Assessing climate risks for walking, wheeling, and cycling - Making Active Places 2026

Research from the DARe National Hub was recently featured at Active Travel England’s Making Active Places Conference in Manchester, where DARe Co-Investigator and lead for the Integrated Modelling Platform, Dr Alistair Ford discussed how we can ensure that the networks on which active journeys rely are resilient to future climate extremes.

The conference brought together researchers, practitioners, and policymakers from across the UK and Europe to discuss the future of active travel, with a focus on place and the built environment. As part of the session ‘From Data to Delivery: Building the Evidence Base for Active Places’, Dr Ford shared how DARe utilises data and models to understand the impacts of extreme weather on walking, wheeling, and cycling infrastructure. The presentation highlighted the importance of incorporating climate hazard data into active travel planning and demonstrated how agent-based modelling can help assess future risks and identify adaptation options.

By simulating individual people, trips, and route choices, agent-based modelling reveals how complex network-wide impacts emerge from everyday travel behaviour. DARe applies agent-based modelling in both its North East England and Greater Manchester case studies to quantify the impacts of climate hazards, including extreme rainfall and high temperatures, on active travel networks and assess the potential benefits of adaptation measures designed to improve the resilience of walking, wheeling, and cycling infrastructure. This ongoing work contributes to DARe’s Integrated Modelling Platform (IMP), a core element of the Transport Performance and Risk Analysis Framework (TPRAF), designed to support evidence-based decision-making for climate-resilient transport planning in an uncertain future.

The Making Active Places conference offered an excellent opportunity to share DARe’s work with leading voices in the sector, learn from innovative active travel initiatives, and explore how research can support the transition to healthier, fairer, and lower-carbon transport systems.

Thank you to Active Travel England for inviting DARe to be part of this great programme.