The answer, reinforced throughout the Strategy, is to "encourage more people to walk, to cycle and to utilise public transport so that they are less car reliant."

The strategy of getting people out of cars and onto public transport is not new, having started in the 1960s. The strategy was combined in the 1970s with the concept of "transport oriented development" (TOD) intended to solve another perceived problem, low density urban "sprawl".

The idea was that re-designing cities to create compact high density settlements along public transport corridors would solve the twin problems of urban sprawl and excessive car use. Despite the adoption of TOD by countless municipal authorities it has never succeeded in achieving its aims. Car use and low density settlement have continued in all cities in all countries.

For example, the proportion of households in the Launceston urban area having no car declined from 11.6 per cent in 2001 to 8.7 per cent in 2016, while those with two or more vehicles increased from 43.3 per cent to 50.8 per cent. During that time Launceston's population increased 12.8 per cent. Of that growth, 93.1 per cent accrued to low density outer suburbs.

Riverside/Legana, Mowbray/Newnham, Prospect/Prospect Vale and Youngtown together accounted for more than two-thirds of Launceston's growth, despite having only one third of its population.

It is said that the definition of insanity is saying the same thing over again and expecting a different outcome.

So why do planning professionals and the authorities they advise keep repeating the same old formula without any credible evidence that it works? The fundamental reason is that planners and governments ignore changing urban travel behaviour.

Since the 1950s all countries have experienced a radical shift in employment from primary and secondary industries to fast growing service industries. Professional and para-professional occupations now dominate employment.

Because service employment is gender neutral the transition has led to a massive increase into the paid workforce of women, especially those with dependent children.

In 2001 women made up 46.3 per cent of the Launceston workforce. By 2016 the proportion had increased to 49 per cent.

In modern societies work commitments along with home and family responsibilities are shared (although not equally) by men and women. Typically, daily activities need to be accomplished within the few hours available between leaving home in the morning to returning in late afternoon.

Activities are scattered across the urban landscape yet most are subject to tight time constraints. Julie needs to be at soccer practice by 4pm. Johnny has a dentist appointment at 4.45pm, Dad has to be checked to see how his health is, and food has to be bought for tonight's dinner.

Accomplishing complex travel patterns requires the use of personal transport, which for the vast majority of people means the car.

Public transport is not a substitute for personal automobility because of necessity it is restricted to points on a line (stops along the route) and is available only intermittently at times determined by timetables.

It lacks the time-space flexibility of the car to cover all points in an area at all times.

The draft Strategy aims to restrict car parking and prioritise buses over cars in the central business district, despite the very low ratio of bus to car passengers.

The policy, if implemented, would accelerate the shift of shopping and employment to the growing regional centres and hasten the decline of the CBD.

The anti-car prescriptions of the draft Strategy ignore the economic benefits of car use, not only on a daily basis but over time.

Cars have been directly responsible for the three great socio-economic revolutions of the post-WW2 period.

Cars enabled families to escape dense inner city living and choose more desirable residential sites on hillslopes, along the river front and, importantly, on cheaper land at the urban fringes. Cars enabled women to enter the workforce and combine work commitments with home and family responsibilities.

And, more recently, cars have enabled elderly people to live more socially, physically and mentally active lives and to defer age-related illnesses such as isolation and dementia. People are not fools. They know what activities they have to do each day and the best way of achieving them in the limited time available.

The LCC and its planners need to accept that car use is here to stay as the dominant mode of transport. They should plan for a liveable and loveable Launceston based on that fundamental reality.