Dynamic road space allocation in a small city: an adjusted zone selection methodology

Urban areas in many cities are predominantly designed to favor motorized transport, a result of the prolonged embracement of car-centric policies. The continuous addition of capacity to withstand car flow peak demand led to unused or underused street space in many moments of the day. This temporary idling space can provide other urban functions, for example, esplanades, playgrounds, sidewalks, or cycle lanes. Reallocating road space dynamically over time (e.g., hours, days, or seasons) is a tactical approach for using space more efficiently and increasing the livability of cities. Candidate zones for dynamic road space allocation solutions can be selected using a systematic process involving network centrality and land-use indicators. The application of this process differs along with the characteristics of the targeted city (e.g., size and density). This research describes the challenges of applying a methodology designed initially for a big city (Valença et al., 2023) to the specificities of a small city. It validates the previous work and proposes some adjustments to refine the methodology, increasing its scope of application. Coimbra, a small city in the center of Portugal, is used as the application reference.