Transport has always been central to the planning of cities and regions. The Griffin Plan for Canberra, for example, used streets and intersections to structure the city (see Chapters 4 and 13). Similarly, Ebenezer Howard’s (1902) ‘garden city’ was designed to reduce long travel times to and from work. Despite this history, 21st-century transport planners are still grappling with the problem of long work journeys in the wake of suburban expansion, as well as dealing with a suite of new challenges: from congestion, pollution and climate change, to more personal concerns of obesity and lack of exercise (see Chapter 16).

This chapter begins by discussing the scope of transport planning, distinguishing it from related disciplines such as traffic engineering. It then examines the development of transport planning techniques and ideas in the United States and Europe, and their adoption by Australian planners. This leads to an analysis of contemporary challenges and policy responses, before concluding with a discussion of likely future directions in transport planning.