Nowadays, the use of information and communication technologies (ICT) for mobility management has a large potential to improve services and the use of resources. This concerns all aspects of mobility management: the planning, management and monitoring of fleets, services and staff as well as the customer-orientated services of travel planning, booking scheduling, dispatching, ticket purchase or billing.
So-called “Intelligent Transport Solutions” have a particular potential to make services and connections on the first and last mile more attractive, more economical and more environmentally sustainable.
Under the theme a mobilife technology, the partnership will develop, test and implement pioneering ICT solutions for mobility management. This work involves GMPTE (Greater Manchester, UK ), University of Aberdeen, UK, TraffiQ (Frankfurt/M, DE), Genk, BE, NiO (Offenbach/DE), Pays de la Loire Region, FR, Pirmasens, SPT (Strathclyde/ Glasgow, UK) and CEPS/Instead, Differdange, LU. The scope of partner activities by ranges from:
Mobility management is at the heart of the low carbon future. Whilst globally significant nations are racing to set the target to meet reductions in greenhouse gas emissions from transport by 2050, technology and travel demand reduction are thought to be the ultimate solutions. However, it is less clear how this will fit with the current and projected demand of travel.
The research question of this study is to gain insights into how Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS) and Information and Communication Technology (ICT) can be used to promote mobility management over the next 25 years using the North West European region as a case study. The detailed objective is to have a better understanding on how ITS/ICT can contribute to improve the (so-called) ‘first and last miles’ of local journeys thus reducing the “mobility gap”.
A questionnaire methodology is used to capture four objectives; current experience of ITS/ICT procurement/deployment/evaluation; future technology requirements; consideration of a variety of future technology scenarios; and anticipated challenges in achieving the future requirements. Local authorities, public transport operators and transport consultancies are the major respondents across 7 North West European nations. The analysis shows that the Public transport (management) and Environment ITS policy themes are the stated top priorities to play a role in improving mobility gaps across different organisation types. Real-time information that reflects the importance individuals place on time was highlighted as the key aspect that all stakeholders wish to address. Furthermore, the trends of first and last mile solutions in different regions may differ to meet local needs.
It may be concluded, however, given the need to address the social exclusion issue and the trend of an ageing population with high life expectancy, that Demand Responsive Transport (DRT) has particular potential to address mobility gaps in the wider context.
In the jointly developed Transnational Competence Center the European partnership provides services and solutions covering the four mobilife themes.
