1. Opinions

In the Opinions section, find socially and politically engaged articles that defend and reveal alternative approaches to mobility.

The self-driving car, a niche market or a true revolution?

By Christophe Gay and Sylvie Landriève, co-directors of Mobile Lives Forum

The car is at the center of our mobility system. It has shaped cities and territories, imposing its infrastructures, norms, and speed. By monopolizing public spaces (roads, parking spaces, parking lots…), it has relegated other forms of transportation (walking, bicycling…) and practices (playing games, strolling…) to a small portion of the road. However, today, its negative effects are unanimously denounced (air pollution, emission of greenhouse gasses, accidents, traffic, noise ...), first and foremost by civil society. Public authorities, notably in cities, are also starting to take on these issues. In this context, what role will autonomous vehicles play?

The flying less movement

Javier Caletrío

First published March 2018. Updated May 2019.


Compared to the cacophony of disparate voices praising the virtues of driving less, cycling and walking, calls for rethinking our flying habits have until recently been few and far between. Yet the number of advocates of ‘flying less’ has been steadily growing for more than a decade. As their voices begin to echo further afield, they have turned what was until recently a rather niche debate into a movement reshaping the way we think of air travel. Who are these people and what is their message?

From Constructed Scarcity and Mobility Austerity towards Mobility Commons?

Vivre à l'ère de la transition mobilitaire

November 2016


We’ve got a lack of space in the city, we’ve got a lack of space on the road and we’ve got a lack of space… it’s a strange metaphor, but – a lack of space in the air…let’s say… CO2.

Sustainable mobility consultant, the Netherlands

 

Robert Smithson and the gold rush

Guillaume Logé

It is alongside a highway under construction that we find Robert Smithson, whose work we analyzed in the previous post . Where does this long expanse of asphalt the construction equipment is unfurling actually lead? What does it tell us about the way we develop? What drives us to build it?

Robert Smithson’s Many Flights

Guillaume Logé

The death of Robert Smithson in a plane crash in 1973, while flying over one of his works in progress, helped forge the mythical aura of this American artist who, at age 35, left behind a literary and artistic legacy that would deeply impact the art world. Smithson’s flight clearly refers to his last, tragic flight, but above all seems an appropriate way of describing both the general attitude of an artist whose thinking developed as a consequence of a life spent in perpetual motion, and the reflections he gained around the airplane, as we will outline in this post.

Braudel, a mobilities scholar avant la lettre?

Javier Caletrio

December 2015


Braudel has been cited but rarely used in mobilities literature, yet his work places movement at the heart of social, economic and political life.

What makes a slow tourist?

Javier Caletrio

Slow tourism is gaining prominence as concern about climate change grows. Yet low carbon forms of tourism may be more widespread than is currently acknowledged.

Sustainable motility

Vivre à l'ère de la transition mobilitaire

As a researcher of the Living in the Mobility Transition project, I have been thinking about new ways of unpacking the so-called “mobility transitions”, over the past six months. Last month, both at the Royal Geographical Society and the Cosmobilities/T2M annual conferences, I came forward with some ideas, although these are still (very) preliminary and incipient.

Que peut apporter l'art sur les études de la mobilité ?

Mobile Lives Forum

Le croisement entre démarches scientifique et artistique donne lieu, depuis quelques années, à un nombre croissant de réflexions et de réalisations. Ces investigations se situent essentiellement dans le champ des mathématiques, de la physique ou de la biologie. On compte toutefois quelques mobilisations de l’art dans le champ des sciences humaines et sociales, pour sonder des phénomènes urbains aux côtés des méthodes plus classiques de la géographie et de la sociologie par exemple.

Displaced lives

Javier Caletrio

Migration and displacement are often discussed in terms of abstract numbers. This powerful photo-essay by award winning photographer Alixandra Fazzina speaks of individual human beings in search of a secure place.

Radical mitigation: a new priority in the mobilities agenda?

Javier Caletrio

Research on ‘carbon budgets’ suggests that avoiding ‘dangerous climate change’ may require an ambitious reduction of certain forms of travel. Should this be a priority in the mobilities agenda?

Christoph fink : objective information and subjective experience

Hanja Maksim

September 2013


“Touch time, touch space, touch experience…and we find ourselves surprised by the indescribable, the untouchable. A brief and intense moment of awareness.”

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