“NOCTURNES” (night transport), Mobility
services in
Summary
Background. Human
activities progressively spread at night and rebuild a new working and leisure
space requiring a quasi-permanent offer of mobility services to which our
organizations aren’t always prepared. In order to answer these developments,
new mobility services are being established. Supported by PREDIT, the
Methodology. An
international survey carried out in 7 languages among 900 towns of 106
countries on the five continents as well as parallel field explorations led at
night allowed to spot good practices and to show some main trends in
mobilities, services and cities evolution at night. The organization of several
international colloquia, among which the colloquia of Rome and Brussels, the
creation of an interactive website (www.u-night.org), the participation in events,
the publication of scientific articles or articles aimed at the general public
and the institution of academic training courses contributed to raise awareness
among the different actors, to put the set of themes on the agenda and to let
projects emerge.
Main lessons. Since the
early nineties, we do witness a progressive colonization of the urban nighttime
through economic activities. Everywhere in
First impact. This
research-action started at the end of 2003 has allowed to put the question of
night mobilities and urban nighttime on many local authorities’ agenda as well
as to create an international network of professionals and experts. It
contributed to the development of transport projects as it was the case in
Lyon, to ease tensions or to launch operations such as the Observatoire de
la nuit (the “Night watchdog”) and the first Université de la
nuit (Night University) in
Potential consequences. Our
interlocutors are interested in networking and developping common initiatives: international
Colloquium on restitution and discussion, International research
programme on the transport demand and the different practices, International
night watchdog based on the initiatives of Lyon,
Questioning. The choice of
developping night mobility services relates back to the emergence of a non-stop
society and a non-stop town 24 hours a day and 7 days a week. And everybody
becomes schizophrenic from then on: the consumer wants a personalized town
whereas the salaried employee refuses atypical working hours. We contributed to
lauching the debate. It’s up to everyone to take part in it and to ask oneself
if the game is really worth the candle.