As European cities confront the intertwined crises of climate change,inequality and congestion,a profound rethinking of urban mobility is underway. Nowhere is this shift more visible-or more politically charged-than in Barcelona and London.A new study from the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE), “Towards post-growth cities: the cultural politics of mobility transitions in Barcelona and London,” examines how efforts to curb car use and promote more sustainable forms of transport are colliding with entrenched habits, economic interests and competing visions of urban life.
Far from being a simple matter of adding bike lanes or expanding public transport, the transition to “post-growth” mobility raises uncomfortable questions: Who gains and who loses when road space is reallocated? How do ideas about freedom, status and modernity shape resistance to-or support for-green transport policies? And what happens when measures designed to tackle emissions are recast as an attack on ordinary drivers?
By tracing recent battles over low-traffic neighbourhoods, superblocks, congestion charges and cycling infrastructure, the LSE research shows that mobility transitions are as much about culture and power as they are about planning and technology. The struggles unfolding in Barcelona and London offer a revealing glimpse of the broader political fight over what – and whom – cities should be for in a post-growth era.
Reimagining urban prosperity How post growth thinking reshapes mobility in Barcelona and London
Instead of treating transport as a conduit for ever-faster circulation of people and goods, post-growth perspectives in Barcelona and London frame mobility as a tool for collective well‑being. This means privileging public space over private speed, walkable neighbourhoods over long commutes, and cleaner air over marginal gains in congestion metrics. In Barcelona, the expansion of superblocks and low‑traffic school streets is reconfiguring daily life around proximity, care work, and children’s safety. London’s experiments with Low Traffic Neighbourhoods (LTNs) and reallocated road space for cycling challenge decades of car‑centric planning, revealing how street design can either reproduce or disrupt existing inequalities. Across both cities, campaigners, planners, and residents negotiate what counts as “prosperity”: is it retail footfall and property values, or quieter streets, social interaction, and time saved from traffic jams?
This struggle over meaning unfolds through narratives, not just infrastructures. Political leaders, community groups, and media outlets mobilise competing stories about who gains and who loses from traffic calming, road pricing, or expanded bus lanes. In post‑growth framing,enough mobility can be better than more,and success is judged by health,inclusion,and climate goals rather than GDP alone. These contrasting visions become visible in everyday debates, from local council consultations to viral campaign posters:
- Security vs. access: traders fearing lost customers versus residents demanding safer crossings.
- Speed vs. sociability: commuters defending driving times versus parents valuing street play.
- Growth vs. justice: property-led regeneration versus affordable, reliable public transport.
| City | Post-growth mobility focus | Cultural flashpoint |
|---|---|---|
| Barcelona | Superblocks, school streets, active travel | Right to public space vs. car ownership |
| London | LTNs, 20mph zones, bus and cycle priority | Local business fears vs. cleaner, quieter streets |
From car centric streets to shared spaces Lessons from contested low traffic schemes and superblocks
In both cities, efforts to reclaim the street from private cars have unfolded as experiments in everyday democracy. Barcelona’s superilles and London’s low-traffic neighbourhoods have exposed how curb space, sunlight, and silence are all deeply political resources-allocated, contested, and defended by different groups. Residents who once treated the street as a corridor for vehicles are now asked to see it as a shared social room, a site for play, commerce, and informal care work. This transition is uneven and emotionally charged; it disrupts routines, redistributes inconvenience, and tests the legitimacy of local authorities. While some drivers frame new layouts as an attack on personal freedom or working-class mobility, others-often parents, older people, and those without cars-claim them as overdue corrections to decades of car-first planning.
These conflicts reveal that technical street design alone cannot deliver post-growth urbanism; what matters is who gets to define “normal” mobility and “fair” access. In both Barcelona and London, new shared spaces have been stabilised where policy-makers acknowledge lived experience, adapt designs, and open up decision-making. Common features of more durable schemes include:
- Incremental implementation with clear trials and sunset clauses
- Visible co-benefits such as shaded seating, micro-playgrounds, and local retail boosts
- Transparent data on traffic displacement, air quality, and emergency access
- Local stewardship via neighbourhood assemblies, school-led campaigns, and business forums
| City | Main tool | Core tension | Key cultural shift |
|---|---|---|---|
| Barcelona | Superblocks | Local shops vs. through-traffic | Street as a civic commons |
| London | Low-traffic schemes | Drivers’ rights vs. public health | Street as a shared obligation |
Equity at the crossroads Who wins and who loses in mobility transitions across diverse neighbourhoods
As Barcelona experiments with superblocks and London rolls out low-traffic neighbourhoods, the promised benefits of cleaner air, quieter streets and safer cycling are not distributed evenly.In districts with strong resident associations and high levels of political literacy, communities can shape schemes to reflect local needs – from protected cycle lanes for school runs to wider pavements for older pedestrians. Elsewhere, changes feel imposed rather than co-created, fuelling perceptions that mobility policy is something done to people, not with them. In working-class and racialised neighbourhoods, this often collides with longer histories of displacement and neglect, sharpening anxieties that new bus gates or parking restrictions are the soft front of gentrification rather than tools for collective wellbeing.
- Winners often include homeowners on traffic-calmed streets, businesses near new transit hubs, and already-mobile professionals who can quickly adapt to cycling or remote work.
- Losers are more likely to be shift workers, carers, and small traders whose routines depend on flexible car access, and also renters facing rising prices in newly “green” areas.
| Group | Likely Outcome | Key Concern |
|---|---|---|
| Social housing tenants | Cleaner streets, but limited say | Participation and representation |
| Local shop owners | Mixed impact on footfall | Deliveries and customer access |
| Care and shift workers | Longer, costlier journeys | Time and income pressure |
| Young cyclists and walkers | Safer routes to school | Maintenance and lighting |
Policy roadmaps for fairer cities Concrete steps for planners to align transport, climate and social justice
Moving beyond growth-led transport planning requires city authorities to hardwire equity into every stage of urban mobility design. This begins with redistributing street space away from private cars and towards walking, cycling and public transport, backed by legal safeguards against displacement in low-income neighbourhoods where new tram lines, cycle lanes or green corridors often trigger speculative investment. Planners in cities like Barcelona and London can embed social impact assessments alongside environmental ones, ensuring that each new mobility scheme is evaluated for its effects on housing affordability, access to jobs and gendered patterns of care work.Crucially, this shift demands co-governance: residents, unions, disability advocates and migrant groups must help set priorities, not simply comment on pre-packaged plans.
- Reallocate budgets from new road capacity to frequent, affordable buses and trams.
- Cap fares and introduce free passes for low-income, youth and elderly residents.
- Design 15-minute neighbourhoods that reduce compulsory travel while expanding local services.
- Open data and citizen juries to scrutinise transport investment and climate claims.
| Policy lever | Climate impact | Justice outcome |
|---|---|---|
| Low-traffic districts | Lower emissions and noise | Safer streets for children and carers |
| Progressive parking charges | Discourages car use | Funds services in deprived areas |
| Fare integration | Mode shift to transit | Cheaper cross-city journeys |
Aligning transport, climate and social justice also means reframing what counts as “success” in urban planning. Rather of measuring performance mainly through traffic flow or GDP growth,cities can adopt indicators that foreground emissions cuts,time savings for low-paid workers,and reduced exposure to pollution for racialised communities. Transparent dashboards that track these indicators by neighbourhood make inequalities visible and politically actionable. Planners can then adjust timelines, routes and funding in response to these metrics, turning mobility transitions into vehicles for redistribution rather than engines of exclusion.
Closing Remarks
As Barcelona and London edge toward post-growth futures, their streets are becoming key battlegrounds where competing visions of prosperity, justice and everyday life collide. Mobility turns out not to be a neutral matter of infrastructure, but a deeply cultural and political project: whose time is valued, whose lungs are protected, whose neighbourhoods are opened up or sealed off.What emerges from the comparison is not a ready-made blueprint, but a warning and an invitation.Policies that cut emissions without confronting inequality risk deepening urban divides; measures that are socially sensitive but ecologically timid will not meet the urgency of the climate crisis. Navigating between these pitfalls will require more than technocratic fixes or moral appeals to “green” behavior.It will demand new forms of democratic experimentation, new coalitions and, ultimately, new stories about what a thriving city can be when growth is no longer its organising principle.For now, the struggles over bike lanes, low-traffic zones and public transport funding may look like small, local disputes. In fact, they are skirmishes in a much larger contest over the direction of urban modernity. How Barcelona and London resolve these conflicts will not only reshape their own mobility systems, but also help determine whether post-growth cities remain an abstract ideal – or become a lived, and contested, reality.
