Journal of Environmental and Public Health The Effect of Active Transport, Transport Systems, and Urban Design on Population Health Guest Editors: Li Ming Wen, Chris Rissel, and Hua Fu The Effect of Active Transport, Transport Systems, and Urban Design on Population Health Journal of Environmental and Public Health The Effect of Active Transport, Transport Systems, and Urban Design on Population Health Guest Editors: Li Ming Wen, Chris Rissel, and Hua Fu Copyright © 2013 Hindawi Publishing Corporation. All rights reserved. This is a special issue published in “Journal of Environmental and Public Health.” All articles are open access articles distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Editorial Board Habibul Ahsan, USA Richard M. Grimes, USA Ike S. Okosun, USA Suminori Akiba, Japan H. R. Guo, Taiwan Mynepalli K. C. Sridhar, Nigeria Stuart A. Batterman, USA Ivo Iavicoli, Italy David Strogatz, USA Brian Buckley, USA Chunrong Jia, USA Evelyn O. Talbott, USA Judith Chow, USA Pauline E. Jolly, USA Edward Trapido, USA DevraL.Davis,USA Molly L. Kile, USA T.L. Tudor, UK Sina Dobaradaran, Iran Joseph T.F. Lau, Hong Kong David Vlahov, USA Walid El Ansari, UK Jong-Tae Lee, Korea Chit Ming Wong, Hong Kong Brenda Eskenazi, USA Stephen Leeder, Australia BennyZee,HongKong Pam R. Factor-Litvak, USA Gary M. Marsh, USA Tong Zheng, USA Alastair Fischer, UK Marsha K. Morgan, USA Anthony B. Zwi, Australia Linda M. Gerber, USA Luke P. Naeher, USA Karen Glanz, USA Oladele A. Ogunseitan, USA Contents The Effect of Active Transport, Transport Systems, and Urban Design on Population, Health Li Ming Wen, Chris Rissel, and Hua Fu Volume 2013, Article ID 457159, 2 pages Cobenefits of Replacing Car Trips with Alternative Transportation: A Review of Evidence and Methodological Issues, Ting Xia, Ying Zhang, Shona Crabb, and Pushan Shah Volume 2013, Article ID 797312, 14 pages Measuring Workplace Travel Behaviour: Validity and Reliability of Survey Questions, Nicholas A. Petrunoff, Huilan Xu, Chris Rissel, Li Ming Wen, and Hidde P. van der Ploeg Volume 2013, Article ID 423035, 6 pages Joy, Exercise, Enjoyment, Getting out: A Qualitative Study of Older People’s Experience of Cycling in Sydney, Australia, Alexis Zander, Erin Passmore, Chloe Mason, and Chris Rissel Volume 2013, Article ID 547453, 6 pages A Population Approach to Transportation Planning: Reducing Exposure to Motor-Vehicles, Daniel Fuller and Patrick Morency Volume 2013, Article ID 916460, 5 pages Association between Physical Activity and Neighborhood Environment among Middle-Aged Adults in Shanghai,RenaZhou,YangLi,MasahiroUmezaki,YongmingDing,HongweiJiang,AlexisComber, and Hua Fu Volume 2013, Article ID 239595, 7 pages Two Pilot Studies of the Effect of Bicycling on Balance and Leg Strength among Older Adults, Chris Rissel, Erin Passmore, Chloe Mason, and Dafna Merom Volume 2013, Article ID 686412, 6 pages Active Transport and Health Outcomes: Findings from a Population Study in Jiangsu, China, Shu-rong Lu, Jian Su, Quan-yong Xiang, Feng-yun Zhang, and Ming Wu Volume 2013, Article ID 624194, 7 pages A Pilot Study of Increasing Nonpurposeful Movement Breaks at Work as a Means of Reducing Prolonged Sitting, Dean Cooley and Scott Pedersen Volume 2013, Article ID 128376, 8 pages A Combined Impact-Process Evaluation of a Program Promoting Active Transport to School: Understanding the Factors That Shaped Program Effectiveness,S.CrawfordandJ.Garrard Volume 2013, Article ID 816961, 14 pages Health-Related Factors Associated with Mode of Travel to Work,MelissaBopp,AndrewT.Kaczynski, and Matthew E. Campbell Volume 2013, Article ID 242383, 9 pages Environmental Determinants of Bicycling Injuries in Alberta, Canada,NicoleT.R.Romanow, Amy B. Couperthwaite, Gavin R. McCormack, Alberto Nettel-Aguirre, Brian H. Rowe, and Brent E. Hagel Volume 2012, Article ID 487681, 12 pages Hindawi Publishing Corporation Journal of Environmental and Public Health Volume 2013, Article ID 457159, 2 pages http://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2013/457159 Editorial The Effect of Active Transport, Transport Systems, and Urban Design on Population Health Li Ming Wen,1,2 Chris Rissel,1 and Hua Fu3 1 Sydney School of Public Health, University of Sydney, Australia 2 Health Promotion Service, Sydney Local Health District, NSW, Australia 3 School of Public Health, Fudan University, China Correspondence should be addressed to Li Ming Wen; [email protected] Received 22 September 2013; Accepted 22 September 2013 Copyright © 2013 Li Ming Wen et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Without doubt, active transport (working, cycling, and the adults who completed an online survey regarding demo- use of public transport), transport systems, and urban design graphics, health-related factors, and the number of times per significantly impact population health. A 2013 systematic week of walking, biking, driving, and using public transit to review of the relationships between active transport and work. Logistic regression was used to predict the likelihood of health outcomes found that active transport was significantly each mode of transport and meeting physical activity (PA). associated with improved cardiovascular health and lower The study found that about 10 percent of respondents met body weight. However, the strength of the evidence varied PA recommendations based on the use of active transport to from weak (mental health and cancer), moderate (body work alone, which has an important implication for promot- weight), to strong (cardiovascular health). The evidence was ingphysicalactivitythroughactivetransport. limitedbylackofcomparabilityofstudyoutcomes,weak The paper by R. Zhou et al. examined the perceived study designs, small sample sizes, and lack of experimental neighborhood environment characteristics associated with studies [1]. PA in urban areas in China. Cross-cultural comparisons of Althoughthelinksbetweenactivetransportandpopu- how the environment can influence behaviour warrant more lation health are still emerging, the evidence linking active attention. In this study, adult cross-sectional data was col- transport directly to health outcomes has not been examined lected using accelerometers, the International Physical Activ- extensively and the relationship between active transport ity Questionnaire (IPAQ), and Neighborhood Environment and health still remains unclear. More research is needed to Walkability Scale-Abbreviated (NEWS-A) survey. Consistent better understand the important correlates related to active with western countries, residents from downtown areas had transport and its contributors to population health, and higher levels of transportation PA and leisure-time PA than develop effective strategies to promote active transport. With respondents living in the suburbs. Residential density was this in mind we selected the theme for this special issue. We positively associated with recreational and leisure-based PA, wish to highly commend the authors for their well written and moderate-vigorous PA was found to be negatively asso- papers exploring a range of issues related to promoting active ciated with traffic safety. transport, which include health benefits associated with it An interesting paper by S. R. Lu et al., however, found and potential strategies to promote active transport as well as that, contrary to expectations, there was no benefit to popula- challenges in measuring the effectiveness of promoting active tion health from active transport. They conducted a popula- transport. tion-based cross-sectional study in Jiangsu, China. 8400 The paper by M. Bopp et al. examined the association community residents aged 18 or above were interviewed fol- between health-related factors and mode of travel to the lowing a multistage random sampling method. Face-to-face workplace. The study used a convenience sample of employed questionnaire survey data, anthropometric measurements, 2 Journal of Environmental and Public Health and biochemical data from blood tests were collected. Results describing a comprehensive impact process evaluation of the showed an inverse correlation between active transport and Ride2School program in metropolitan and regional areas some health outcomes, including cholesterol disorder, risk of in Victoria, Australia. The paper highlights the benefits of diabetes, and risk of obesity. undertaking both qualitative and quantitative methods in AnotherpaperfocusedoncyclingwasthepaperbyN.T. evaluating active transport to school programs that enables R. Romanow et al., which used a case-control study design both measurement and understanding of program impacts. to examine environmental risk factors for bicycling injuries. Finally, the paper by D. Fuller and P. Morency called for They combined data on bicyclist injuries collected by inter- a population approach to transportation planning: reducing views in the emergency department with street-level environ- exposure to motor-vehicles. This paper provided an overview mental audits of injury locations, capturing path, roadway, of Geoffrey Rose’s strategy of preventive medicine applied to safety,landuse,andaestheticcharacteristics.Theyfocused road traffic fatalities and concluded that interventions should on more severe injuries—being struck by