Traffic development in Copenhagen in a long-term perspective

In 2020, Copenhagen will receive a new state of the art traffic model that can be used for decision-making on new infrastructure projects for many years to come. Copenhagen Municipality is behind the project, and Artelia is heading the team of consultants that will deliver the model, which has been named COMPASS.

It is part of the international traffic modelling community, and the team consists of leading experts from Denmark, the United Kingdom and the United States.

These high ambitions are attributed first and foremost to a desire to give the planners brand new opportunities to shed light on the traffic of the future. Note that this applies to all road users – motorists, cyclists, pedestrians, commuters on public transport and the interaction between the various methods of transport.

An activity-based model
COMPASS will be the first operational transport model in Europe that is entirely activity-based. This means that the model seeks to describe our daily activities based on the composition of the household – that a father takes the child to daycare on his way to work and buys groceries on the way home, while the mother picks up the child.

There has been a paradigm shift in relation to traditional models that view transport as an end in itself. In recent years, activity-based models have undergone significant development and are used today in many major American cities.

In Copenhagen, the method will make it possible to shed light on combination journeys, such as taking bicycles on trains, and parking behaviour, as well as assessing various parking policies.

In addition, the model can describe congestion on cycle paths and capacity constraints in public transport.

Driverless technologies
One of the ground-breaking aspects is the model’s ability to analyse new transport tech-nologies, such as driverless cars, car sharing and driverless minibuses.

Artelia has already tested the model for this purpose in the publication “Traffic Scenarios for the Capital Region”, which was prepared for the Capital Region in cooperation with Atkins. Several scenarios leading up to 2035 are reviewed here, and one of them is the importance of the introduction of driverless technologies.

In general, the results of the analysis point out that driverless technologies will significantly ex-acerbate the congestion challenges. We will see a general increase of 5% in car traffic. Bicycle rides and walks will decline by 9% and 5%, respectively.

These are the methods of transport that are both health-promoting and environmentally friendly.

The calculations also show that of all the cars on the road in 2035, 41% will be ordinary passenger cars and 59% will be driverless cars.

Public transport leading up to 2050
Artelia has also helped Copenhagen Municipality analyse how the public transport infrastructure can be expanded to meet urban development as we head towards 2050. The results were presented in a report published in September 2018.

This comprehensive analysis includes an ex-amination of the need and possibilities for the development of the metro system and the prospects of light rail and bus rapid transit (BRT) lines with dedicated lanes.

As a basis for this analysis, traffic model calcu-lations have been carried out for no less than 30 different scenarios with new metro, light rail and BRT lines.

Light rail at Frederikssundsvej
In connection with this extensive analytical work, Artelia has also helped focus on more specific traffic problems and possible solutions.

Frederikssundsvej in the Northwest District of Copenhagen is one of the traffic arteries that are expected to be challenged in the coming years. This can easily be illustrated by the fact that the 5C Line is Denmark’s busiest bus route. On the stretch between Nørrebro St. and Husum Torv, the 5C Line carry around 6 million passengers a year, and this is even supplemented by the 350S bus. The corridor is expected to be pressed even more by population growth and by increased car ownership in the capital region. This increased congestion will result in reduced mobility with major delays for both buses and cars.

Copenhagen Municipality, Gladsaxe Municipality and the Capital Region have therefore joined forces to explore the possibility of a light rail line from Nørrebro St. to Gladsaxe Trafikplads via Frederikssundsvej.

Artelia has been responsible for all the calculations and assessments of the potential passenger numbers for a light rail line. The department has also analysed the traffic conse-quences of the light rail line on the rest of public transport and on car traffic.