TRAFFIC IN TOMORROW'S TOWNS: conference and memorial event for Sir Colin
Buchanan (1907 - 2001)

20 November 2002                Imperial College London

PROGRAMME

0900    Registration:
1000    Welcome
        Sir Richard Sykes DSc FRS, The Rector of Imperial College
1005    Introduction
        Chairman, Dr David Quarmby
1015    The message of Traffic in Towns 1963. How do its conclusions and
underlying assumptions look after 40 years?
        Professor Peter Hills, University of Newcastle
1035    Urban mobility world wide - how does it look today?
        David Bayliss, Halcrow
1055    Discussion
1115    Can planning reduce traffic problems? Goals, role and effectiveness
of regional planning 1963-2020
        Professor Sir Peter Hall, Institute of Community Studies/University
College London
1135    Better roads - an essential ingredient of any transport plan
        Sir Christopher Foster, RAC Foundation:
1155    Discussion
1215    Lunch
1340    Securing safe streets and good urban environments
        Dr Jan Gehl, Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts
1400    Where, when and what will road pricing contribute to solving traffic
problems?
        Professor Stephen Glaister, Imperial College London
1420    Discussion
1440    More or less traffic in towns?
        Malcolm Buchanan, Colin Buchanan and Partners
1500    Discussion
1520    Chairman's concluding remarks
1530    Tea and registration
1600    Memorial event
        Readings and tributes from those who knew or worked with Colin
1730    Drinks and refreshments in the Senior Common Room

Sponsored by: Colin Buchanan and Partners, Imperial College, Institute of
Logistics and Transport, Institution of Civil Engineers* Institution of
Highways and Transportation*, Royal Town Planning Institute*, PTRC,
Rees-Jeffreys Road Fund, Transport Planning Society.
* Member of the Urban Design Alliance
This event is being organised to further the objectives of the Urban Design
Alliance

Sir Colin Buchanan (1907 - 2001):
Trained as an engineer, an architect and a planner, Colin Buchanan's
interests were wide and multi-disciplinary. This breadth is reflected in the
topics selected for discussion at this conference.  Colin Buchanan's
interest in traffic began well before the war when he was a young engineer
working for the Ministry of Transport. His first book Let us take the road,
was concerned primarily with the rapidly increasing problem of road
accidents, but he failed to find a publisher.  After the war, he returned to
the civil service, enthusiastically getting involved with the implementation
of the Abercrombie plans for London and the South East. During this period
he broadened and rewrote his book, which was eventually published as Mixed
Blessing - the motor in Britain in 1957.   After a period as a Planning
Inspector, he became influential in the world of transport and planning from
the publication of Traffic in Towns in 1963. He then left the civil service
and from that time until his retirement from active professional life he
formed the consultancy Colin Buchanan and Partners, helped to found PTRC,
started the Transport MSc course at Imperial College, dissented on planning
grounds from the majority findings of the Roskill Commission on the siting
of London's third airport, and established the School of Advanced Urban
Studies at the University of Bristol.

Speakers:
Peter Hills - a graduate of Imperial College, Peter Hills joined the
"Traffic in Towns" team at the Ministry of Transport in 1962.  After
publication, Peter Hills followed Sir Colin and others of the team onto the
staff of Imperial College, as Lecturer in Transport (1964-72).  After 5
years at the (now) ITS at Leeds University (1972-77), he then took up the
Professorship of Transport Engineering at Newcastle University (1977-date);
for 19 years as Director of TORG and the last 6 years as Dean of
Engineering.  He was a member of SACTRA (1989-95), special adviser to the
NRTF (1997), president of the IHT (1992-93), awarded an OBE (1995) and
elected to Fellowship of The Royal Academy of Engineering FREng (2000).

David Bayliss is a transport engineer who has spent most of his working life
dealing with transport in London as Chief Transport Planner of the GLC and
Director of Planning of London Transport.  He is a Director of Halcrow
Consulting and Visiting Professor at Imperial College.  He had the privilege
of knowing Colin Buchanan through his work on London.

Peter Hall is Professor of Planning at the Bartlett School of Architecture
and Planning, University College London, and Director of the Institute of
Community Studies.  From 1991?94 he was Special Adviser on Strategic
Planning to the Secretary of State for the Environment, with special
reference to London and South East regional planning including the Thames
Gateway and the Channel Tunnel Rail Link.  In 1998-99 he was a member of the
Deputy Prime Minister's Urban Task Force.

Christopher Foster is currently chairman of the RAC Foundation and chairman
of its recently published independent inquiry, Motoring Towards 2050. After
an economics fellowship at Jesus College, Oxford, he became Barbara Castle
and Richard Marsh's chief economist and special adviser at the Ministry of
Transport. In the 1970s he was a professor of economics at LSE as well as
Crosland's adviser on housing, local government and land taxation. In 1978
he became head of Coopers and Lybrand public sector and economics division
where he remained a partner (except for three years on the management board
of BT) until 1994. At various times he has been on the boards of the Post
Office, Coopers and Lybrand, the National Provident Institution, the RAC and
Railtrack, also on the Audit Commission, the E.S.R.C and the London
Docklands Development Commission.

Jan Gehl is an Architect, Senior Lecturer of Urban Design and Director of
Centre for Public Space Researches at the School of Architecture, the Royal
Danish Academy of Fine Arts in Copenhagen. He is Associated partner of GEHL
Architects ApS - Urban quality consultants, Copenhagen.  His international
teachings and consultancies include universities in Edinburgh, Toronto,
Calgary, Melbourne, Perth, Berkeley, Oslo, Dresden, Wroclaw, Hanover,
Guadalajara, Vilnius and San Jose, Costa Rica and work for cities and
developers in Europe, America, Australia and the Far East.  Publications
include Life Between Buildings - Using Public Space published in 11
languages, Public Spaces Public Life, Copenhagen 1996, Winner of the
Edra/PLACES Research award USA, 1999 and New City Spaces, Architectural
Press, Copenhagen 2001.  Jan Gehl has been awarded the Sir Patrick
Abercrombie prize for exemplary contributions to town planning by the
International Union of Architects and holds an honorary doctor's degree from
Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh.

Stephen Glaister CBE is Professor of Transport and Infrastructure at
Imperial College, London. He specialises in the economics of transport and
the other regulated utilities. He was a non-executive director of London
Regional Transport from 1984 until 1993 and in July 2000 he became a member
of the Board of Transport for London. Between 1993 and 2001 he was an
economic advisor to the Rail Regulator.

Malcolm Buchanan transferred from the Transportation Branch of the GLC to
CBP in 1974, after Sir Colin had retired.  With his fellow directors he has
seen the firm expand (and sometimes contract) from about 25 to its present
200 staff in three companies. He remains committed to and absorbed by
professional work, managing studies, acting as expert witness and working
overseas -last year directing CBP's review of the transport strategy for
Shanghai, a city of 16m people, with ambitions to encourage car ownership.

TRAFFIC IN TOMORROW'S TOWNS: 20 November 2002 Imperial College London
FURTHER DETAILS AND REGISTRATION FORM:
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ns.asp