20 proposals addressed to the participants of the Citizens' Convention on Climate

“For more than three months, you have been actively working on designing measures to reduce greenhouse gas emission by 40% by 2030. The discussions you are having resonate with the research conducted by the Mobile Lives Forum, especially with regards to reducing forced or subjected travel, combining environmental measures with social justice and calling for democratic decision-making processes relating to mobility. ¹ We believe in citizens’ ability to imagine a desirable future with more frugal and fairer lifestyles. We would like to share with you some further proposals that have resulted from our research, ² which, while not exhaustive, may enrich your discussions.

The research conducted by the Mobile Lives Forum on travel habits leads us to argue that in the face of the climate emergency - as well as social and health challenges - we need to rethink how we organize our territories, our work and our lifestyles by refocusing them around people’s aspirations. We believe that desires to live more locally, at a slower pace and with more free time connect with these environmental and social goals. It is high time to take these aspirations seriously and put strong proposals on the table for the transformation of our societies, productive systems and territories. ³

We call for a balanced and polycentric organization of territories, in contrast with the current concentration of activities in metropolises. Our goal is to imagine resilient territories that are more autonomous in terms of food and energy, thus allowing people to lead more localized lives. It is necessary to develop services and infrastructures in areas where they are lacking (periurban, rural, suburban...) in order to reduce, in the medium term, their dependence on central cities. This also means reversing the trend towards the concentration of services, infrastructure and jobs around Paris, where the living environment is unsatisfactory: indeed, it is in the Ile-de-France region where travel times are longest and where one in two inhabitants report wanting to move away. In this context, we offer 20 proposals, considering that our main priority is to drastically reduce the volume of carbon-emitting trips, the amount of which keeps increasing despite current public policies.”

Signatories: Philippe Bihouix, Eric Chareyron, Yves Cochet, Philippe Duron, Mathias Emmerich, Caroline Gallez, Christophe Gay, Anne Jarrigeon, Mark Hunyadi, Vincent Kaufmann, Sylvie Landriève, Marie de Lattre-Gasquet, Arnaud Lemarchand, Christian Licoppe, Jean-Pierre Martin, Dominique Méda, Olivier Mongin, Jean-Marc Offner, members of the Steering and Strategic Foresight Committee of the Mobile Lives Forum

Our 20 proposals

Reduce the volume of carbon-emitting trips, to respond both to people’s desire for slower-paced lives and to environmental goalsx

• Proposal 1. Introduce individual carbon mobility credits to make travel rationing a principle of equality amongst citizens in the fight against global warming.
• Proposal 2. Introduce an environmental accounting system (State and business) that takes into account the negative “externalities” of travel and digital technologies.
• Proposal 3. Make the establishment of companies, shops and large facilities in a given territory conditional upon the development of alternative means of access other than individual cars (collective transport, carpooling, bicycle...).
• Proposal 4. Tax companies on distances travelled with high-emission modes of transport by employees, customers and suppliers.
• Proposal 5. Immediately create a job exchange market between employees, starting with voluntary experiments in large companies, public administrations and local authorities, and fight to overcome the barriers to local recruitment within certain public or private organizations.
• Proposal 6. Abolish the kerosene tax exemption at the European level.
• Proposal 7. Decrease speed limits on the entire road network and reduce the prominence afforded to cars in cities.

Radically transform the transport system, in favor of small vehicles and active and shared modes, to meet people’s desires for greater well-being, health and localized lives

• Proposal 8. Ban the marketing (in the short term) and then incrementally the movement of the heaviest private vehicles, with the exception of those that are designed for housing (trucks, caravans, etc.).
• Proposal 9. Place an immediate ban on all advertising for combustion engine vehicles (as with tobacco).
• Proposal 10. Require companies and administrations to transform their entire fleet of company cars and service vehicles within three years (the duration of the lease), by investing in low GHG-emitting vehicles (motorized two-wheelers and lighter electric vehicles, bicycles and related equipment).
• Proposal 11. Cancel all flights for which there is an alternative route by train (when the additional travel time is less than 2h30mins).
• Proposal 12. Develop river, equine and rail options at the European level - including night trains - and facilitate their use (information, fares, connections, etc.).
• Proposal 13. Immediately identify in the existing road network a complete network dedicated entirely to active modes, including in periruban, suburban and rural areas.
• Proposal 14. Increase the signage for walking/cycling and systematically create pedestrian pathways to access local services and businesses.
• Proposal 15. Incorporate active modes in the mission statements of public transport operators, ensuring that calls for tenders contain a “walking and active modes” component.
• Proposal 16. Develop communication about small vehicles, active modes, the fight against sedentary lifestyles and collective transport

For a right to a carbon-free mobility, fight against inequality and ensure that the low-income members of society have access to low-emission modes of transport

• Proposal 17. Significantly raise the conversion bonus for the replacement of old vehicles and reserve it for the lowest income households to enable them to effectively purchase low-emission vehicles.
• Proposal 18. Help with the purchase and rental of bicycles - whether classic, electric, delivery, specialized - and related equipment (rain jackets, bags, bike locks...).
• Proposal 19. Make secure bicycle parking compulsory in all public spaces (workplaces but also universities, libraries, museums, train stations...), along with lockers to store belongings (helmets, sports equipment...) and access to showers and changing rooms.
• Proposal 20. Introduce learning about mobility into the educational curricula (orientation, the use of active modes, digital tools, eco-driving, etc.).

Of these 20 proposals, 4 would have a strong and rapid impact

• Introduce a carbon mobility credit (Proposal 1)
• Ban the marketing and the movement of the heaviest private vehicles (Proposition 8)
• Ban all advertising of combustion engine vehicles (Proposition 9)
• Raise the conversion bonus for the replacement of old vehicles and reserve it for low-income households (Proposition 17)
  
  

Mobility

For the Mobile Lives Forum, mobility is understood as the process of how individuals travel across distances in order to deploy through time and space the activities that make up their lifestyles. These travel practices are embedded in socio-technical systems, produced by transport and communication industries and techniques, and by normative discourses on these practices, with considerable social, environmental and spatial impacts.

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Movement

Movement is the crossing of space by people, objects, capital, ideas and other information. It is either oriented, and therefore occurs between an origin and one or more destinations, or it is more akin to the idea of simply wandering, with no real origin or destination.

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