The standard commute could by no means be the identical once more as soon as individuals return to work after lockdown in what is probably going to be an period of social distancing.

It is a significantly massive downside for employees within the UK’s largest cities.

One current report warned that sustaining a 2m (6ft 6in) distance between Tube passengers in London, for instance, would cut back its capability to 15% of regular ranges, and buses to 12%.

But when extra individuals take to the streets, will the highway community cope?

“If in massive cities we’re to have a radical shift to bicycles, scooters, different methods of getting about, that may require a sudden and radical change in highway use,” stated Prof Tony Travers from the London Faculty of Economics.

“You could have to transfer individuals rapidly by streets and the best place to do that’s most important roads. However they’re utilized by buses, taxis, supply autos and different important autos. Altering highway use does not occur rapidly.”

The usage of public transport would additionally want to be staggered, with “rush hour peaks” lasting maybe for five-hour stretches, and areas being allotted, Prof Travers recommended.

Earlier expertise suggests this might not be a simple change to result in.

“Public transport operators have spent a long time making an attempt to get customers to unfold the push hour,” he stated.

“It could be arduous to do that voluntarily. You’ll have to have some extent of individuals, in impact, being allotted slots.”

It could even have knock-on penalties for different features of day by day life.

“Will cafes, bars and eating places want relaxed licensing legal guidelines to allow them to be open for longer? How about mother and father with kids who want to acquire them from faculty?” he stated.

“It has profound implications for the way companies work.”

So – what’s the greatest various?

Electrical scooters

They’re largely banned on UK public roads and pavements, however e-scooter gross sales have doubled year-on-year for Somerset-based retailer Pure Electrical.

It offered 135 e-scooters in a single day final week, and 11,500 final 12 months.

“Electrification is coming – it is a low price, low impression transport,” says chief govt Adam Norris. His agency additionally sells e-bikes.

Mr Norris’s UK-wide best-selling e-scooter is the M365 from Chinese language price range model Xiaomi.

They’ve a velocity cap of 15km/h (10mph) and he suggests they’re ideally suited for journeys of round two to 4 miles, with e-bikes taking a barely longer haul.

E-scooters are a typical sight in lots of cities world wide together with Paris and LA however formally within the UK they’re solely allowed on non-public land.

The federal government was planning a public session prior to the pandemic however campaigners have lengthy warned of the hazards to each pedestrians and riders.

In 2019 TV presenter Emily Hartridge, 35, was driving an electrical scooter when she was killed in a collision with a lorry in south London.

Nevertheless, Mr Norris thinks a change within the regulation is “logical” following the rise in client demand, and he believes that with smart precautions akin to high-vis clothes and newer fashions with bigger wheels to sort out potholes, security could be improved.

“Security is necessary,” he stated. “But when they restrict all e-scooters to the identical velocity as electrical bikes, what is the distinction?”

Analyst Carolina Milanesi, from Inventive Futures, thinks even with the appropriate laws in place, individuals could also be much less probably to need to rent electrical autos, a service supplied by companies like Lime and Chicken.

“I’m not positive if e-bikes and scooters are essentially the way in which individuals will go except they put money into them themselves, fairly than utilizing rent companies which might require them to clear them once they get them,” she stated.

Take your individual automobile

Anthony Eskinazi runs the platform Simply Park, which lets individuals provide their parking areas up for hire. He says the agency is contemplating turning its personal 300 automobile parks into storage for scooters and bikes.

He believes “the steadiness between congestion and comfort” could imply automobile homeowners will not need to use particular person autos for very lengthy as soon as site visitors builds up.

“I feel parking demand will surge after lockdown however it will not be sustainable,” he stated.

“Individuals need an actual various now. If the federal government can facilitate it we will see a growth in micro-mobility.”

Get a cab

By its personal admission, lockdown has proved to be a difficult time for Uber, which says it’s now “making ready for the subsequent section of restoration”.

It’s supplying PPE gloves and masks to all its drivers and is contemplating calls to pay them a small payment in the event that they take day out between passengers to clear their car interiors.

“I do surprise what the impression on Lyft and Uber will be,” stated Carolina Milanesi.

“What will these firms have to disclose to develop belief that the motive force or the passenger is secure?”

Uber may adapt a newly launched driver ID instrument to ask drivers to add selfies to show they’re sporting masks at work, it stated.

The agency can be creating its personal driverless automobile – however it was solely allowed again on the roads in California two months in the past following a deadly crash in 2018.

Drone taxis

If all else fails, how a couple of flying taxi?

You might need issues hailing one. There are 175 drone taxi designs floating round (sorry) however as but no common service in anybody nation.

“I’ve been watching empty buses drive previous for the previous few weeks, and each time I consider how nice it will be to present small-scale public transport with robotic taxis,” says Dr Steve Wright, affiliate professor in aerospace engineering on the College of the West of England.

“I really need these taxis to be flying ones too, however I feel I’m going to have to wait, because the coronavirus might be going to hinder the Evtol [vertical take off and landing] revolution greater than encourage it.

“The meltdown occurring within the airways might be going to drag down the entire aviation trade.”