Calls for papers

 

Latin American Journal of Management for Sustainable Development

 

Special Issue on: "Sustainable Road Transportation in Latin America"

Guest Editors:
Dr. Barbara Stolte Bezerra, Sao Paulo State University, Brazil
Dr. Niels Agerholm, Aalborg University, Denmark

Transport has an important impact on people everyday life but it also impacts the environment. How people and goods are moving depends on the management of transport systems in cities and road systems. The modes of transport used in large cities are responsible for more than 25% of carbon dioxide emissions worldwide. In order to change this situation, governments worldwide are investing in research and development towards more sustainable transportation systems. Sustainability in transports means to fulfill the needs of mobility, both urban and global, without jeopardising future generations, regarding natural resources and pollution levels.

Today all major cities are facing serious traffic problems such as congestion, road safety problems, and rising carbon dioxide emissions. Also, several cities worldwide struggle against the car dependency phenomenon by trying to build walking - and cycling - friendly cities. This fight depends on several fronts: improving public transport, improvement of pedestrian circuits, creating exclusive routes for cyclists, the availability of bicycles and clean vehicles for hire, expensive costs of parking meters for those who bring their cars to the city, car sharing and carpooling. But these encompass the management and construction of a new type of transportation infrastructure in order to promote safe mobility. Without planning for vulnerable road users and raising road safety as a priority, any policy for promoting sustainable transport will fail.

In other words, the mobility pattern focus on individual motorised transport proves unsustainable, both in terms of the environment and the mobility of people and goods. The traditional answer to the problems of congestion (i.e. increasing road capacity) encourages car use and generates more bottle necks, feeding a vicious cycle responsible for the degradation of air quality, global warming, and impaired quality of life in cities (significant increase of noise levels, loss of time, deterioration of public space, accidents and stress).

Aligned with this growing interest in sustainable development and sustainable transport, this special issue – although it is focused on case studies of Latin America cities and transportation companies - intends to explore as many different dimensions of the issue as possible (for instance, best practices and research in this issue worldwide) which can benefit Latin America.

Subject Coverage
Suitable topics include the following:

• Safe mobility
• Which environmental impacts does safe mobility policy have for vulnerable road users?
• How do risk factors change the way people choose their mode of transportation and impact the management of the transportation system?
• Motorcycle as an unsustainable transportation mode
• Factors that contributes to unsafe behaviour and leads to a unsustainable urban transport
• Public transportation policies
• Sustainable management of public transportation system
• How does the planning and management of public transportation system impact the use of energy, emissions and other resources?
• Sustainable transport
• Variables that must be taken into account in the preparation of urban mobility policies that include sustainable cargo logistics
• Sustainability and business management in transportation companies
• Users, needs and behaviour
• What would the conditions necessary for transportation/sustainability coexistence be?
• What is users’ behaviours like?
• What is the consequence of infrastructure design for change in behaviour towards more sustainable transportation modes?
• New innovative technologies in transportation
• The role of IVT (in vehicle technologies) systems
• The role of ITS (intelligent transportation systems)

The above list is not exclusive; other contributions on relevant topics will also be considered. This project aims at developing a comprehensive understanding of the topic through case studies on good or bad practices.

Notes for Prospective Authors

Submitted papers should not have been previously published nor be currently under consideration for publication elsewhere. (N.B. Conference papers may only be submitted if the paper has been completely re-written and if appropriate written permissions have been obtained from any copyright holders of the original paper).

All papers are refereed through a peer review process.

All papers must be submitted online. To submit a paper, please read our Submitting articles page.

Important Dates

Abstract submission (email): 2 August, 2014

Full paper submission (online): 15 December, 2014

Revised paper submission: 15 February, 2015

Final paper acceptance: 16 April, 2015