluence to different places and the level and type of restrictions, we investigate through regression analysis their impacts on the changes in driving, public transport and cycling use. We find that cycling increased significantly (+63%), and that driving levels have returned to pre‐COVID levels after a significant reduction in spring 2020, while the return to public transport has been slower. We also find that the change in cycling use was not influenced by COVID‐19 restrictions, although telework and closing of retail establishments strongly affected the other modes.

Background Historically, quantitative forecasting methods have been used in transport planning. As forecasts can be unreliable to plan for the medium- and long-term, scenario building has recently been increasingly used. However, scenario building methods often fail to take disruptions and wild cards into account, i.e., low probability but high impact events. When unaccounted for, wild card events, like the COVID-19 pandemic, lower the efficacy of scenario building in policy making, as these events may completely disturb the developed scenarios of the future. Methods In this paper, we develop and apply a creative and participatory methodology to develop visions and disrupted scenarios for rural mobility. Our research was carried out in the Belgian village of Oetingen, where inhabitants developed more resilient views of the future by creating disrupted mobility scenarios and a preferred mobility vision for their village for the year 2050 in a participatory scenario building exercise. Wild cards related to mobility were collected from mobility experts and inhabitants in three workshops. Inhabitants were engaged to define their mobility vision on a postcard that was distributed to all houses in the village as well as on a project website. Respondents were invited for a follow-up interview in which their preferred mobility vision was subjected to the wild cards, and participants described how these wild cards would change their preferred vision. As children tend to have more creative ideas, they were engaged via workshops at school. Results This process resulted in mobility scenarios for the village for the year 2050 based on the different wild cards, as well as an overall desired vision. We found that the use of wild cards did not significantly change the scenarios when compared to the vision, although it did make the interviewees step outside of their comfort zones. We also found that the citizens did not have more original and less path-dependent ideas in developing wild cards when compared to experts. Lastly, we found that children have many outside-of-the-box suggestions when it comes to the future. Although some of their ideas can be judged as impractical by today’s standards, many ideas had an indirect implication for mobility in the village and gave insights into children’s priorities, as potential future residents of the village.

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