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Conversations about Creating a Culture of Activity: Profiling the people, places, programs, and policies that help to promote a culture of activity within our communities.
Note: This transcript was exported from the video version of this episode, and it has not been copyedited
00:00:00:00 - 00:00:20:24
Prue Oswin
The stoic virtues help us to, you know, they guide us to solve problems and the problems we are trying to solve. You know, they they affect every part of people's daily lives. You know, they they they affect whether people are killed or not kill. You know, it's it's an ethical challenge. It's an enormous challenge to everyone.
00:00:20:24 - 00:00:50:12
John Simmerman
Welcome to the Active Towns Channel. My name is John Simmerman, and that is Prue Oswin from Sightlines Traffic in the Sunshine Coast of Australia. And we're going to be talking about her work to encourage that the right type of active transportation infrastructure is being put in in the communities and how she is outreaching to community members, especially parents with school age children, to really hone in on what to do.
00:00:50:17 - 00:01:02:02
John Simmerman
So without further ado, let's get right to it with Pru. Pru, thank you so much for joining me on the Active Towns podcast.
00:01:02:04 - 00:01:04:27
Prue Oswin
Thank you for having me, Joan. I'm really excited to be here.
00:01:04:29 - 00:01:12:29
John Simmerman
Well, I love to give my guests an opportunity to just introduce themselves, so please share who is true.
00:01:13:01 - 00:01:31:10
Prue Oswin
I am an active transport engineer and I'm based in Queensland, Australia on the Sunshine Coast. I didn't always work in this field. I started in the water industry after I studied engineering and I kept finding myself out on site. We were investigating sewers and I was trying to put in bikeways and I kept thinking, this be a nice place for bikeways.
00:01:31:10 - 00:01:54:18
Prue Oswin
So I've always ridden my bike everywhere. So very passionate about active transport when I lived in in Melbourne and went to university. So it took me a little while to get into active transport. But yeah, it's a really exciting field now that I'm here and there's so much work to be done in terms of keeping communities safe and making our towns safe for people to walk and ride around.
00:01:54:18 - 00:02:05:18
Prue Oswin
And it's just, you know, it's a very simple kind of desire to, to be working towards or an objective to be working towards. But yeah, there's plenty of work to be done there.
00:02:05:21 - 00:02:28:07
John Simmerman
Yeah, there sure is. And I have not visited Australia yet, but I would very much like to do so and so I get curious. I'm like, okay, well where in the world is she? Like, okay, so if we've got the map all pulled up here and by the way, I used to live in Hawaii, so I used to live in the middle of that ocean right right there.
00:02:28:09 - 00:02:42:08
John Simmerman
But yeah, back on that coast, literally, if we zoom in and boom, here you are. And so you're in is my getting the the name of this right is at Moffitt Beach.
00:02:42:10 - 00:02:45:12
Prue Oswin
I'm in Caloundra actually here in California.
00:02:45:15 - 00:02:48:09
John Simmerman
And that's just just south of there. Yeah. So I see.
00:02:48:11 - 00:02:51:01
Prue Oswin
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Masterpiece features an excellent.
00:02:51:01 - 00:02:58:08
John Simmerman
Area and this is all basically referred to as the Sun side Sunshine Coast. Is that correct?
00:02:58:10 - 00:03:18:21
Prue Oswin
Yeah. We talk about the Sunshine Coast from all the way from Noosa down to Caloundra and Cloudy South as well. So yeah, there's lots of originally they were little kind of villages and communities and now much of it has joined together. But we still have these really strong communities and Caloundra where I live is a beautiful little town.
00:03:18:22 - 00:03:29:17
Prue Oswin
It's a, it's a walkable town. It's, you know, you can walk to the beach, the schools, the sports fields, the town center and the main street. So we're we're pretty lucky where we are.
00:03:29:20 - 00:03:43:09
John Simmerman
Yeah. Yeah. Now I'm seeing the beach right in here, and it looks like I see some waves coming in now. When I lived in Hawaii, I used to be a surfer. Is it a is it kind of a surf community, too?
00:03:43:12 - 00:03:53:06
Prue Oswin
Yes, we have. Moffat Beach is a very good surf. But you can't talk to me too much about something. I don't. I'm. I really can't catch waves, but I'm happy to go out there and sit on board and pretend.
00:03:53:09 - 00:03:56:03
Prue Oswin
Yeah, I'm brave enough to catch one.
00:03:56:05 - 00:04:01:09
Prue Oswin
But yeah, I'm sure a lot of people would testify to having a great place. I think as well.
00:04:01:11 - 00:04:29:03
John Simmerman
Yeah. Fantastic. Well, what I love about, you know, beach towns and communities like this is that there is that sense of what I call a culture of activity. You know, there is a certain amount of, you know, active living is very much a part of the DNA of the place. And so I used to when I would hang out in beach communities, I just you know, it was like the best way to get around is to walk and bike everywhere.
00:04:29:03 - 00:04:30:14
John Simmerman
It really.
00:04:30:17 - 00:04:49:07
Prue Oswin
Yeah. Yeah. I'm really glad you brought that up. It's, you know, we have this, you know, fairly I think interesting culture in that it is it's an active town and I think it's not a coincidence that I ended up here. Like when I came here, you know, the first thing I found were people swimming across the bay down at the beach each morning.
00:04:49:07 - 00:05:17:12
Prue Oswin
And it's this culture of of activity. And we're a morning, you know, a morning culture as well, where the best time of day is, you know, getting up really early and going surfing or bike riding or mountain biking. There's just people, people doing stuff everywhere. So, yeah, it's lovely. And I think we need to think about that when we're thinking about our transport and things, because the beach is this whole destination that we, we are always aware of, you know, it's always part of our lives.
00:05:17:14 - 00:05:27:20
John Simmerman
Yeah, yeah. Now you had mentioned that you were very much involved in the water side of things and you are an engineer, correct?
00:05:27:22 - 00:05:29:28
Prue Oswin
Yes. Yeah, I'm an engineer, Yeah.
00:05:30:00 - 00:05:30:28
Prue Oswin
Yeah.
00:05:31:00 - 00:05:49:10
John Simmerman
And, and you said that, you know, you kind of had like that active mobility was like sort of always there and that always an interest. What, what was that story? You know, you know that origin story. What really got you to the point where I'm going to focus in on this.
00:05:49:12 - 00:06:04:15
Prue Oswin
I think it was I think there's a bit of luck involved as well. And I think, you know, if I had my time again, you'd kind of talk to young people and say, you know, find your passions, follow your passions and do that. And it was really obvious the whole time I was at university, I rode my bike everywhere as a child.
00:06:04:15 - 00:06:26:07
Prue Oswin
That's what I did. I love that that freedom. And but not just that. Me and my friends would be sitting around in the pub and talking about how we could make cities safer for cycling. And we just it didn't make sense that it was so scary out there on our bikes and things. So, you know, if I looked back, I'd just say, Look, that was a really big part of me from early on, so I'm not sure why I was.
00:06:26:07 - 00:06:42:15
Prue Oswin
I was in the water industry. I just think I thought that's what I should do because I studied environmental engineering and then a job came up and because nobody was really trained in cycling infrastructure just came up in my local community and they were looking for an engineer and they're like, Well, she's got a good background. I'm like, okay.
00:06:42:15 - 00:06:56:06
Prue Oswin
So it was a really nice, you know, really good way to transition and then start building my skill in a local government, which is a great way to do it, especially with some really great mentors at that time. And people had been really progressive with active transport.
00:06:56:08 - 00:07:22:08
John Simmerman
Yeah, and it actually brings up a really good point too, is that the training of engineers and this isn't just in Australia, it's not just in North America and the United States, This is pretty consistent globally. Is that engineering? You know, you learn the engineering and you learn how to think like an engineer and be an engineer. But you're not necessarily an expert in transportation engineering.
00:07:22:10 - 00:07:58:29
John Simmerman
And in the case of in the United States, frequently, it may only be a course or two or three in transportation planning and transportation engineering. And oftentimes what gets lost in that whole education process and one of our biggest challenges with in dealing with, quote unquote traffic traffic engineers is that they have very little appreciation for kind of what we're seeing on screen here, which is the human dynamics of what it means to have a mobility network.
00:07:59:02 - 00:08:14:18
Prue Oswin
Yeah, I, I definitely agree. And I think that, you know, having mentors that can help support you to take in the big picture is really important as I've you.
00:08:14:21 - 00:08:15:10
Prue Oswin
That there's.
00:08:15:10 - 00:08:27:09
Prue Oswin
Just so there's so much to that and it's such a complicated network. I think one of the diagrams I gave you has the kind of three uses that I always just map out in my mind in terms of.
00:08:27:17 - 00:08:27:26
Prue Oswin
The.
00:08:27:27 - 00:08:46:14
Prue Oswin
For active transport, who we're planning for. And it's just so complicated when you think of that little boy on the screen that, you know, we're thinking about it, a four year old that's, you know, an incredibly erratic user that we're trying to provide for and make this this place safe. So, yeah, this is this is what I always have in mind when I'm thinking about active transport.
00:08:46:14 - 00:09:07:29
Prue Oswin
I think about this, this erratic three year old who's, you know, you see this little kid on the scooter and I. So every time I see one of them, I'm just like, I just crack up laughing because it's hilarious. But basically, you know, then scooted off behind them. There's a parent or grandparent running down the road trying to keep them under control, like, I'm free, you know, and we have to plan for this person on the network.
00:09:07:29 - 00:09:30:09
Prue Oswin
We need to understand, like how they're going to behave in a high risk situation as well as someone who's got a vision impairment, someone with a wheelchair and everybody in between all of this. So it's it's a really complicated kind of system. And, you know, that whole group of people can easily be lost when we're thinking about, you know, trucks and SUVs and all the different types of vehicles and things as well.
00:09:30:09 - 00:09:32:17
Prue Oswin
So, yeah, it's a complicated issue.
00:09:32:23 - 00:09:33:14
Prue Oswin
Yeah.
00:09:33:16 - 00:09:57:28
John Simmerman
Yeah, yeah. I really appreciate that. This particular diagram that you have on here and we'll sort of describe it for the listening only audience as well. So in the it's essentially a triangle turned upside down triangle or permit pyramid, upside down pyramid in the sense that on top we have, as you said, the erratic three year old sort of tarting around.
00:09:57:28 - 00:10:16:12
John Simmerman
And then then you have like the sort of going across the top. You know, we have somebody who's, you know, running or jogging with their dog and then somebody who looks like they're walking with a cane and that the fire in there of course, we've got somebody, like I said, vision and vision impaired with a guide dog with a cane.
00:10:16:17 - 00:10:37:22
John Simmerman
And then down below in the in the pointy end of the upside down triangle here, we, of course, as you mentioned, have somebody with a wheelchair. But what I love about the the this diagram and the way that you have this is laid out is that it's sort of on this, you know, this what's the word I'm searching for?
00:10:37:22 - 00:11:03:13
John Simmerman
We all are at different stages of becoming less mobile and less able as time goes by because very well as as we get older, we could, in fact, lose our sight. You know, it doesn't necessarily mean you don't have sight, you know, your entire life as some people that is the case. But for for many people, we could lose our mobility as we get older.
00:11:03:16 - 00:11:14:16
John Simmerman
You know, hopefully not. But that's the case, you know, for many people. And I think somebody had once said that, you know, we're all at different stages of losing our abilities as time goes by.
00:11:14:16 - 00:11:37:16
Prue Oswin
Yeah, Yeah, definitely. And we have to we need simple and easy models so that we can always keep that in mind. And I think that I brought this one together because it's, you know, between if we provide for these extremes, then we can capture everybody in between. But we need a simple model because we're out there on site with thinking about problems.
00:11:37:16 - 00:11:54:11
Prue Oswin
We're looking at diagrams, and we need to be able to, you know, make sure we're not going to to miss anything there. So it's it's by mapping that out. And it's just what happens in my head whenever I'm kind of looking at a site, How's this going to work to somebody who who can't see how they can make it across the road here?
00:11:54:11 - 00:12:12:18
Prue Oswin
Is there something to support them to do that? Somebody who's looking after that little kid who might just slip off, is it going to be self explaining for that person? And I think when I started out in this field, I actually I had this background of I used to ride my bike. We were everywhere around the city as a as a bike rider.
00:12:12:18 - 00:12:30:04
Prue Oswin
And not that many people actually commute by cycling the Sunshine Coast. People use it for recreation and get around. But it was it's when I started out it was not that common, the Sunshine Coast, but I also spent a number of years competing in quite a high level as a triathlete. And I went to Hawaii and did the Hawaiian Ironman there.
00:12:30:04 - 00:12:50:12
Prue Oswin
So I had that kind of background as a sports writer as well. So I used to think, you know, when I first started out, I'm like, Yeah, I've got it covered. I've done the commute, bike riding. I get around by bike and I've done the sport cycling, blah, blah, blah. And then I had children and I was like, oops, you know, And I didn't even knew that I was missing stuff.
00:12:50:12 - 00:13:10:04
Prue Oswin
You know, I'd see a school and I'm like, Yeah, we need to have active transport here. But, you know, really, I would like to say that I was ahead of the game and I really thought it through and I knew what I was doing, but I did not, you know, it just literally came along with my children. I went, my gosh, you know, as a bike rider, as someone who walks and around my town, it just shrunk.
00:13:10:04 - 00:13:24:04
Prue Oswin
Like we basically had to move to somewhere that had footpaths and things. So with that diagram, I don't want to let that happen again. I want to make sure I'm, you know, I'm not an older person yet, but I want to make sure I'm ahead of the game in thinking about that time.
00:13:24:11 - 00:13:25:14
Prue Oswin
Yeah.
00:13:25:16 - 00:14:07:22
John Simmerman
Yeah. It's it is interesting and I you and I have that that commonality of of Ironman as well and and then I also had the privilege of living in Kona too. So I was part of the actual world championships. I was one of the top volunteers within the organization. And so one of the things that I kept trying to do with active towns as an organization is trying to engage the more recreation and sport cyclists as well as the athletes, like try airmen, distance triathletes and trying to bring them along with understanding this dynamic that you and I are talking about, which is how important it is that people can get around their communities through
00:14:07:22 - 00:14:43:00
John Simmerman
active mobility and getting, you know, back to this this image that we have on screen here of this child, you know, being able to walk to meaningful destinations like to school, like to a park, like to a friend's house, and hopefully, you know, end up having that that freedom and ability, both the self-efficacy, you know, of of being able to do this, that I can do this, but also being in a place, a community that embraces that and encourages that because it's inherently a safe place for them to be able to get around.
00:14:43:03 - 00:15:05:06
John Simmerman
And this is your website. So this is this is your landing page. This is your your website for your your your organization's site. Sidelines traffic. Let's keep them safe and talk a little bit about launching your own firm. You mentioned in alluded to just a moment ago that you went to work for a municipality for a while and did that.
00:15:05:09 - 00:15:09:29
John Simmerman
So then you decided to strike out on your own?
00:15:10:01 - 00:15:30:20
Prue Oswin
Yeah, after I had children, I it was difficult for me to go back to work. Actually, the the organization I worked for because the councils are very big here and I was going to be moved to an office in a different town. I didn't actually want to work in a different town, only about 30 kilometers away from here.
00:15:30:22 - 00:15:50:04
Prue Oswin
But, you know, I had a young baby. I didn't want to be driving on a highway every day and going off to a different town. So and that was one of the things that triggered me moving. And I went and actually worked for a female traffic engineer who was fantastic. I she she told me at that time she's like, because I wanted to get some more traffic skills.
00:15:50:06 - 00:16:09:03
Prue Oswin
I was working in the cycling stuff, but I'm like, I can't change the road environment if I don't have to in general traffic skills. So working for her and she was amazing. She's like, Mums can do anything for you. They underestimate how much we can. We can do. And she talked about when her children were young and how much she did and she set up her own company.
00:16:09:03 - 00:16:24:26
Prue Oswin
So I worked with her for a few years and then as I seem to do, it was, it was kind of a little bit of luck. She she went off to do something else and we had just won this big contract, which was about doing a an active transport plan, which was nearly on me. And she's like, But you can do this through.
00:16:24:27 - 00:16:44:11
Prue Oswin
I will still direct it and you can run the project. And that's what triggered me to kind of launch my own company. So, you know, my kids were still very young then, but I was really fortunate because the active transport plan we were doing was a town that I've lived in for a number of years. And so it was and I'd been doing it was lovely because I'd been doing iron Man training there and stuff.
00:16:44:11 - 00:17:06:19
Prue Oswin
So I knew the network really well. And I think that local knowledge in active transport planning is really important. It's such a fine brain network and when we have these really big local governments, it's so complicated to try to prioritize what's what needs to be done. So, you know, I loved being able to bring that knowledge of someone who'd lived in that area for a few years and be able to do that job well.
00:17:06:19 - 00:17:29:24
Prue Oswin
So I kind of fell onto my feet a little bit from there. And then it's just grown from there and it's it's interesting. I've been doing it and I think it's maybe that was about seven or eight years ago now, but it's it's just kind of in the last couple of years that I feel like my skillset has really come together and I've got a lot more confidence in the types of problems I can solve.
00:17:29:26 - 00:17:33:03
Prue Oswin
And that's really it's a great feeling. Yeah.
00:17:33:06 - 00:18:16:24
John Simmerman
Yeah, yeah. Now the other thing that I think we have in common too, is a love of stoicism. because I see one of your, your slides that you did, you've got the, the, we need all four stoic virtues to support transport investment. And I'm like, well, that's cool. She has found a way to incorporate, you know, the basically the, the, the four virtues of, of stoicism and the four, the virtues of stoicism are something that, you know, right down the road from here in Austin Ryan holiday you know, talks about.
00:18:16:24 - 00:18:40:19
John Simmerman
So yeah, I've been thinking about this too. I've been thinking about active towns and urbanism and how do we bring in because when I'm, you know, I every day I get up and I read the Daily Stoic and I've been following Ryan's work for many, many years. And I've been thinking about this is like, how do we bring like the virtues, these four virtues of stoicism?
00:18:40:22 - 00:19:04:09
John Simmerman
Again, you know, you've got your wisdom, courage, temperance, and or moderation in justice into it, and boom, lo and behold, that's what you did. You you put it on on a on a slide for this. So talk a little bit about your inspiration for bringing in wisdom, justice, moderation and courage into the active transportation world.
00:19:04:12 - 00:19:33:05
Prue Oswin
I'm I'm so excited that. Yeah, you appreciate that. You appreciate this. It was a little bit far fetched, I thought, but I thought, you know, I'm talking on the Two Towns podcast, so what's going through my head at the moment? And, you know, I'm like, how do we solve problems? Well, the stoic virtues help us to, you know, they guide us to solve problems and the problems we are trying to solve, you know, they they affect every part of people's daily lives.
00:19:33:05 - 00:19:54:27
Prue Oswin
You know, they they they affect whether people are killed or not kill. You know, it's it's an ethical challenge. It's an enormous challenge. So I don't know what made me think of applying this, but it just seems like a really natural fit. And I really think the practitioners need to understand the context that they're working in, that this is a really enormous context.
00:19:54:27 - 00:20:17:03
Prue Oswin
When I get feedback and I look at community requests about active transport projects, the they are emotive, you know, people are scared, they're fearful, they're fearful of crossing the road, fearful of hitting, being hit by a scooter and things. So I guess that's what kind of triggered me to think, Hey, can we put this model onto transport? And I could have populated this 20 times.
00:20:17:03 - 00:20:41:12
Prue Oswin
It's really easy. So basically the the four stoic virtues we have wisdom, justice, moderation and courage and wisdom I see is being, hey, we have really good technical guidance that's focused on safe and sustainable networks. It's you know, it's what the research tells us that we should be building to make our towns. We've got some great words for it, and I'm not going to think of them now.
00:20:41:12 - 00:21:05:12
Prue Oswin
But, you know, healthy fare, great places to live that we can walk and cycle around. And wisdom is about having informed decision makers and practitioners. There's a whole lot of work there in educating and continually training. It's not just a one off thing because it keeps changing as well. So wisdoms, that great technical guidance and great capability to educate everybody who's involved in the decisions.
00:21:05:12 - 00:21:30:17
Prue Oswin
Justice I see is about protecting people from harm. That's a justice issue. It's about protecting the climate, the future of the planet. Access for all don't despise place, people and nature from roads because we're still we're still doing that. We're destroying part of the planet to build these roads as well. So that's a justice issue, moderation. So the temperance one is always the one that I forget and is really quite a tricky one.
00:21:30:19 - 00:21:54:29
Prue Oswin
But, you know, I've just put some words in there. Don't rely on megaprojects to solve problems. You know, I say that in the Strong Towns website as well as, you know, these tiny little interventions that we make at a community level can really change people's lives, connect up communities, moderation. If we think about vehicle speeds, you know, we have really high speed roads going through communities and places where people are walking something that's not moderation.
00:21:55:01 - 00:22:21:03
Prue Oswin
Don't forget investments in little trips again. And the final one, I put that in red of courage because we we can't keep just responding to what people, you know, are demanding in terms of expanding roads. So we need the courage to actually go back to the wise decisions with the technical guidance in the courage to invest in safer, more sustainable solutions, even when they're not the most popular.
00:22:21:05 - 00:22:51:10
Prue Oswin
And that courage to build wise projects. And I think it's really worth articulating it. And one of the things that I learned when I was doing Ironman and and training for those real endurance events, I had a couple of events where I was running along as, I feel terrible, this is awful, you know? And then I didn't what I didn't realize at the time that I was running up a hill, I was doing something hard, and if I'd known I was going up the hill, I would have had my mind set adjusted to We're doing hard stuff now, so just, you know, toughen yourself up.
00:22:51:10 - 00:23:11:27
Prue Oswin
And I think we need to, you know, give ourselves that pat on the back going, this is going to be hard. This is a hard project. You know, have the courage to go through with that. But it's not going to be this hot forever. So I guess that's why I wanted to articulate that as well, to say that, you know, people didn't really, you know, think they were always going to be running up the hill.
00:23:12:00 - 00:23:44:06
John Simmerman
Yeah, yeah. No, I appreciate that. And I really just I applaud you for for going through that mental exercise to put this together in the the four stoic virtues framework here, I think is is brilliant. And I'm so glad that you did it. And yeah, I can remember also doing, you know, races and even training sessions where you know it's easy for us to, you know, to, to start getting down on ourselves and, you know, the devil gets inside.
00:23:44:06 - 00:24:02:07
John Simmerman
You're on your shoulder and starts, you know, whispering in your ears, just just quit, just give up, etc.. So there has to be a certain amount of courage to to think that it's going to get better and stick with it. The persistence of, you know, working through it. I had a couple of times where I know it was I don't know.
00:24:02:07 - 00:24:25:03
John Simmerman
It's probably like halfway through the marathon portion of one of the iron mens I was participating in, or no, it was actually the bike in Lake Placid and my knee was just like super, super painful. And I'm like, my gosh, do I have like a serious injury here? And I'm like, Just relax, you know, have the courage to keep going and be patient and sure enough, you know, it worked itself out.
00:24:25:03 - 00:24:56:22
John Simmerman
It just kind of magically went away. But at the same time, if I had freaked out in the moment, like so often we end up freaking out in the moment when there's a resistance to some sort of active transportation thing. We're so tuned in to like resistance of people complaining that we, like, freak out and give up. And so we have to be persistent, give people that opportunity to let the change sort of, you know, give them the opportunity to to really, you know, make it work.
00:24:56:27 - 00:25:24:19
John Simmerman
And I love the fact that you the way you put moderation in there in terms of, you know, in mentioning, you know, strong towns, you know, like like Chuck says, you know, what's that next little step that we can do that gets us heading in that direction And that kind of helps with that persistence, too. If we just do a little change, give people an opportunity to respond to it and then continue and then be persistently better year after year, time after time.
00:25:24:19 - 00:25:26:08
John Simmerman
So, yeah.
00:25:26:11 - 00:25:44:09
Prue Oswin
I love your your knee analogy. I'm going to think of you on me every time I've got. AM There's a reaction to a project. My first the first time I did a line marketing plan which was a postpaid straight to put cycle symbols on the end of the road, on the middle of the road, which was a little bit of an unusual treatment.
00:25:44:09 - 00:26:07:18
Prue Oswin
And there was a lovely engineer that I was working for. And so we put these symbols in, which is, you know, it is still there today. And we got these phone calls coming up immediately afterwards. And the engineer said to me, Don't worry about it. You know, they'll call for a couple of days and then, you know, then they'll die off and the symbols will be there for the next ten years.
00:26:07:18 - 00:26:31:00
Prue Oswin
And, you know, it's ten years later. The symbols are still there. And I really appreciate that, You know, and that approach where he just allowed, you know, the community to accept, respond and then settle down and we don't instantly react. So, yeah, just like, you know, if we instantly overreact or react to that, it's not allowing that time to calm down.
00:26:31:02 - 00:26:33:12
Prue Oswin
Yeah. Yeah.
00:26:33:14 - 00:26:41:26
John Simmerman
And when you say die off, you really mean the numbers of calls. We're going to die off. We're not actually saying that. That the people are dying.
00:26:41:28 - 00:26:46:19
Prue Oswin
No, it was the telephone calls. Thank you. Ding, ding.
00:26:46:22 - 00:27:09:22
John Simmerman
So and this actually kind of relates to what we have on screen right now, which is sort of a difficulty rating in delivering an active t tation types of infrastructure projects because to your point, you know, some things are really, really big lifts, Some things are very, very difficult to to do.
00:27:09:25 - 00:27:30:15
John Simmerman
I'll let you kind of frame this up for the audience in terms of, you know, that extreme difficult all the way to, hey, this, this stuff is pretty easy. Doesn't mean that people won't have reactions to it, but overall, these seem to be a little bit easier to to bring to fruition.
00:27:30:18 - 00:27:55:25
Prue Oswin
Yeah, in my mind I have thought we different towns and cities are at different stages when it comes to active transport. Just in my local area, if we look at the capital city, if we look at Brisbane, this bicycle user groups, there's a structure to the city where everybody is going into the CBD and a lot of emphasis on getting a lot of commuters, cyclists into the CBD, which is something they're working on and is really important.
00:27:55:27 - 00:28:16:06
Prue Oswin
These are the kind of projects that I would call difficult or extreme projects because it's really contested space. You have to take parking away or traffic capacity or something to get it in. But they are at that stage of evolution because they've got a lot of people in the community advocating for it. They've got a lot of congestion and they've got things to help get it through.
00:28:16:06 - 00:28:43:19
Prue Oswin
It's still hard. There's other areas like where I live, where we don't have a lot of people kind of pushing and advocating for kind of commuter cycling infrastructure, but we still have a need to. It doesn't mean that we need a whole culture change to get active transport happening in our town. I've engaged a lot with school communities and, you know, these communities are ready and raring to go for active transport.
00:28:43:19 - 00:29:02:22
Prue Oswin
They're, you know, they're putting in petitions asking for safer infrastructure. The parents want kids to be able to walk and cycle to school and the little projects that they need to facilitate that are often fairly simple. They're things like crossings and connecting, you know, the high school to the sports facilities, which are often is often not contested space.
00:29:02:22 - 00:29:26:10
Prue Oswin
It's not like trying to put a bikeway in the middle of the CBD kind of area. So I, I use the difficulty ratings from mountain biking and they fitted surprisingly well. Just I just used the definitions that they had, you know, So the extreme ones are difficult even for experts. So it's that thing where we go back to the stoic virtues and we're going to have to have courage to do this stuff.
00:29:26:17 - 00:29:46:01
Prue Oswin
But there's these, you know, these lovely easy projects and things like putting bikeways in space that isn't contested. And most of these are will be in in most places, but there's often some lovely creek corridors and things where there might be a little old path there and we can upgrade that and make it better. So that is an example of an easy type of project.
00:29:46:01 - 00:30:06:05
Prue Oswin
So I guess I'm, I'm trying to use this to encourage all towns to think about what kind of projects do they want to take on. Even in big cities, there are so many easy projects because these are often in the suburbs, in the neighborhoods, and it's about connecting that those up together. So I don't know if I've made that any clearer, actually.
00:30:06:08 - 00:30:32:04
John Simmerman
No, no. I think it's it's brilliant to to, you know, I think intuitively we know that some projects are easier to to to push forward and do and you know especially like for instance if there's it's an area, like you said, where there's contested space, where there's, you know, it's like, okay, there's going to be a major compromise that someone's going to have to, you know, give here.
00:30:32:06 - 00:30:55:09
John Simmerman
And in the case of like in North America, where we have all these roads and we're like, okay, come on, guys. He's got like five or six or seven lanes here. You can get rid of one and give us one so that we can create a safer active transportation corridor through here. But at the same time, it's still a road, you know, it's still kind of a more dangerous, you know, environment.
00:30:55:09 - 00:31:25:06
John Simmerman
So even though these are these are kind of difficult things to be able to do when you're looking at going after a limited amount of real estate that's out there and redefining it. Yeah, we get lots of strong opinions and lots of folks start freaking out. Now, you had mentioned a little bit there that you started really focusing in on children and kids and getting to school.
00:31:25:08 - 00:31:37:15
John Simmerman
Now, one would think that this would be easier in that easier bucket, you know, because I mean, this is this is like obvious kids should be able to get to school through walking and biking.
00:31:37:17 - 00:32:01:12
Prue Oswin
Yeah, well, I do think it's in the easy bucket. I think it's something we can do. And we just we have a slightly different situation in Australia because I think in in America there's a lot more zebra crossings and pedestrians have right of way pedestrian crossings. We don't use them as much here. So we have a lot of roads that, you know, the only way to get across is to pick a gap in traffic.
00:32:01:12 - 00:32:17:29
Prue Oswin
And the traffic is not going to help you at all. And these are kind of major blockers to getting around communities. So even places that might have a good pathway networks, as soon as you get to the the road, you know, there's a whole large proportion of the population that they will have no way of getting across the road unless they can get a gap.
00:32:17:29 - 00:32:42:00
Prue Oswin
You know, they can pick that gap and no one's going to help them. So a few years ago, I might do that. Three years ago, I did my first survey of parents to plan infrastructure around a local primary school. And when I got there and basically I did like a spatial survey, I put out a survey tool. I had maps and really simple questions Where do you need safer crossings?
00:32:42:02 - 00:33:02:04
Prue Oswin
Where are you concerned about your kids when they walk or cycle to school? Where do we need new pathways? So nothing complicated here. And I asked them some questions about the type of crossings they liked as well. And when we got the survey results in, it was really interesting. The school had about 400 kids. We got 110 survey responses.
00:33:02:06 - 00:33:20:07
Prue Oswin
The parents and citizens group said Normally when we put out a survey, we get seven responses and it's the same seven same seven parents. So instantly I'm like, Well, the parents are engaged on this issue. You know, we have kind of one in four families from the school had responded to the survey, and the points on the map were amazing.
00:33:20:07 - 00:33:41:26
Prue Oswin
Even though we had 110 people and I gave them ten dots each to say where they wanted safer crossings and things. So that's a lot of dots. But they came up with like maybe ten places in the covered most of the town where they needed safer crossings. So rather than this exercise being something that, you know, set, you know, the community coming back saying we want everything fixed everywhere, they didn't.
00:33:41:26 - 00:34:09:17
Prue Oswin
They came back and they they basically put together a cohesive plan of this is what needs to be fixed so our kids can walk and cycle to school. And the slide you've got there as well. We asked them about these road safety barriers. So we asked them whether they strongly agreed or somewhat agreed with the comment. Road safety is the main reason I don't like children walkers, they cycle to school and kind of seven out of ten parents strongly agreed or somewhat agreed to that.
00:34:09:17 - 00:34:26:19
Prue Oswin
So I think that has really changed my practice. That's what really opened my eyes to this idea that there's a lot of easy projects out there and there's actually with these facial tools we've got, we can we can get community data straight in there to plan around what they need.
00:34:26:21 - 00:34:43:24
John Simmerman
Yeah, yeah. And I learned something new today in looking at, you know, the the materials that you sent through. I learned that you all have yellow crossings.
00:34:43:26 - 00:34:46:27
Prue Oswin
So what's up with this?
00:34:46:27 - 00:34:52:13
John Simmerman
Is this new is is this a new adaptation? The yellow crossings.
00:34:52:15 - 00:35:20:00
Prue Oswin
And. Well it's interesting actually, and it has been a little bit controversial. The yellow crossings, they made their way around the world on LinkedIn. So this this treatment here is called a race priority. Crossing treatments, something we do at continuous pavement treatments. There's all different kind of varieties of them. So our state government put together some guidance which said we need to use giveaway signs and line marking to establish priority to the park uses that originally came from a cycling treatment.
00:35:20:03 - 00:35:47:01
Prue Oswin
If it was a cycleway, we'd make it green because that's what cycling infrastructure is. But this isn't. It's a shared path, so we can't use that color a lot of the time. People just continue the footpath color and continue. It is great. This path is right next to a school. Now my considerations, because I recommended the yellow here is that the drivers need to give way to parties is here, but we also want the parties to be aware that they are entering a crossing When it comes to children.
00:35:47:01 - 00:36:11:02
Prue Oswin
We need to be able to to make it explicit so it needs to be something that we can describe, so that we can teach children. So we want it to look like the pathway, but we also want it to be something that we can describe. And that's where yellow is a good color because we can say where the path turns yellow, check the cars and I'm with my own children.
00:36:11:04 - 00:36:28:22
Prue Oswin
When we use the green cycling treatments, I found the same thing I say where the past tense green. They have to give way to you, but you check for them just in case. So that's where the yellow came from. We also need this really good contrast between the the ramp and the raised crossing and the footpath as well.
00:36:28:22 - 00:36:52:15
Prue Oswin
And we also have some guidance in Australia that says, you want to reemphasize, really emphasize pedestrian crossings, you can paint it yellow. So it was a whole lot of kind of guidance that, you know, a few things that came together that that was the decision to make it yellow. Now I know some practitioners don't don't like the yellow when I talk to the community, they like at the school like said to me, it feels safe.
00:36:52:15 - 00:37:10:13
Prue Oswin
It also you come down the street and you see these crossings and that, yeah, there's a school here. There's something important going on here. And in every one of my surveys it pops up. But these side roads in a place of concern for parents with children walking or riding to school. So you can see the little there's a heat map there.
00:37:10:13 - 00:37:18:18
Prue Oswin
That's an example of one of the outputs of the studies that shows, hey, these are the the problem areas. And those crossings were something we treated.
00:37:18:20 - 00:37:51:20
John Simmerman
Yeah, yeah. Well in in I think it's incredibly important to to just acknowledge the fact that a you know we have opportunity I think to offshoot or offset a lot of these short trips and being able to encourage safe zones around schools and getting to parks and really throughout the community. I mean, kids should be able to get around their community without having to worry about, you know, being in a hostile environment.
00:37:51:22 - 00:38:08:28
John Simmerman
But in reality, it's it's not that easy and it just doesn't happen that way. You've got an the Australian care related travel graphic here. We pop over and take a look at this and in in and talk through this as well.
00:38:09:00 - 00:38:33:27
Prue Oswin
Yeah. So this is something I guess we see so much, so much investment on expanding roads to provide for these trips to school and up to school to work. You know, we're always looking at peak hour and we're always talking about work trips and things and I'm just going to hold up. Caroline Criado Caresses book, Invisible Women, and this is where all kind of there it is.
00:38:33:27 - 00:38:57:08
Prue Oswin
Yep. It all came together for me. She talks about how many trips are related to care related travel. So that's number of trips made for caring purposes. The children for people, other people. And it almost equals the number of work trips if you put them all together. But unfortunately, like in our travel household travel survey, they're not put together.
00:38:57:08 - 00:39:15:10
Prue Oswin
So that's why I've kind of drawn that out here to say, pick up, drop off delivery. That's where the the parents taking the kids to school, taking them to support that all comes into that. So that's where we need to see look at this together to say this is an enormous part of our congestion issue as well as a safety issue.
00:39:15:10 - 00:39:23:07
Prue Oswin
And I guess I do that so that we can kind of try and access some of that that money that is about congestion and saying it's worth investing in this.
00:39:23:10 - 00:39:51:29
John Simmerman
Yeah, yeah. And and again, we've we've gotten into a bad habit in the United States, in North America of citing schools far, far away from from people whereas before, you know, you had neighborhood schools and it was very, very common for people to be able to get, you know, to school by walking, biking, you know, including like the the higher grades, the high school level.
00:39:52:01 - 00:39:56:20
John Simmerman
Talk a little bit about what you guys are seeing as well.
00:39:56:22 - 00:40:20:20
Prue Oswin
Yeah, I think that there seems to be a trend towards these bigger schools and we're really creating almost unsolvable problems in making the catchments bigger and making the number of students attending the schools bigger. And it gets to a point where, you know, it doesn't matter how well you transport networks designed trying to get, you know, over 10,000 kids into this These areas in a 15 minute period, twice, twice a day is just going to cause havoc on the network.
00:40:20:20 - 00:40:45:27
Prue Oswin
So that's something that, you know, there's there's people pushing against to keep these catchments relatively small. I think the other issue we have as well is we have a tendency to build mega sports precincts now, and it's, you know, creating the same problem again on the weekend as well. And that's Austin apart from the school as well. And we have this, you know, then we create all these additional trips from the schools to the mega sports precincts.
00:40:45:27 - 00:41:17:08
Prue Oswin
So this is something where you're keeping the catchment small so that they are solvable. Problems is part of the planning and all this stuff can be so easily missed because kids aren't, you know, in the workplaces and the people who are doing a lot of the caring duties for children are less likely to be in the workplaces because they're more likely to be sharing their duties, you know, So that's where I think this these gender issues are really important and need to be really thinking about it like I wasn't before.
00:41:17:08 - 00:41:32:02
Prue Oswin
I have children. You know, every time we're thinking about, hey, this mega sports precinct that's about to be built out on the edge of town, how are those kids going to get there? We need to be aware of raising that again and again. It's just the kind of stuff we're likely to miss.
00:41:32:05 - 00:42:01:28
John Simmerman
You know, one of the biggest problems that we have in in North America is and I suspect that this is the same, you know, around the globe is is that there's this inclination towards towards safety ism. And and, you know, looking at things from the perspective of, we need to just educate, you know, the kids and, you know, the kids need to, you know, be aware and all of that.
00:42:02:01 - 00:42:34:20
John Simmerman
But it's I think you can only go so far, you know, with that because, you know, we then put on, you know, this particular slide, we pay homage. And believe me, this happens a lot on my podcast here is that we, you know, start talking about the experience of the Netherlands and, you know, the Stop the Child murder campaign, the stop to condemn it, because I think it was really important to understand that at the, at the basis of this is that the parents, when they were protesting, they were like, no, this isn't appropriate.
00:42:34:20 - 00:43:05:07
John Simmerman
We need to create a system that just isn't, you know, putting our families at risk. We need to change in the way that we're approaching these these types of things. But the next slide just really made me chuckle because then I see, you know, children's safety in Australia and it's basically a fence around a pool. And I have to chuckle about that because, you know, when you have these two slides side by side, you know, one after the other, you're like, you get it.
00:43:05:07 - 00:43:19:19
John Simmerman
You know, it's like we can't just keep, you know, this concept of, let's victim blame and okay, well then what we're going to do is we're just going to fence the kids off from from living, you know, from life.
00:43:19:22 - 00:43:20:10
Prue Oswin
00:43:20:12 - 00:43:22:20
Prue Oswin
So you have to have fences in America.
00:43:22:23 - 00:43:28:06
Prue Oswin
Yeah, we do. Yeah. You do have fatalities in America.
00:43:28:08 - 00:43:57:03
Prue Oswin
It's interesting. I put that slide up about this stop child murder campaign, because I think in Australia, a lot of the time we try to just build these Netherlands dolls and they didn't start by taking contested space and building these cycleways into all the difficult areas where adults were driving. They started with the children who don't have licenses, who have very short trips to make and who were getting killed because they don't have alternative options.
00:43:57:05 - 00:44:16:00
Prue Oswin
We I don't hear it so much anymore, but a few years ago I would hear people blaming the helicopter parents and it's like, hang on. And my first survey told me about this. I thought, am I becoming a helicopter parent? I'm really not comfortable with these crossings and my kids using them. And and I'm just getting to risk averse after my time in traffic.
00:44:16:00 - 00:44:34:01
Prue Oswin
And then when I got the first survey back and I asked people, how concerned are you when your child uses this crossing? 90% of the parents felt like me and I'm I applied my safe system principles. I'm like, if they make a mistake, what happens is a 90% chance they end up dead or seriously injured. That's, you know, that's just not right.
00:44:34:01 - 00:44:55:28
Prue Oswin
And I'm not crazy that that road network is crazy and we need to do the hard work and we need to start with children and getting this infrastructure in that that if they make a mistake and they children they will they don't get killed or seriously injured. And if we don't do that work, then parents will put their kids in cars to be sure that their kids don't get killed or seriously injured on the way to to school.
00:44:55:28 - 00:45:17:09
Prue Oswin
So I find our road safety guidance that we have now a fantastic lever to push for what we need for kids to walk and cycle to school. And my objective when my kids walk and talk, go to school. My number one objective is that they don't get killed or seriously injured, which is 100% in line with our road safety strategies and things now.
00:45:17:09 - 00:45:29:26
Prue Oswin
So I feel like we are at this lovely time if we wisely apply our road safety guidance that can build the infrastructure that people want to walk and cycle around.
00:45:29:29 - 00:46:05:15
John Simmerman
Right? Right. Yeah. Well, and I think it's it's interesting too, because you brought up a good point there, is that if a if a mistake happens, you know, is it going to be a fatal mistake? And I think a part of that is getting back to the infrastructure and saying, are we encouraging through our design slower speeds because that really helps A if with slower speeds, motor vehicle speeds, many of those those collisions are simply avoided because they can be avoided because of the slower speeds.
00:46:05:17 - 00:46:29:19
John Simmerman
And if a if a collision does happen, if it's a slower speed, the likelihood of a fatal outcome goes down dramatically. Whereas if the if the you know, the speed creeps up even just a few kilometers per hour, miles per hour, etc., it goes up exponentially. So speed is such a huge thing at getting those that traffic calming done.
00:46:29:26 - 00:46:43:19
John Simmerman
And I think that is part of what's what's happening here, too, is planning for infrastructure, for walking and writing to school. A big part of that has to also be what are we doing with the automobile traffic around schools, too?
00:46:43:22 - 00:47:09:27
Prue Oswin
Yeah, absolutely. And speed it's we we need to tackle it on all all the different fronts we can know if we can get precinct wide speed limit reductions, then that's going to help. If we can get it on a street, then that's going to help. A lot of what I do is pinpoint the places where we need those those road crossings and aim that we get 30 k's an hour at that crossing point.
00:47:09:27 - 00:47:33:29
Prue Oswin
So yeah, whenever we're looking in these places and this is a community of about 10,000 people on the map here and just through one school study, these are all the locations we identify it. Yeah. So that's, that's one of the crossings that the parents found concern, as you can imagine. And I went out when I was out there on a Sunday afternoon, it was terrifying to me as an adult, let alone for children.
00:47:33:29 - 00:47:53:15
Prue Oswin
So we can tackle speed with the street, we can tackle it with the precinct. Or like in this situation, we can raise those crossings and then we can get our speeds from 50 k's and out the crossing to 30 k's an hour. We got people's the driver's foot on the brakes and ready to respond if there is someone walking there.
00:47:53:15 - 00:48:17:06
Prue Oswin
So whenever I'm recommending a crossing, it's always recommending a raised crossing Now. So these are just some of the outputs of some of the studies I've done and just gives an idea of the kind of things that where people what kind of places that people are concerned about kids safety. So in our roundabouts in Australia, we didn't ever have guidance that said you had to have a pedestrian crossing that gives people walking priority.
00:48:17:08 - 00:48:39:20
Prue Oswin
And so it's really difficult to cross at roundabouts. And now in the last 18 months Queensland has brought in guidance that says for new roundabouts he should provide a pedestrian crossing that that gives pedestrians priority over cars because otherwise it's just too complicated. And if you think back to that little triangle with someone with a vision impairment or someone in a wheelchair trying to pick a gap in that situation is really difficult.
00:48:39:23 - 00:49:24:23
John Simmerman
You know? Well, what's interesting too is that when we look at the the design that like, say, the Dutch roundabout design, where they prioritize safe crossings for people walking and biking, kind of reminds me a little bit of your your raised crossing that you have here with your with your yellow. They build in that design in those types of roundabouts where there there is a buffer area there so a motor vehicle can come up wait yield for the person walking or biking to get across the road and then they can proceed without you know, going up the the the roundabout.
00:49:24:26 - 00:49:48:17
John Simmerman
Because, you know, I really do love roundabouts, but I always preface and say that specifically. I really love the Dutch style roundabouts where pedestrian and cycling priority are there because otherwise it's the roundabout tends to behave more like a through traffic mechanism. Prioritizing motor vehicles.
00:49:48:19 - 00:50:11:23
Prue Oswin
Yeah, then roundabouts. So for me, I think they go from my one of my least favorite treatments when they don't have that pedestrian, at least pedestrian priority because cyclists can, when they're lowest paid, when they have that they might be able to share too. When they have the priority crossings like the Dutch style roundabouts. And we have a lot here with bridges crossings.
00:50:11:25 - 00:50:25:11
Prue Oswin
Then my favorite treatment, you don't have to wait. The vehicles are going low speed and it's amazing. So it's quite amazing that by putting those crossings, I can go from the worst to the best thing to see. Yeah.
00:50:25:14 - 00:50:49:01
John Simmerman
Yeah. And you and speed again is the key thing. The design speed of the roundabout has to be, you know, using in, in miles per hour, I like to say a 15 mile per hour design in kilometers. It would be something right around the 30 kilometer or less, you know, speed design so that it encourages, you know, it's tight enough.
00:50:49:01 - 00:50:53:08
John Simmerman
And also it's not a multiple threat. It's one lane in each direction.
00:50:53:11 - 00:51:21:02
Prue Oswin
Absolutely. Yeah, definitely. That's yeah, we've got there's some others sustainable safety principles that I really like as well. And they talk about predictability. And I think sometimes where we even have the speed under control for people walking and cycling, but it's a really unpredictable environment and anyone who is traveling with children or something, you've already got your own micro unpredictable environment, let alone adding, you know, multiple lanes of traffic and things as well.
00:51:21:04 - 00:51:42:23
Prue Oswin
I showed this picture. It's a picture of a mum with about two or three children standing on a tiny little refuge island in the middle of the road. And I started an engineering conference once and after the presentations I was talking to people at night and they said that picture, you know, that mum is working so hard to keep those children safe and they it really resonated with them.
00:51:42:23 - 00:51:56:24
Prue Oswin
And I think that's why it's important having these pictures, because that's what I was thinking too. I was like, look, she's actually grabbing one. She's checking for the other at the same time as trying to pick a gap in traffic. It's it's a really difficult task.
00:51:56:27 - 00:51:57:19
Prue Oswin
Now, what.
00:51:57:19 - 00:52:06:03
John Simmerman
Would the design speed typically be for a street such as this? Is this leaning more towards the 50 kilometer per hour?
00:52:06:06 - 00:52:30:05
Prue Oswin
This treatment is in this situation, it's 50. But the picture you showed before with it, it's a similar island and there's a truck that's a 60 kilometers an hour environment. So and possibly higher. So this treatment is something we're only allowed to put the zebra crossings on roads that are 50 kilometers now. So what's been done in the past is where it's higher than 50 kilometers now.
00:52:30:05 - 00:52:57:25
Prue Oswin
This is the treatment we use. So this is something why it's really important to do these school studies with parents to to find out, you know, how they feel about it, because that guidance is not supporting them to let their kids walk and talk, go to school. And one of the most kind of compelling questions I ask is how concerned are you when your children are using this kind of crossing and it comes up as that 90% of parents very concerned or somewhat concerned on this type of crossing?
00:52:57:25 - 00:53:16:25
Prue Oswin
So that's where I turn it around and say, well, I don't think the parents are being helicopters here. You're not passing the parent test in terms of safety. And if we want kids walking and cycling school, we need to pass this parent test. I don't know. The parent test comes from the pub test, which I think is a bit outdated.
00:53:16:25 - 00:53:22:06
Prue Oswin
Do you have a pub test in in America or is that just an Australian thing? Well, you talk about having to pass.
00:53:22:06 - 00:53:45:06
John Simmerman
A pub test. It's the first time hearing it. So it might be an Australian thing, but I'm just I'm still just shocked at the speeds that that you're dealing with here. I mean, it kind of goes back to, you know, the Strode conversation of, you know, these these roadways are trying to be both streets and roads at the same time.
00:53:45:06 - 00:54:11:05
John Simmerman
And, you know, again, any any speeds north of 30 kilometers per hour, the fatality rates just go sky high. And so, you know, in reality and this is one of the things that the Dutch are starting to come to grips with is they've been studying the fatality serious injury and fatality rates on their 50 kilometer per hour streets and comparing that to their 30 kilometers per hour streets.
00:54:11:07 - 00:54:40:06
John Simmerman
They're getting to the point now where they're like, hey, if we're talking about in the city centers and in residential areas, that's all going to be lowered down to 30 kilometers per hour in whenever there's a situation of it being a 50 kilometer per hour street or higher, then you've got completely separated infrastructure and completely separated underpasses or overpasses, you know, or whatever the case may be, so that there's less of that mixing in.
00:54:40:06 - 00:54:57:28
John Simmerman
And certainly not a situation like this where, you know, the the family has to dart across and use a, you know, a small little island and maybe being exposed to, you know, 50 kilometers hour motor vehicle speeds.
00:54:58:00 - 00:55:26:29
Prue Oswin
It's going to be more it's it's often more than 60 as well. So that's. Yeah, yeah. So this is yeah, we are still back at the point where we need to change this. But it's it's been really good getting that community data because I've found that practitioners are really responsive to that. Once we have that data set that says hey, 90% of parents are very concerned about this and, and there's all other ways we can argue it, but you know, this is what has got it across the line for me.
00:55:26:29 - 00:55:50:10
Prue Oswin
So that's where I think I've been a little bit more vocal ever since I started doing those parent surveys and things because I'm like, Hey, the community is quite consistent in their messages and it's a call to action for us. But yeah, it's, it's I'm glad you pointed that out because it's it's an extreme situation and it's and fortunately it's very typical in Australia.
00:55:50:13 - 00:56:11:23
John Simmerman
Yeah. Yeah. And again your website again here is sightlines traffic and the different services that you do provide to your communities and in your area mostly work right in your, your jurisdiction, your area there or you national.
00:56:11:25 - 00:56:36:07
Prue Oswin
I do a little bit of, a little bit of everything. When I'm doing physical projects, it's usually local projects, but it's like planning for infrastructure around schools. But I also do a number of different things running training courses. So I'm one of the presenters. We have a raised crossing training course, which I do with Safe System Solutions and also some of the national guidance projects and things I'm on.
00:56:36:07 - 00:56:44:04
Prue Oswin
So, you know, there's there's local state when it comes to guidance and training and national care as well.
00:56:44:06 - 00:56:54:22
John Simmerman
Yeah. Yeah. By chance will you be able to make it out to the velocity conference in Belgium this coming year in June?
00:56:54:24 - 00:57:04:24
Prue Oswin
I don't know. It's a it's a very busy year. It's, it's looking pretty busy. So I'm, I'm not sure that would be an ambitious to try to.
00:57:04:26 - 00:57:05:25
Prue Oswin
Get that in.
00:57:05:27 - 00:57:25:08
John Simmerman
Yeah well last year I will be there and last year quite a few Aussies were there They're there really pushing to see if they can have the Sydney host velocity in in the coming years. So I'm not sure where that application process is, but that might be an.
00:57:25:08 - 00:57:26:11
Prue Oswin
Opportunity as you come.
00:57:26:11 - 00:57:29:12
John Simmerman
Down under and come hang out. yeah.
00:57:29:14 - 00:57:30:25
Prue Oswin
But Cathy.
00:57:30:28 - 00:57:35:06
John Simmerman
Is there anything that we haven't mentioned yet that you'd like to leave the audience with?
00:57:35:08 - 00:57:56:20
Prue Oswin
The only thing, and I think we've kind of touched upon it, but and it's completely in line with what you're saying with active towns. But what I've found in my work is that communities really are experts in their own neighborhoods. And when we query those communities and find clever ways to collect their knowledge, then it can really inform our decision making.
00:57:56:22 - 00:58:19:18
Prue Oswin
And it's up to us to to find these and establish these clever ways of collecting their stories. I really like the spatial surveys. It's easy to pass on and communicate and analyze. So I think we are at the right time with the tools we've got available for collecting this information and then fading that into the better outcomes that we need.
00:58:19:18 - 00:58:24:01
Prue Oswin
So yeah, I think that's the thing I'd like to leave off on, maybe.
00:58:24:03 - 00:58:31:11
John Simmerman
Fantastic. Well, Prue Osman it has been an absolute joy and pleasure having you on the Active Towns podcast. Thank you so much.
00:58:31:14 - 00:58:34:00
Prue Oswin
thank you so much, John. It's been really fun.
00:58:34:02 - 00:58:53:05
John Simmerman
Hey, thank you all so much for tuning in. I hope you enjoyed this episode with Prue, and if you did, please give it a thumbs up. Leave a comment down below and share it with a friend. And if you haven't done so already, I'd be honored to have you subscribe to the channel. Just click on this subscription button below and bring the notifications bell And if you are enjoying this content, please consider supporting my efforts.
00:58:53:13 - 00:59:17:00
John Simmerman
You can do so easily. Just head on over to active towns dot org. Click on the support button and there's several different options, including Patreon. And by the way, Patreon supporters do get access to all this content early and ad free. So there is that. Thank you all so much for tuning in. I really do appreciate it. And until next time, this is John signing off by wishing you much activity and happiness.
00:59:17:03 - 00:59:36:27
John Simmerman
Cheers. And again sending a huge thank you to all my active towns. Ambassadors supporting the channel on Patron Buy me a coffee YouTube super. Thanks. As well as making contributions to the nonprofit and purchasing things from the active towns store, every little bit adds up and it's much appreciated. Thank you all so much.