SUSTAINABLE TRANSPORTATION FUTURE

Sustainable transport refers to the broad subject of transport that is or approaches being sustainable. It includes vehicles, energy, infrastructure, roads, railways, airways,waterways, canals,pipelines, and terminals. Transport operations and logistics as well as transit-oriented development are involved. Transportation sustainability is largely being measured by transportation system effectiveness and efficiency as well as the environmental impacts of the system.

Sustainable transport systems make a positive contribution to the environmental, social and economic sustainability of the communities they serve. Transport systems exist to provide social and economic connections, and people quickly take up the opportunities offered by increased mobility.The advantages of increased mobility need to be weighed against the environmental, social and economic costs that transport systems pose.

Green Vehicle

Example of sustainable transport is Green Vehicle.A green vehicle or environmentally friendly vehicle is a road motor vehiclethat produces less harmful impacts to the environment than comparable conventional internal combustion engine vehicles running on gasoline or diesel, or one that uses certain alternative fuels.Green vehicles can be powered by alternative fuels and advanced vehicle technologies and include hybrid electric vehicles, plug-in hybrid electric vehicles,battery electric vehicles, compressed-air vehicles, hydrogen and fuel-cell vehicles,neat ethanol vehicles, flexible-fuel vehicle,natural gas vehicles, clean dieselvehicles, and some sources also include vehicles using blends of biodiesel andethanol fuel or gasohol.Several author also include conventional motor vehicles with high fuel economy, as they consider that increasing fuel economy is the most cost-effective way to improve energy efficiency and reduce carbon emissions in the transport sector in the short run. As part of their contribution to sustainable transport, these vehicles reduce air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions, and contribute to energy independence by reducing oil imports.

Environmental Sustainability

Healthy ecosystems provide vital goods and services to humans and other organisms. There are two major ways of reducing negative human impact and enhancing ecosystem services and the first of these is environmental management. This direct approach is based largely on information gained from earth science, environmental science and conservation biology. However, this is management at the end of a long series of indirect causal factors that are initiated by human consumption, so a second approach is through demand management of human resource use.

Management of human consumption of resources is an indirect approach based largely on information gained from economics. Herman Daly has suggested three broad criteria for ecological sustainability: renewable resources should provide a sustainable yield (the rate of harvest should not exceed the rate of regeneration); for non-renewable resources there should be equivalent development of renewable substitutes; waste generation should not exceed the assimilative capacity of the environment

Social Equity

There are multiple definitions of social equity as it is a new term; each industry has seemed to take on a different connotation. The following provides for examples of each connotation. Social Equity is the least defined and least understood element of the triad that is Sustainable Development yet is integral in creating sustainability - balancing economic, environmental and social equity. Vital communities meet the needs of all of their citizens.They provide good schools, affordable housing, and the basic services that enable even the least affluent to live comfortably.A healthy society fosters a wide sense of individual responsibility for the community.

Economy Sustainability

Economic sustainability is the term used to identify various strategies that make it possible to use available resources to their best advantage. The idea is to promote the use of those resources in a way that is both efficient and responsible, and likely to provide long-term benefits. In the case of a business operation, it calls for using resources so that the business continues to function over a number of years, while consistently returning a profit.

In most scenarios, the measure of economic sustainability is presented in monetary terms. The worth of assets and resources in dollar figures is common, as is identifying the amount of return generated by the efficient use of those resources. The idea is to aid in identifying areas of the operation in which resources are not being utilized in the most efficient manner, and take the steps to correct the situation. At the same time, the proposed changes to the operation are considered in terms of their overall effect on the production flow, making it possible to address any potential difficulties later in the process before the changes are actually implemented. Doing so means engaging in a strategy known as cross-sectoral coordination, which involves identifying what impact changes in one area of the operation will have on subsequent phases of the production process.