You step out of the house and hear people laughing and birds chirping. From there, you walk across a green space. You're intersected by a bike path, with many people gliding along on two wheels. At the next corner, you get on the bus that is just arriving. Although there are many people on the road at this time of day, you find a seat because there are enough buses. The e-bus quietly drives through the streets and drops you off in front of your office. On the way home, you get off in front of the supermarket and do your shopping. Since your bags are heavy, you rent one of the cargo bikes via an app. While you cycle home on the wide bike path, small electric vehicles transporting goods pass you on a narrow lane.
This - or something like it - is what mobility could look like in the climate-neutral city of the future, where combustion engines and private cars have become largely superfluous thanks to optimised public transport, a convenient cycling infrastructure, electrified sharing fleets and intelligent logistics. In rural areas, too, cars could be made dispensable in many places, with seamless and comfortable local transport available in the form of buses, trains, on-demand vehicles and autonomous minibuses.
We explore how this vision can become a reality and which role digital technologies play in the process.
Let's rewind to the present. Each new report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) calls for effective climate protection measures with increasing urgency, as we already live in a +1.2-degree world. Any further delay will lead to an additional rise in temperature. However, a look at different sectors clearly shows that, besides industry, transport is proving particularly resistant to reducing its CO2 emissions.
The transport sector, still mainly driven by fossil fuels, is one of the largest emitters of CO2 in Germany and contributes to around 20 percent of emissions. In 2019 alone, cars and the like were responsible for over 160 million tonnes of greenhouse gases. This is mainly attributable to emission-intensive transport means like cars and trucks, which cause almost all CO2 emissions related to road traffic.
This means we pay a high price to get from A to B and transport our goods. Not only are we fuelling the climate catastrophe, but we are also tolerating air pollution, noise, and high land consumption for parking spaces, roads and motorways. This determined by the German Advisory Council on the Environment (SRU) in its first report exactly 50 years ago.
According to the Climate Protection Act, greenhouse gas emissions from transport in Germany must fall to 85 million tonnes of CO2 by 2030. This means almost halving emissions in the next seven years. The European Parliament even calls for a 60 percent reduction by 2030 and the Federal Environment Agency recommends that CO2 emissions in Germany be reduced by at least 70 percent by 2030. Furthermore, the emissions must continue to be reduced from there, falling to zero by 2045, so that Germany becomes greenhouse gas neutral – as stipulated in the Climate Protection Act.
According to the 2022 Climate Protection Report, however, it is foreseeable that the targets of the Climate Protection Act will be missed by a large margin in the transport sector – unless something changes quickly.
First and foremost, this includes avoiding traffic by shifting to climate-friendly means of transport such as rail, public transport and cycling. Secondly, traffic must be handled in a more climate-friendly and efficient way such as low-CO2 electromobility and intelligent transport systems. Third, strong local infrastructure that allows for short-distance travel should be prioritised.
For the mobility transition to gain momentum, consistent political action and a social rethink are needed, as mobility expert and activist Katja Diehl emphasises in an interview with RESET.
In the implementation of the various measures, as in many other areas, digitalisation is playing an increasingly important role.
When it comes to shifting traffic to rail, public transport and cycling, promoting low-CO2 transmission, managing the transport system more intelligently, and enabling short-distance urban transit, digital innovations are playing an increasingly important role in the transport sector.
One approach for a more attractive, sustainable public transport system is to combine the comfort of individual transport with the advantages of local public transport. On the one hand, this includes planning based on actual demand. If there is a lot of traffic, larger vehicles will run at closer intervals; if there is little traffic, smaller vehicles will be sent out at adapted intervals. On the other hand, passengers must be provided with information that is important for their journey and easily accessible. Will the bus be on time? Are there enough seats in the next vehicle, and will the bicycle still fit?
The prerequisite for this is that the important data for this information is collected and made available. With the help of artificial intelligence (AI), among other things, it is already possible to create accurate forecasts of occupancy in public transport.
Within the framework of NV-ProVI, a project between Stadtwerke Gießen and the data analysts at Brodtmann Consulting, for example, an AI-based algorithm was developed to generate forecasts for public transport in real-time using GPS data from buses and trains, timetables, route networks, historical data, weather data, and information about holidays and major events.
In addition to various traffic and real-time data, movement data will also be of interest for optimised planning and forecasting. However, as these can reveal a lot about people, they should be handled very carefully.
In rural areas, life without a car is hardly possible today. The way to work, to the doctor, or simply to shops cannot be done in 10 minutes by bike, and many remote areas are inadequately or not at all connected to public transport. For the approximately 30 million people who live in rural regions in Germany and whose share of total passenger transport is about 37 percent, switching to public transport is challenging.
On-demand shuttle services are now being tested in many places to bridge the divide between shared public transport and individual car journeys. One of the largest projects in Europe is On-Demand Mobility for the Frankfurt/Rhine-Main region, which aims to reduce CO2 emissions in transport by filling gaps in public transport services with zero-emission vehicles. Route- and timetable-independent transport is organised through a digital platform. Passengers can book the appropriate route via an app, and the software behind it takes care of ridepooling, which combines the requests of different passengers for similar routes.
Autonomous vehicles have potential in local public transport as small, driverless shuttle buses could help to massively expand local networks.
Various pilot projects are already testing the possibilities. In Darmstadt and in the district of Offenbach, a pilot operation will start in May 2023. Deutsche Bahn, the Rhein-Main-Verkehrsverbund (RMV), and local transport companies will send automated shuttles on the road, which, equipped with camera and sensor technology, will direct on-demand operations.
Automated vehicles hold great promise for driving more efficiently and saving energy compared to traditional cars. However, the energy consumption associated with automation and vehicle networking has been largely overlooked (as noted in SustAIn Magazine). According to a study by Agora Verkehrswende, the potential of automation can only be realized if these vehicles are used collectively and integrated into public transport, replacing passenger cars. To minimise additional energy consumption, efficient components should be selected and big data analysis processes employed to keep data transmission to a minimum.
Carpooling is another way to fill gaps in public transport and reduce CO2 emissions from individual car journeys. In any case, there is not enough space for additional passengers in most cars: in the EU, the average car carries less than two people. But with each additional passenger, the journey becomes more CO2-efficient. Regular carpooling in particular can therefore significantly reduce the negative impact of the mobility sector on our environment and, in the long run, even make owning a car obsolete.
New car-sharing platforms, such as PENDLA, are emerging as a solution. This crowd-based carpooling platform is designed for districts, cities and municipalities to facilitate the formation of regular carpools. Drivers can add their routes to the platform, which automatically compares them with those of other users to find the best match. The app then displays the matched routes on a map. PENDLA is specifically tailored for regular rides, allowing riders to choose the days of the week they drive the route and enabling other users to join these rides on a regular basis.
Simulations have long been crucial in managing traffic flows in cities. They inform when traffic lights should turn green and guide the placement of important traffic signs and overall road organisation. Furthermore, simulations can aid in reducing CO2 emissions.
The German project with the somewhat unwieldy name KI4LSA, for example, is developing AI for optimising traffic flow. The technology is designed to help passengers get from A to B faster, reduce road noise and, most importantly, reduce air pollution. The technology is designed to autonomously learn strategies to optimise traffic flow in real time and improve over time. The data collected is then made available as open data, which means that theoretically the whole world could use this technology.
Applications like these have the potential to decrease transport emissions. However, it is yet to be determined whether they will only make driving more convenient, which could lead to increased demand, or if they will truly reduce CO2 emissions in significant amounts.
Bicycles and e-bikes are the most environmentally-friendly mode of transportation when it comes to CO2 emissions and noise. The increased usage of two-wheelers directly improves air quality in cities, reduces traffic congestion, and frees up space previously reserved for cars, enabling other activities. Digital solutions like bike-sharing and rental systems, navigation, and route-planning apps make cycling more convenient and accessible.
For instance, Bike Citizens strives to integrate bike-friendly route planning with better infrastructure for two-wheelers. The navigation app displays cycle-friendly routes, and the data voluntarily recorded by users helps to better comprehend cycling. The objective is to equip cities and municipalities with the necessary knowledge to optimise cycling.
Hamburg's PrioBike has a different approach: its app aims to create a green wave for cyclists. "In a sense, the app generates a 'pseudo green wave': if cyclists adjust their speed based on the app's recommendations, they can enjoy a type of green wave within certain limits," says Sven Fröhlich, who leads the project at TU Dresden. The app's speed recommendations are based on a forecast that combines data from traffic light circuits, information about the current traffic situation, and the position and speed of the cyclists.
Achieving climate-neutral mobility requires embracing electromobility, but adoption of electric vehicles has been slow in many countries. Apart from the lack of political incentives, doubts about the range and availability of charging options have contributed to this. New digital solutions aim to address these issues by mapping charging stations and making it easier to plan routes for electric vehicles.
The apps Plugsurfing and PlugShare, for example, not only show free charging stations that are suitable for one's vehicle, but also provide information on how reliable and convenient a station is. Likewise, concepts like Monta's lay the foundation for a scalable and sustainable charging infrastructure. The open-source app and platform is a B2B software solution for companies that want to offer charging options for e-mobility on their business premises.
Bicycle couriers have become the norm for pizza delivery in most major German cities, with many food and parcel delivery services also turning to cargo bikes or small, electric pedal-powered vehicles to deliver packages. These modes of transport are ideal for navigating narrow streets and busy city centres, saving time and resources by avoiding traffic jams and the search for parking spaces. Compared to cars, cargo bikes produce only one-tenth of the emissions, making them a sustainable and efficient option, particularly for last-mile logistics.
To support cargo bike delivery in urban areas, the SmartRadL project is developing an innovative software solution. The route planning software is specifically designed for delivery bike transport and continuously connects riders to the delivery management system. With real-time updates, the route plan can be quickly adjusted to accommodate new shipments.
But what about long-distance transport? In Germany, this is mainly carried out by road. Of course, the first priority should be to shift goods transport from road to rail and to switch to e-trucks. Compared to a truck, a goods train requires only about 20 percent of the energy per tonne-kilometre and produces only about 25 percent of its climate-damaging emissions, according to Agora Verkehrswende.
Digital solutions have the potential to increase the efficiency of rail transport by leveraging automation and data analysis to optimize capacity utilization and integrating freight transport with passenger transport. The CargoSurfer project aims to develop and implement a platform for brokering freight capacities, which will also include an AI-based forecasting tool to ensure the timely delivery of goods by optimizing transport connections.
If the so-called "freight on transit" concept works, existing infrastructure would be much better utilised and even remote places in rural areas could be integrated into the already existing public transport network.
Simply enter your starting point and destination into your phone, and the app will provide you with the best route based on your preferences – whether that be the quickest, most comfortable or most environmentally friendly option. The route may include walking, cycling, public transport, or even an on-demand shuttle depending on what is available. Real-time traffic information will also be displayed on the screen. The goal is to move from A to B using a variety of transportation options rather than relying solely on owning a personal vehicle. This concept is called Mobility-as-a-Service.
Mobility-as-a-Service works by using traffic and real-time data like GPS data from buses and trains, timetables, route networks and traffic reports. These data sources are linked together using digital tools and platforms. This creates an optimised and situational mobility experience where public transport is still a primary mode of transportation, but also integrates other regional services.
When different mobility services work in sync, users can experience seamless movement without worrying about traffic jams or parking. This integration can also lead to a reduction in transport-related CO2 emissions, less noise and air pollution, and more public space for everyone.
stadtnavi is a great example of how multiple sustainable transport options can be connected seamlessly to help people reach their destinations. It links various modes of transportation available in the Herrenberg region, enabling residents to plan and execute multimodal journeys with ease. Jana Zieger, who is in charge of the project, highlights that combining several eco-friendly transport options can save significant travel time. Apart from route planning, stadtnavi also provides location-specific details like the nearest bike station, ride-sharing options, availability of rental bikes, and cargo bikes.
Furthermore, creating and running a mobility app can serve as a tool for local authorities to handle the intricacy of their own mobility data. This includes analyzing the quality and availability of existing data, generating missing data, and utilizing newly acquired data to support eco-friendly transportation solutions.
There are already several municipalities and regions that have adopted their own mobility platforms inspired by stadtnavi Herrenberg. Additionally, many major cities have their own public transport companies that offer mobility apps like Jelbi in Berlin or Switchh in Hamburg. However, there are many other models as well, and the field is constantly evolving with many more platforms being developed and planned. According to Zieger, it's a very dynamic field with a lot of movement.
Digitalization is important for the mobility transition, but it raises questions about data protection and sustainability. The hardware and software required for digital mobility solutions consume resources and energy. Therefore, it's important to ensure that digitalization is pursued in a sustainable and responsible manner.
As the transportation system becomes increasingly automated and interconnected, it becomes more important to address questions related to data ownership, processing, and protection. Transparent and responsible data management is crucial to ensure the trust and acceptance of users. At the same time, easy access to data can foster innovation and the development of new mobility services.
To ensure trust and acceptance of users, it is crucial to have transparency in the processing of personal data for both manufacturers and operators. This can be achieved by providing easily understandable information to users about the data collected and its intended use, and allowing users to decide which data they release. Privacy by default, which includes data protection-oriented default settings, can make this possible. By implementing such measures, the goal of fostering innovation and new mobility services can be achieved while ensuring data privacy and protection.
Anonymisation or pseudonymisation procedures can be used to process data in a way that allows larger data sets to be collected without violating data protection laws' principle of data economy. This approach is also recommended by Agora Verkehrswende for big data applications.
The freemove project, funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), is looking at possible technical solutions for anonymising movement data, such as differential privacy. With this procedure, information can be published while maintaining privacy without encrypting it. For this purpose, the data is provided with "noise" so that no clear statements can be made about certain properties of the data.
Having a good data basis is crucial for new digital solutions, but data availability and quality in Germany can still be a challenge, especially for small municipalities and projects. While the Mobilithek of the Federal Ministry of Digital Affairs and Transport (BMDV) makes some traffic data openly available, it can be costly to ensure good and machine-readable quality. Additionally, open and free access to data for everyone is still not a common practice.
An open data law has been proposed by Agora Verkehrswende to improve data availability and quality for digital solutions in transportation. Such a law would establish regulations for disclosing data in standardized formats and ensuring its availability through an online portal.
Furthermore, municipalities and cities can benefit from the progress made by others if mobility apps and other applications are made available as open source without license fees and can be replicated and improved upon. Despite the success of stadtnavi Herrenberg and similar projects, open source applications remain uncommon in the transportation sector.
Reducing the environmental footprint of digital tools and services is crucial, and can be achieved through various means such as using efficient devices and algorithms, and sourcing renewable energies for development and operation. Policymakers play a critical role in setting the appropriate framework conditions and promoting the development of sustainable devices, as well as improving recycling processes.
At the same time, it is important to digitalise moderately ("as much as necessary, as little as possible") and to weigh the actual impact against the use of resources. The example of autonomous driving shows what is at stake: as already mentioned, autonomous minibuses are seen as a possible solution to promote environmentally friendly mobility in rural areas. However, autonomous driving only works through the use of many sensors and algorithms. In order to be able to assess the actual impact, it is therefore necessary to realistically evaluate how environmentally friendly the AI integrated in them and the resource consumption of the vehicles really are, as Andreas Meyer, research associate at the Distributed Artificial Intelligence Laboratory of the TU Berlin, states. To this end, the question must also be answered to what extent emissions are actually reduced by the new service because car journeys are eliminated or whether the resource consumption of the minibuses actually causes even more emissions.
Answers to many of these questions have yet to be found, as the resource consumption of digital applications is still not consistently included in impact analyses.
If the mobility transition, which is so urgent for effective climate protection, is to succeed, the essential measures must be implemented quickly. Digitalisation in particular can play an important role in this:
The Mobility-as-a-Service (MaaS) approach makes our smartphone the most important tool and navigator for diverse alternative mobility options. With apps that link public transport with cycling and ridesharing services, we can quickly find the fastest routes in real time. Our digital footprint also provides valuable data for creating and developing new mobility services, as well as for effective transport research and planning. In logistics, the digital networking of all road and rail-based modes of transport in a communicative system will lead to new solutions for reducing CO2 emissions. This will not only enable the seamless management of complex transport chains across different modes of transport but also promote more efficient use of existing structures.
Despite the availability and growing use of various mobility solutions, such as the ones mentioned earlier, the reduction of CO2 emissions in the transportation sector has been minimal in recent years. The number of internal combustion vehicles on our roads has not decreased, and the expansion of the rail network and public transport has not been substantial. Therefore, it is evident that the necessary transformation is not just a matter of knowledge but also a challenge of implementation.
Therefore, a strong policy is needed to create a framework for a successful mobility transition. This policy should include instruments to limit car traffic and reduce emissions, such as consistent parking space management, taxes and levies on combustion engines, CO2 charges, speed limits, and the expansion of rail and local public transport. In addition, specific funding programs and practical projects that promote new and innovative mobility solutions should be encouraged. Strengthening new alliances of actors that involve politics, administration, private sector, civil society, and science is also essential. Such cooperation can lead to the development of new, integrated solutions and achieve broad support and acceptance for the necessary changes.
At the same time, it is important to explore all possibilities for a rapid transformation and rethinking. As the example of stadtnavi shows, municipalities and cities can set an important course for the mobility transition on site by promoting intelligent solutions themselves. Companies can initiate the mobility transition by implementing sustainable concepts such as e-fleets, charging stations in car parks or ridesharing apps for their employees. Citizens have the opportunity to initiate sustainable digital mobility concepts in house communities and cooperatives, such as digitally supported cargo bike and car sharing.
Digitalisation is transforming the entire transportation sector, and we are only at the early stages of this transformation. The rapid advancement of automation, increasing networking, and the emergence of new collaborative mobility solutions will undoubtedly trigger further changes in mobility behaviour and the transportation system. However, given the challenges posed by digital transformation in transportation, it is clear that this process must be actively shaped by policy-makers to become the sustainable mobility of the future.
" ["post_title"]=> string(72) "Mobility Transition: The Multimodal and Interconnected Way of the Future" ["post_excerpt"]=> string(176) "What will climate-neutral mobility look like in the future? What digital solutions are ready for a systematic mobility transition? And how do we get there? Let's take a look..." ["post_status"]=> string(7) "publish" ["comment_status"]=> string(6) "closed" ["ping_status"]=> string(6) "closed" ["post_password"]=> string(0) "" ["post_name"]=> string(71) "mobility-transition-the-multimodal-and-interconnected-way-of-the-future" ["to_ping"]=> string(0) "" ["pinged"]=> string(0) "" ["post_modified"]=> string(19) "2025-02-28 12:02:17" ["post_modified_gmt"]=> string(19) "2025-02-28 10:02:17" ["post_content_filtered"]=> string(0) "" ["post_parent"]=> int(0) ["guid"]=> string(27) "https://reset.org/?p=107825" ["menu_order"]=> int(0) ["post_type"]=> string(4) "post" ["post_mime_type"]=> string(0) "" ["comment_count"]=> string(1) "0" ["filter"]=> string(3) "raw" } [1]=> object(WP_Post)#6711 (24) { ["ID"]=> int(113573) ["post_author"]=> string(5) "21514" ["post_date"]=> string(19) "2024-08-19 07:03:00" ["post_date_gmt"]=> string(19) "2024-08-19 05:03:00" ["post_content"]=> string(11174) "Armed with a borrowed tent, a hastily stuffed rucksack and my weekend’s diet of crisps, snack bars, crackers and a few token vitamins in the form of dried fruit, I left my apartment for Berlin Südkreuz station. I was on my way to Melt Festival, located at the Ferropolis near Gräfenhainichen in Saxony-Anhalt. One S-Bahn, one regional train, another S-Bahn and one shuttle bus later, I’d arrived at the festival grounds.
Later in the evening, I recounted this journey to Hatim, a helping hand of the Crowd Impact team who was at Melt surveying how people arrived at the festival. He recorded my answers on his iPad, before showing me the climate impact of my journey. Based on the assumption that I’d use the same travel method for my return home after the festival, my round trip would be 278km and emit 16.7kg of CO2.
This data isn’t just useful for me to know; Melt will use all the data that Crowd Impact collects to calculate their overall CO2 emissions. When it comes to festivals and events, the biggest climate impact by far is the journey of attendees. (The exact figure is contested but, according to a report by A Greener Future, lies at 41 percent of all carbon emissions.) By providing in-depth data, Crowd Impact gives festivals insights into what information and solutions they can offer festival-goers to incentivise them to make a more climate-friendly journey. Meanwhile, the data Crowd Impact collects is also part of a larger research project, “ECO2CONCERT”, in which festival organisers and research institutions collaborate to analyse both mobility and energy emissions of festivals.
Crowd Impact screenshots
After finishing my survey with Hatim, I caught up with Crowd Impact Co-Founder Laura Kleber to ask how their work was going. It had been a tricky start: there had been a thunderstorm earlier that day that had stopped them from surveying, and they were trying to meet their target of surveying a certain number of attendees. “10 percent is gold, really, really good,” Kleber told me. “But my dream today is to get to eight percent.” Anything above five percent gives a usable data set that can provide valuable insights.
I asked Kleber what barriers there were that stopped people from choosing sustainable transport options. “It’s way more convenient to take a car,” she explained, “because people have so much stuff to carry. Especially if there’s no supermarket at the festival site, as they want to drink cheap beer at the festival [and don’t want to carry that by train].” She also pointed out that “German infrastructure is really lacking, especially in rural areas.” With festivals in rural areas, “you don’t always have good public transport connections, and when people come from rural areas themselves the only choice is to take the car.”
What I hadn’t realised before chatting to people at Melt was just how far people had come for the festival. A staple of the international techno scene—that’s now ending after 27 years—Melt attracts attendees from everywhere from Ireland to Israel. Crowd Impact Co-Founder Julian Vogels told me he’d surveyed a group of 13 people who had flown from Sydney to come to Melt. Later that night, I heard a hubbub of Australian accents and quickly turned around to ask the group whether they were the same people Vogels had surveyed. They seemed confused by my question of whether they were a specific group of Australians. “Mate, there’s so many Aussies here!” one of them barked. “Probably 10 percent of the festival.” I’d advise taking that statistic with a pinch of salt—but either way, that’s a hell of a lot of CO2 emissions for some techno.
Another misconception I had was that my journey by train was the most sustainable way to travel to Melt from Berlin. But Vogels explained to me that the Bassliner, a shuttle bus that transports people from Berlin’s main stations directly into the festival grounds, emits less CO2 than the combination of trains I took. “A percentage of regional trains are still diesel-based,” he pointed out. The S-Bahn also stops and starts frequently, using carbon each time it does so. Meanwhile, every seat on the Bassliner is usually occupied (I can attest to this, given they were all sold out when I optimistically tried to book a ticket on Friday morning). So while its engine is bigger than that of a car, the diesel it uses is split between around fifty people.
Once Crowd Impact has provided a festival with data on their CO2 emissions, they can use this to set up measures that will incentivise people to travel more sustainably. As Kleber explained, a festival supermarket is a no-brainer. If the data shows that lots of people are arriving from one location, the festival can consider offering a shuttle bus from there to the festival grounds (though no matter how many attendees arrive from Sydney, a shuttle bus is hardly a solution for our friends from down-under). And if many people are travelling in cars with only one or two people in them, offering reduced parking costs for those with full cars would incentivise people to look for ride-shares.
While this can currently be done on Facebook or Telegram groups, Kleber points out that an event-focused ride-share platform would also make it more feasible for people to reduce their CO2 emissions by sharing cars. And while Crowd Impact has a blog post summarising their suggestions for climate-friendly incentives, they are planning to add automated suggestions to their app that will give festivals recommendations on what measures to put in place based on the data they’ve collected.
Kleber also adds that “communication plays a really big role in incentivising people to travel more sustainably.” Crowd Impact discovered that people who were informed about sustainable travel created 19 percent fewer emissions than those who weren’t. In collaboration with The Changency, Crowd Impact conducted a research project called Ticket To Ride which analysed 10 concerts from a German band. Their research revealed that when the band themselves asked their fans to travel to the gig sustainably, this had a big impact on reducing CO2 emissions. But, as Kleber points out, “It’s easier with a band than a festival because people have even more of an emotional bond with them.” Regardless, clear information about sustainability measures in all festival communications would surely help attendees make more climate-friendly choices.
Besides focusing on the journeys of attendees, festivals should also be expanding sustainable initiatives to other areas of festival organisation. DGTL in Amsterdam sets a positive example with its plant-based, waste-free food court, while Green Gathering in the UK is run on 100 percent renewable power.
As for Crowd Impact, the data they’ve collected for ECO2CONCERT will help the research project progress towards its end goal of “[building] a platform for festivals to help them improve their CO2 emissions and energy consumption.” In the meantime, their app will continue popping up wherever there’s a crowd, reducing the CO2 of festivals one survey at a time.
" ["post_title"]=> string(99) "Crowd Impact Reduces Festivals’ CO2 Emissions by Providing Data on Attendees’ Transport Choices" ["post_excerpt"]=> string(228) "The journey to a festival site is the biggest contributor to a festival’s CO2 emissions. Crowd Impact surveys attendees on how they arrived, giving festivals data they can use to incentivise more sustainable transport choices." ["post_status"]=> string(7) "publish" ["comment_status"]=> string(6) "closed" ["ping_status"]=> string(6) "closed" ["post_password"]=> string(0) "" ["post_name"]=> string(93) "crowd-impact-reduces-festivals-co2-emissions-by-providing-data-on-attendees-transport-choices" ["to_ping"]=> string(0) "" ["pinged"]=> string(0) "" ["post_modified"]=> string(19) "2025-01-09 14:50:04" ["post_modified_gmt"]=> string(19) "2025-01-09 12:50:04" ["post_content_filtered"]=> string(0) "" ["post_parent"]=> int(0) ["guid"]=> string(27) "https://reset.org/?p=113573" ["menu_order"]=> int(0) ["post_type"]=> string(4) "post" ["post_mime_type"]=> string(0) "" ["comment_count"]=> string(1) "0" ["filter"]=> string(3) "raw" } [2]=> object(WP_Post)#6686 (24) { ["ID"]=> int(107157) ["post_author"]=> string(5) "21506" ["post_date"]=> string(19) "2024-07-12 09:09:00" ["post_date_gmt"]=> string(19) "2024-07-12 07:09:00" ["post_content"]=> string(20593) "Katja Diehl is a prominent moderator and keynote speaker on the topic of mobility in Germany. She published the book "Autokorrektur — Mobilität für eine lebenswerte Welt" (Car Correction — Mobility for a Livable World) and is a guest researcher at the WZB Berlin. She advises, among others, the Austrian Climate Protection Minister Leonore Gewessler and Transport Minister Winfried Hermann in the German state of Baden-Württemberg.
For Diehl, it is clear that a real mobility turnaround can't be achieved without turning away from motorised individual transport. In this interview, we talked to her about what we can all gain from a future without cars, how we can get there and where digital technologies can help.
Katja: By looking at mobility in a way that is completely detached from means of transport, I first try to question how we could become so dependent on cars. We ourselves have created the situation in Germany in which 49 million cars move around for 45 minutes a day on average, so reducing this is a huge opportunity. In a positive sense, I believe that behind the cars lies paradise, in rural areas as well as in the city. I would like to create livable spaces and give them back to the people.
I believe that mobility, as it stands today, has simply centred cars for too long. People don't drive cars because they are car fanatics or because they like driving but because society does not offer them an alternative. Safety, accessibility and affordability are key.
I think we live in a car ideology. The car has been elevated to a pedestal that it simply does not deserve. The transport sector under Volker Wissing is even recording rising emissions. We have the Paris climate goals, the Climate Protection Act and the Federal Constitutional Court, which has said that you must not do anything that harms future generations—it's outrageous that a sector can escalate like this. 61 percent of CO2 emissions in the transport sector come from private cars. But it is precisely these that we are not addressing. We are beating around the bush. The transport sector should be reducing its emissions 14 times faster than it's doing now.
Let's take a look at Austria, where I accompany the climate protection minister in the advisory council. Two and a half years ago, she began looking at all major construction projects. She and her ministry took a year to do this and worked together with scientists, deciding that a motorway and a tunnel wouldn't be built because the CO2 targets would then be missed.
I think it's a small minority that are very loud. There is the so-called revolving door effect. That's what you call it when people go from politics to industry and back again. This also happens a lot in the field of mobility which has certain complications.
This must change. But right now, change is being refused and we've taken the wrong path economically.
I see the biggest opportunity right on our doorstep, which is to look for people like myself who want to change things, become climate resilient and save CO2. I have received letters from people who say that they have been demanding cycle paths in rural areas for ten years so that their children can get to school. I think being vocal about that is the right way to go.
We should of course be science- and fact-based, but I think we have been too polite for too long. How are we going to be convinced by facts? For example, simply cycling to school with children protected as a group as Kidical Mass. These are great pictures, nobody says they don't want that. The ideas are all there already. We have lost so much that we can get back. I see so many opportunities to create something beautiful.
We need new stories, definitely. For example, if people always say that (Berlin's) Friedrichstraße was closed, then I would say, no, Friedrichstraße was opened up for people who can now also use the street. Or also to say, a car park is something for me that has trees, that is green. Today's car park is mainly a car parking or storage area.
And maybe I also need to question which narratives I adopt and why I accept that I need a holiday twice a year because the city stresses me out so much. But where does the stress come from? Of course, I must like living with many people in a small space. But the stress also comes from traffic, because it robs us of space. I always invite people to tell other stories and say, there's a lot to gain. The loss is far too small compared to the gain we could have.
Reducing emissions quickly is only possible with a determined policy like Austria's, which clearly states their goal, written into the treaty, that they want to be climate neutral by a certain date. So far, we haven't managed to do that in Germany.
I think it is important that we also recognise that many people do not understand the climate catastrophe because they have the feeling that if it were really that serious, politicians would do completely different things. We're giving people a false illusion of security.
The first rule of the transport turnaround is: to avoid and shorten journeys. The second rule is to shift journeys from air to train, and the third rule is to make an improvement through digital measures. If we digitise the current system, mobility will remain lacking because it will exclude a lot of people who use wheelchairs and can't get on a bus because it has steps. But digitalisation can help with accessibility.
I already see many good examples, such as shuttle systems. You don't have to build stops but there is a virtual stop which is much easier to find if you are guided there. That's where mobility comes to you, so to speak. The opportunities are definitely there but all that is only as good as the foundations we create.
There are so many details about this platform economy that worry me. I would like to have a European solution where I am sure that the data is in good hands and that good mobility is also designed with it.
In my vision of Hamburg, I walk out the door and see someone I know across the street. We sit down on a bench and chat for a while, then we drop by the exchange house, bring books there and pick up new ones. There are clothes, lettuce and tomatoes growing in a patch. The area in front of my house is a shared space, maybe there are still a few autonomous cars that are shared, for people who transport things or have disabilities. But actually, muscle mobility is way out in front. I definitely hear children's laughter and other sounds that I don't hear at all in the city today and everything I need is within walking or cycling distance of me.
Then I get on the train and get off at my parents' house in the countryside. My parents don't have to pick me up, there are good cycle paths and I get on with my little folding bike. When I visit acquaintances who live in really rural areas, they no longer have three cars either, but one car that is relatively small and charged with electricity from their own photovoltaic system.
Beyond this car, they find many other forms of mobility and there is again a local supply. There are small supermarkets or a supermarket bus, and perhaps also libraries that run along there. Many things have simply been thought of differently, in such a way that people can actually grow old in rural areas and continue to be mobile. The quality of life has increased incredibly, and above all, the quality of life of people is greater than that of cars.
I think digital technologies can, as they say, nudge you. In other words, they can nudge you to do things differently and come up with other ideas. For example, digital technology could know that someone never rides a bike and then offer that person a voucher for the Stadtrad Hamburg (Hamburg's bike-sharing system). I think that's what the 9-Euro-Ticket showed. People who always thought that it would take them a long time to get to their place of work by public transport realised that this was not true at all. And perhaps they realised: I can sit in a vehicle and read, listen to music or close my eyes again. I gain time for myself because I don't have to hold the steering wheel.
Yes, digitalisation can also help to uncover mobility gaps. When navigation systems are analysed, you can see, for example, that there is only automobility in a place before six o'clock. What is the reason for that? The bus doesn't leave until six, so maybe we need a call bus system in the time before six. Many routes are simply routine, such as the way to work, and digital systems can offer assistance in planning new services. But the digital system could also withdraw options based on lower demand so there aren't empty diesel buses running routes. For me, simply optimising this is the great added value of digital technologies.
Yes, that quickly brings us to a system change question. That is also the problem with the mobility transition. It's also about a social transformation. We definitely have to change our consumption, because if we continue to order as much online as we do now, we'll be dealing with dead cities. We also need retail as something worth living for and we should definitely strengthen regional consumption.
I would want to shift logistics as a whole to rail. Unfortunately, we have ruined that. After German reunification alone, 4,000 kilometres of rail disappeared. The network has shrunk by 14 percent in recent years—even though passenger numbers and rail freight traffic are increasing.
And things can also be rethought in logistics. Why not have a parcel box delivered somewhere once a week? Why shouldn't it move autonomously overnight? If you think about distribution to consumers, i.e. supermarket logistics and so on, this could also be done at night with electric trucks, which are automatically quieter vehicles. But I'm also thinking of things we've already had, such as the postal bus in rural areas to move passengers and goods.
Whether by car, train, ship or plane, the movement of people and goods always causes emissions. The transport sector, currently mainly driven by fossil fuels, has increased its carbon dioxide emissions by 24 percent since 1990. In 2022 alone, transport was responsible for around 760 million tonnes of greenhouse gases in the EU, 60 percent of which came from cars and motorcycles.
The effects are dramatic: the high CO2 emissions not only massively fuel the climate catastrophe, but the never-ending avalanche of cars floods streets and public spaces, impacts health through noise and air pollution, destroys ecosystems and consumes vast amounts of energy-intensive resources such as aluminium, steel and plastic.
The European Parliament has called for a 60 percent reduction in overall greenhouse gas emissions by 2030. This reduction is predicted to be essential for keeping the planet under the 1.5 percent Celsius global temperature rise threshold as stipulated in the Paris Climate Accord.
Nevertheless, transport continues to bring up the rear in much of Europe’s already unenthusiastic climate protection efforts. Industry and politics often ignore the need for a fundamental shift in mobility and continue to promote precisely those structures that are responsible for the majority of transport emissions.
There is a broad consensus in the scientific community that CO2 emissions from transport can only be reduced through a radical shift away from private motorised transport to the environmental alliance of local public transport, cycling and walking. Luckily, there are a few early innovators.
Since its ambitious circulatieplan in 2017, the city centre of Ghent has been completely car-free. This was made possible by a mix of far-reaching measures: motorised traffic runs in loops around the city centre, parking is allowed for a maximum of 30 minutes on the outskirts of the city centre, parking garages near the city centre cost 30 EUR for 24 hours, however car-sharing cars pay nothing. Children up to 15 years of age can travel for free on public transport, while cycle paths and the pedestrian zone have been expanded. Transport within the city is often done by cargo bike. Even if not everyone was enthusiastic from the start, the overall response has been positive; the share of cars has fallen from 55 to 39 percent and cycling has almost doubled. There are significantly fewer accidents and traffic jams in the city centre of Ghent and birds can be heard again.
Other cities have also taken similarly proactive measures. In Copenhagen, two thirds of all journeys are made by bicycle and Vienna not only has a well-developed network of cycle paths, but also a good local transport system. Residents of the Austrian city are mobile all year round with the 365 EUR ticket, and nationwide with the 1,095 EUR flat rate since October 2021. While this might seem like a lot to pay in one go, it’s worth pointing out that running a car racks up around 8,000 EUR per year in inspections and maintenance alone, not to mention 1.7 EUR per litre for fuel. In Estonia’s capital, Tallinn, as well as Luxembourg and Malta, public transport is free.
Other cities such as Brussels, Paris, Helsinki and Oslo have also forged ahead, while some German cities such as Cologne and Halle have also set out to largely rid their city centres of cars. With the reduction in traffic, noise and emissions comes immediate results. In these cities, locals are rediscovering streets and squares as public places to linger and play.
So far, examples like these are individual rays of hope that are the result of the initiative of very ambitious decision-makers and initiatives. However, this does not yet mean that a real, nationwide mobility revolution has been initiated. This can only succeed if the current framework conditions are changed as a first step. In particular, a reform of transport law and integrated transport planning in Europe is needed.
In addition — as seen in the example of the city of Ghent — a mixture of measures is needed to both restrict fossil fuel transport and simultaneously favour alternative modes of transport — so-called ‘push-and-pull’ measures. The EU Council and Parliament has earmarked 25 billion EUR for a continent-wide reformation of transport, including revising rules on heavy vehicles, developing local transport infrastructure, promoting rail travel and rail passenger rights and the development of post-fossil fuels. The important thing here is that where car transport is restricted, a reliable and environmentally friendly substitute is available to distribute mobility opportunities fairly — and this can only succeed with an active, forward-looking policy.
In implementing many of these measures, one of the greatest transformations of our time could also have a major influence: the digital transformation.
The widespread use of smartphones and mobile internet has already ensured that a multitude of new modes of transport and business models have emerged in the mobility sector. Car and bike sharing, e-scooters, taxi platforms, ride-sharing and ride-pooling platforms are greatly expanding the range of mobility options, especially in cities. Meanwhile, new mobility platforms have been developed to help road users find their way around the increasingly complex mobility market. With the idea of "Mobility-as-a-Service" (MaaS), companies such as Google Maps, Moovit or Free Now bundle sharing offers, driving services and public transport. They display various transport options to users via their apps as well as allowing for convenient cash-less payment. Although these platforms are largely maintained by private companies, some municipal transport companies are also getting in on the act. Berlin has Jelbi, Paris Bonjour RATP and Amsterdam Amaze — all MaaS platforms in public ownership.
Big data analytics, predictive algorithms and artificial intelligence could also make it easier in the future to better align public transport, footpaths and cycle paths with actual use. Additionally improved traffic flows and multimodal travel can be promoted by linking a wide range of data — geodata, traffic data, weather data — to intelligent transport planning. But digital technologies do not only offer new solutions in passenger transport; tomorrow's logistics could also be made more efficient — and in the best case, less resource-intensive — for example by making full use of capacities through intelligent planning, networking and route optimisation.
This means that the linking of transport and communication is also becoming increasingly important from an ecological perspective. At the same time, new solutions also bring new challenges: e-scooters turn many a pavement into an obstacle course, mobility platforms in private hands create further monopolies and electromobility has an environmental problem with heavy lithium-ion batteries.
In the coming weeks, we will present sustainable digital solutions with the RESET Greenbook: "Mobility Transition — Shaping Climate-Friendly Mobility with Digital Solutions”. We will explore how transport, locomotion and logistics can be made climate-neutral, new innovative low-carbon transport designs and the challenges created by the intersection of mobility and digitisation.
" ["post_title"]=> string(46) "How Can the Mobility Transition Gain Momentum?" ["post_excerpt"]=> string(192) "The transport sector is still responsible for enormous CO2 emissions. A mobility turnaround is urgently needed. But what are the essential steps and what role does digitalisation play in this?" ["post_status"]=> string(7) "publish" ["comment_status"]=> string(6) "closed" ["ping_status"]=> string(6) "closed" ["post_password"]=> string(0) "" ["post_name"]=> string(45) "how-can-the-mobility-transition-gain-momentum" ["to_ping"]=> string(0) "" ["pinged"]=> string(0) "" ["post_modified"]=> string(19) "2024-08-28 13:37:25" ["post_modified_gmt"]=> string(19) "2024-08-28 11:37:25" ["post_content_filtered"]=> string(0) "" ["post_parent"]=> int(0) ["guid"]=> string(27) "https://reset.org/?p=106136" ["menu_order"]=> int(0) ["post_type"]=> string(4) "post" ["post_mime_type"]=> string(0) "" ["comment_count"]=> string(1) "0" ["filter"]=> string(3) "raw" } [4]=> object(WP_Post)#6675 (24) { ["ID"]=> int(110662) ["post_author"]=> string(5) "21506" ["post_date"]=> string(19) "2023-12-13 08:07:00" ["post_date_gmt"]=> string(19) "2023-12-13 06:07:00" ["post_content"]=> string(9511) "The festive season is the perfect time to look into donating to projects that make a difference in this world. This is the time for giving, and there are plenty of worthwhile causes that need your donations to keep doing their amazing work.
How about letting us recommend a project to you? This year at RESET.org, we have been working intensively on solutions in the CO2-intensive transport and building sectors. Here are our recommendations for suitable donation projects!
Almost a billion people live far away from developed roads and have no access to affordable means of transport. They spend hours every day travelling on foot to get to the essentials. World Bicycle Relief mobilises schoolchildren, carers and other dedicated residents in disadvantaged regions with specially designed, robust and locally assembled bicycles.
Donate to the World Bicycle Relief
Travelling from A to B by public transport is an extremely sustainable way of getting around. But without reliable information about stops, routes and timetables, it quickly becomes complicated. The NGO Trufi develops open-source applications and open-data solutions for public transport worldwide - from Mexico to Morocco and Ghana to Bolivia.
In the Rückenwind bicycle workshop, volunteers from Berlin and the rest of the world work together to repair donated bicycles. The road-ready bikes go to refugees - and not only make them mobile, but also facilitate their arrival and bring them together with Berliners.
Habitat for Humanity is a well-known nonprofit organization that works to provide affordable and sustainable housing for people in need. Known for their philanthropic housing solutions, Habitat for Humanity also does amazing work in the field of sustainable housing around the world. For example, their 'Better World Starts at Home' project designs, supports and provides access to renewable energy solutions to make renewable energy the default choice for homes. They have already helped approximately 70,000 children and their families in Uganda. Their 'Build Solid Ground' project inspires city authorities, governments and citizens to work together to build sustainable and inclusive cities.
Donate to Habitat for Humanity
At RESET.org, we provide over two million users per month with information about digital innovations and solutions to solve the climate crisis. There aren't many people who do what we do, and certainly not at this scale, and we do it all free of charge. We look at different answers to the biggest problems of our time, and work tirelessly to make sure all of our readers get informed, regular and trustworthy editorial on topics that matter to them.
In order to remain a strong voice for climate protection in the future, we are dependent on donations. Thank you so much to all those who have donated, and to all of our readers, we wish you a safe, healthy and peaceful holiday season.
" ["post_title"]=> string(61) "Reset 2023 Roundup: 5 Impactful Climate Projects to Donate To" ["post_excerpt"]=> string(129) "Christmas time is donation time! But, with all the choice of wonderful sustainability projects to pick from, how does one choose?" ["post_status"]=> string(7) "publish" ["comment_status"]=> string(6) "closed" ["ping_status"]=> string(6) "closed" ["post_password"]=> string(0) "" ["post_name"]=> string(52) "reset-2023-roundup-5-impactful-projects-to-donate-to" ["to_ping"]=> string(0) "" ["pinged"]=> string(0) "" ["post_modified"]=> string(19) "2023-12-19 12:09:57" ["post_modified_gmt"]=> string(19) "2023-12-19 10:09:57" ["post_content_filtered"]=> string(0) "" ["post_parent"]=> int(0) ["guid"]=> string(27) "https://reset.org/?p=110662" ["menu_order"]=> int(0) ["post_type"]=> string(4) "post" ["post_mime_type"]=> string(0) "" ["comment_count"]=> string(1) "0" ["filter"]=> string(3) "raw" } [5]=> object(WP_Post)#6714 (24) { ["ID"]=> int(109172) ["post_author"]=> string(5) "21506" ["post_date"]=> string(19) "2023-08-21 12:13:01" ["post_date_gmt"]=> string(19) "2023-08-21 10:13:01" ["post_content"]=> string(7401) "Whether as storage in photovoltaic systems or in electric cars — in a climate-friendly future, we need to be able to store electricity efficiently. Storing it well means making it available at certain times and places when needed, and sustainable mobility also requires batteries and accumulators to make e-cars and electric micro-vehicles independent of the power grid.
However, the production of new batteries massively increases the eco-cost of electromobility. Large quantities of resources such as lithium, cobalt and nickel are required for this, and their extraction is not only very costly, but also releases enormous amounts of CO2. One way to make batteries more sustainable is to consistently recycle the materials that are already in circulation.
And this is exactly what the EU Parliament wants to achieve through a new battery regulation that came into force in Germany in 2023.
The EU member states have been discussing new regulations for accumulators and batteries for several years. The current EU Battery Directive dates back to 2006, long before the German Climate Protection Act of 2021 or the Paris Climate Agreement of 2015 came into force. While the new regulations may already apply, from mid-August 2023, companies will be given a grace period until 18 February 2024.
For the first time, the new, Europe-wide battery regulation considers the entire life cycle of new batteries. For this purpose, information is to be collected in a digital battery passport and made available throughout their entire life. Theoretically, this would allow recycled batteries to be traced back to the manufacturer. In addition, the new regulation also tightens the sustainability regulations for batteries and spent batteries. By 2031, batteries must have new minimum proportions of recycled materials.
The problem is that by no means that all batteries must be recycled. The Munich-based start-up Tozero, for example, wants to reduce the waste from battery recycling to 0 percent. However, power storage units in circulation are not being recycled consistently enough and end up in landfills instead. So materials like lithium, nickel and cobalt have to be re-extracted, and that drives up the eco-balance of batteries. It is precisely for these materials that the new Battery Ordinance contains new requirements.
Specifically, new batteries must contain a minimum of 85 percent recycled lead from 2031. For cobalt, the requirements will be 16 percent, for lithium and nickel 6 percent. In total, 80 percent of the lithium from spent batteries is to be recycled by the end of 2031. In order to make the recycled materials available, the new regulation also formulates collection targets for manufacturers. This applies above all to industrial batteries, batteries in light means of transport and general-purpose portable batteries.
The new Battery Ordinance already sets this collection target for manufacturers at 73 percent by the end. For used batteries in light vehicles, the target is 61 percent and the deadline is the end of 2031. In order to better track which batteries are in circulation, which components they are made of and also whether they have already been recycled, the EU member states have also agreed on a new battery passport.
In the future, the digital battery passport will be found as a QR code on batteries. This will be a new requirement for batteries for light transport, industrial batteries with a capacity of more than 2 kWh and traction batteries — for example, traction batteries for e-cars.
The information collected includes safety instructions regarding the disassembly of the battery, previous recycling and repair processes, the composition of the battery, information on its carbon footprint and the origin of battery materials used. In addition to the digital battery passport, some of whose information can only be viewed by the manufacturer or recycling companies, batteries should also be more clearly labelled in future. Consumers should thus be able to better assess how they should deal with used batteries.
The EU's new battery regulation is also exciting as a blueprint for new regulations for other materials that we will have to recycle better in the future. According to Federal Environment Minister Steffi Lemke, the great achievement of the new regulations is that they "for the first time focus on the entire life cycle". The fact that environmental aspects are also included is a "real milestone".
Based on this milestone, it is therefore important to introduce holistic regulations also for building materials, electronic waste and other materials. Because through consistent recycling, we can cover a large part of our resources without mining new materials.
" ["post_title"]=> string(78) "How a New Battery Regulation Should Make Europe’s Batteries More Sustainable" ["post_excerpt"]=> string(156) "A green future needs sustainable batteries. A new battery regulation in the EU should create better conditions for this in the future. But how does it work?" ["post_status"]=> string(7) "publish" ["comment_status"]=> string(6) "closed" ["ping_status"]=> string(6) "closed" ["post_password"]=> string(0) "" ["post_name"]=> string(75) "how-a-new-battery-regulation-should-make-europes-batteries-more-sustainable" ["to_ping"]=> string(0) "" ["pinged"]=> string(0) "" ["post_modified"]=> string(19) "2023-12-13 20:42:26" ["post_modified_gmt"]=> string(19) "2023-12-13 18:42:26" ["post_content_filtered"]=> string(0) "" ["post_parent"]=> int(0) ["guid"]=> string(27) "https://reset.org/?p=109172" ["menu_order"]=> int(0) ["post_type"]=> string(4) "post" ["post_mime_type"]=> string(0) "" ["comment_count"]=> string(1) "0" ["filter"]=> string(3) "raw" } [6]=> object(WP_Post)#7073 (24) { ["ID"]=> int(107555) ["post_author"]=> string(5) "21507" ["post_date"]=> string(19) "2023-05-08 08:34:00" ["post_date_gmt"]=> string(19) "2023-05-08 06:34:00" ["post_content"]=> string(9358) "One reason is certainly that many rural areas are not sufficiently integrated into public transport. This is exacerbated by the fact that subsidies and tax breaks provide additional incentives for car-heavy commuting.
However, new solutions are emerging, especially near large cities. Some villages are offering subsidised taxis, community buses, on-demand shuttles or even shared e-cars.
Another solution is ride-sharing benches. These are marked benches on main roads where people willing to ride can sit and signal to passers-by that they want a lift. While this solution is straightforward and spontaneous, it is not always reliable and, worst case, can lead to being stuck on a bench instead of attending a morning meeting.
By contrast, platforms such as BlaBlaCar are more reliable. The digital car-sharing platform has become increasingly popular in recent years, especially for irregular journeys over longer distances. BlaBlaCar has been in business for more than 17 years and is has around 35 million members. The offer to users is simple: drivers can enter their route, preferred driving style (chatty or quiet) and the number of free seats via an app. Travellers looking for a ride then submit a request.
However, for people who commute the same distance to work every day, BlaBlaCar is quite burdensome. For example, there may not be a ride at a specific time each morning, with your specific preferences.
This is where new car-sharing platforms come into play. Companies such as crowd-based carpooling platform PENDLA want districts, cities and municipalities to support regular carpooling. Just like BlaBlaCar, drivers can add their routes. The app then automatically compares their route with those of other users to find the best match before displaying it on a map. The service is tailored to regular trips, i.e. drivers can choose which days of the week they drive the route and other users can join these trips on a regular basis. A key aspect is that users can see how many other people are travelling in the same direction.
What also distinguishes PENDLA from other car-sharing services is that the counties, cities and municipalities bear the costs for the introduction of the service in their area. This makes the service more affordable for fur users, increasing the impetus to use it.
In any case, in the EU, the average car carries less than two people. And since the daily commute to work accounts for such a large share of car journeys, that's quite a few half-empty cars travelling the same distances every day. The sustainable option would look quite different.
With each additional passenger, the journey becomes more CO2-efficient. Regular carpooling can significantly reduce the negative impact of the mobility sector on our environment.
Another impact of a well-established carpooling service can also be that it reduces car dependency in the long run. If carpooling is a convenient and affordable option, it may eventually eliminate the need to own a car. This in turn increases the chance that other journeys will be made by public transport, and, with any luck, drives down the environmental impact associated with manufacturing cars.
Even further, car sharing can also significantly reduce traffic congestion, leading to less congestion and fewer accidents, while also reducing the need for parking infrastructure.
However, of course, the benefit that probably appeals to most new users first is the cost reduction. According to their own information, PENDLA users can save up to 75 percent of their travel costs through gas and parking fees, making ridesharing not only ecologically but also economically much more sustainable.
Ridesharing can be an extremely effective tool in reducing our emissions. Moreover, similar to shuttle services, it can fill gaps in public transport and, in the best case, also improve local connectivity in the long term.
However, trust is still a challenge in ridesharing, as people must book rides with strangers, at least at first. While many platforms — like BlaBlaCar — work with a rating system to highlight trustworthy drivers, unfortunately, this is not a 100 percent fail-safe system; racism, missing payments or last-minute cancellations cannot be completely ruled out.
And, as long as company cars are provided by companies and commuting kilometres with one's own car are tax-privileged, incentives for carpooling are often lacking. For a real mobility turnaround, political change needs to speed up.
" ["post_title"]=> string(61) "How Companies Such as Pendla Are Shaking up the Daily Commute" ["post_excerpt"]=> string(134) "What if you could reduce your emissions and expenses and make new friends along the way? New ridesharing platforms make this possible." ["post_status"]=> string(7) "publish" ["comment_status"]=> string(6) "closed" ["ping_status"]=> string(6) "closed" ["post_password"]=> string(0) "" ["post_name"]=> string(44) "pendla-facilitates-ridesharing-for-commuters" ["to_ping"]=> string(0) "" ["pinged"]=> string(0) "" ["post_modified"]=> string(19) "2023-05-15 11:50:47" ["post_modified_gmt"]=> string(19) "2023-05-15 09:50:47" ["post_content_filtered"]=> string(0) "" ["post_parent"]=> int(0) ["guid"]=> string(71) "https://reset.org/pendla-erleichtert-das-ridesharing-fuer-pendlerinnen/" ["menu_order"]=> int(0) ["post_type"]=> string(4) "post" ["post_mime_type"]=> string(0) "" ["comment_count"]=> string(1) "0" ["filter"]=> string(3) "raw" } [7]=> object(WP_Post)#7072 (24) { ["ID"]=> int(107275) ["post_author"]=> string(3) "390" ["post_date"]=> string(19) "2023-04-26 10:10:59" ["post_date_gmt"]=> string(19) "2023-04-26 08:10:59" ["post_content"]=> string(6869) "Once a common sight in large cities across the world, overhead electric cables have been powering public transport for generations. However, as private car ownership increased in the 1950s, many fell by the wayside and were destined to be removed or relegated as historical curiosities. But they could be about to make a return — on our highways.
A new study from Georgia Tech's College of Engineering has looked into the feasibility and benefits of using overhead cable line (OCL) technology to power e-highway trucks on motorways. The study envisioned a new generation of e-trucks and tractor-trailers equipped with roof-mounted arms known as pantographs. Roof-mounted sensors would detect the presence of overhead power cables, automatically deploying the pantograph. When these make contact with the OCL, the vehicle should shift from an onboard battery and combustion engine to draw power directly from the grid.
The assessment, published in Environmental Research: Infrastructure and Sustainability, found that traditional diesel trucks would release around 2.5 times more greenhouse gases than overhead-line and hybrid-powered vehicles. It also suggested that the technology would become environmentally and economically beneficial over both diesel and battery-powered trucks once adoption reached 10 percent, despite additional costs and emissions coming from the installation of the overhead cables.
The technology is currently being explored and tested in several nations, including the United States, Germany and Sweden. Having pioneered the technology in the 1880s, Siemens is also leading the way with their eHighway system. A 10-kilometre stretch of eHighway has been established in Hesse, with smaller stretches in Sweden and the US.
According to Siemens, OCL technology would extend the operational range of e-trucks by reducing the burden on their onboard batteries. Long-haul logistical journeys over 500 kilometres are almost exclusively driven on highways, and 89 percent of all German trucks only drive around 50 kilometres once leaving the highway. This means onboard batteries could only be used for “first and last mile” driving and overtaking.
Not only does this drastically increase the range of e-trucks (a traditional battery-powered truck only has a range of 200 kilometres), but it could also reduce the size, expense and resources of pre-existing e-vehicle batteries.
The Federation of German Industries recommends 4,000 kilometres of autobahn should be electrified. They predict this would provide an economic incentive for 80 percent of German heavy duty trucks to switch to OCL technology. An individual 40-ton truck could save up to 16,000 EUR for every 100,000 kilometres travelled. Additionally, over seven million tons of carbon could be saved if just 30 percent of trucks adopt OCL charging.
However, these statistics come with a big caveat. The Georgia Tech study revealed only certain cities, states and nations would actually benefit from OCL technology. In some cases, it might actually increase emissions over diesel powered vehicles. It all depends on where the electricity comes from in the first place. Once a vehicle shifts to using electricity, emissions are displaced, rather than eliminated, and it’s possible power stations may produce more carbon and other greenhouse gases per OCL truck than a diesel truck would have produced on its own.
For example, the technology may be best suited for nations which already produce a significant amount of electricity from renewable sources, such as Sweden, Germany, France, Belgium and Brazil. Nations which still rely heavily on fossil fuels, such as India, China, Poland, South Africa and Estonia, are likely not ready for widespread OCL implementation. For the United States, it varies on a state-by-state basis. For cleaner states, such as New York, Washington D.C, Vermont and Oregon, it would be beneficial. Meanwhile, it would be counterproductive in dirtier states such as West Virginia, Wyoming, Kentucky, Utah, and Missouri.
There may be additional concerns to implementing the technology, not least major disruption caused by installation to the arterial trade and logistical routes of a nation.
Ultimately, however, the factors around OCL technology once again illustrate the importance of decarbonising the foundations of our power generation with reliable, proven renewable methods.
" ["post_title"]=> string(54) "Can Long Haul Trucks Be Powered Like Trams and Trains?" ["post_excerpt"]=> string(85) "A new study has explored the feasibility of large scale overhead power line trucking." ["post_status"]=> string(7) "publish" ["comment_status"]=> string(6) "closed" ["ping_status"]=> string(6) "closed" ["post_password"]=> string(0) "" ["post_name"]=> string(53) "can-long-haul-trucks-be-powered-like-trams-and-trains" ["to_ping"]=> string(0) "" ["pinged"]=> string(0) "" ["post_modified"]=> string(19) "2023-05-05 13:33:57" ["post_modified_gmt"]=> string(19) "2023-05-05 11:33:57" ["post_content_filtered"]=> string(0) "" ["post_parent"]=> int(0) ["guid"]=> string(27) "https://reset.org/?p=107275" ["menu_order"]=> int(0) ["post_type"]=> string(4) "post" ["post_mime_type"]=> string(0) "" ["comment_count"]=> string(1) "0" ["filter"]=> string(3) "raw" } [8]=> object(WP_Post)#7071 (24) { ["ID"]=> int(107177) ["post_author"]=> string(5) "21506" ["post_date"]=> string(19) "2023-04-17 08:54:00" ["post_date_gmt"]=> string(19) "2023-04-17 06:54:00" ["post_content"]=> string(22623) "Mobility-as-a-Service is the term used to describe a new concept for the mobility of the future. The idea behind it is to move from A to B, with different mobility offers linked by digital tools and platforms. Instead of getting into your own car, you type the start and destination into your smartphone and the fastest, most comfortable or least CO2-intensive route appears on the screen, depending on your choice of parameters. This could consist of a short route on foot, by bike or e-scooter, a section by bus or train and perhaps also an on-demand shuttle, depending on the available mobility services. If everything works well together, the result is not only comfortable, free of traffic jams and the search for parking spaces, but also lower on traffic-related CO2 emissions, less noise and air pollution and more public space through a shift away from motorised individual transport.
For this to happen seamlessly, however, not only apps and other digital solutions are needed that reliably link the various services, but also a transport system that is adapted to the actual demand. In addition to various traffic and real-time data — such as GPS data of buses and trains, timetables, route networks or traffic jam reports — movement data is also interesting for mobility-as-a-service offers, i.e. data that our apps deliver via GPS and with which the actual movement patterns of people can be tracked.
However, it is personal data that can reveal a lot about people, and should therefore be handled very carefully. The freemove project deals with the exploration of our mobility data in particular. Comprised of a team of transdisciplinary experts in the fields of machine learning, digital self-determination, human-centred computing and information security, freemove is exploring possible technical solutions for anonymising movement data and developing recommendations for practical action based on real usage scenarios.
Much data is bundled under the generic term "mobility data". We are concerned here with personal movement data that is recorded by smartphone apps via GPS, for example. This contrasts with mobility data without a personal reference, such as public transport timetables or road networks. Since these do not contain any data protection risks, they are not relevant in the context of our project.
Movement data is used, for example, for realistic traffic simulations in order to be able to estimate changes due to road closures or road works in advance, or to expand the infrastructure according to the actual behaviour of drivers, such as the fleet positioning of shared mobility services. Routing algorithms can also be improved with this data according to various criteria.
The somewhat abbreviated idea is that a broad database and detailed knowledge about the way citizens move will result in optimal mobility solutions that are more efficient and sustainable without having to change or adapt at one point or another. Applications that make traffic more efficient need this data in order to improve algorithms — but in the end, they have to be used by the road users and are therefore only a limited substitute for a change in thinking.
To our knowledge, there are hardly any movement data sets worth mentioning that are openly accessible as open data, and for good reason from a data protection point of view. This does not mean that there is not a lot of movement data. Mobile phone providers sell some of this data to the public transport system and to administrations.
Open traffic data, on the other hand, does exist, such as the BMDV's Mobilithek. In combination with the Mobility Data Space, where companies can offer their data for a fee — probably mostly for further profit-generating models — that's something.
I am ambivalent about the open data issue — sensitive data needs to be protected, perhaps through organisational measures such as access restrictions or processes where I, as a user, have to prove that I have a vested interest in the data. At the same time, I don't necessarily see the greatest possible public interest orientation in the products if purely private-sector actors have access to this data. In my experience, this is more likely to come from administrations, science and civil society.
Sharing with administration is now also to be addressed in legislation and I am confident that in the future we will find ways to protect individuals, but at the same time still be able to exploit potentials.
In a more or less intensive form, this is now standard practice for most transport companies — for example, German transport companies such as Bahn, BVG, etc., already generate capacity utilisation forecasts, use automatic passenger counts and conduct household surveys. At the same time, especially in small cities, there is often a lack of data science expertise to actually exploit the potential.
In general, we can say that the handling of sensitive data in practice can be improved — but, of course, we come from academic discourses with very high demands.
Movement profiles are highly individual and can potentially contain information that affects our privacy, be it doctor visits or other movement patterns that allow conclusions to be drawn about lifestyle issues such as sexuality, religious practice or the like. The collection of this data is problematic because it often happens without users' reflective and conscious consent. Let's be honest — data protection regulations are rarely read and app permissions are usually set in auto-pilot in order to be able to use the desired service as quickly as possible.
Privacy is preserved by informing users about practices and risks in a way that they "really" consent to. And by taking safeguards as a data processor, such as having little raw data access or using new technologies that preserve privacy. This is a vital field where a lot is happening right now. Differential privacy is one of the better known examples.
We work on a use-case basis. After several practical exchanges, we have decided on three use cases based on the results and the knowledge we can contribute as a consortium. Firstly, we are working on standard procedures for movement data analysis, secondly on open data and raw data formats, and thirdly on citizen science or data donation platforms and their technical implementation.
Together with students, we have collected a small data set on which we are now testing anonymisation technologies. The main goal, however, is to investigate the quality of information in the direction of the data donors.
Such projects can provide important impulses and help shape agendas, but will hardly be able to meet needs in terms of the amount of data generated. In the end, it will come down to a combination of different data sources. Of course, such projects are still important for science because they generate data to solve partial questions. And the high level of interest is definitely an indication that citizens are willing to give up parts of their privacy for the "right" purposes.
What we see in practice is that privacy concerns and protection of trade secrets are used by private companies as arguments to prevent the sharing of their own data. However, if there is added value in the data for the common good, we are in favour of sharing it under certain conditions, i.e. if anonymisation technologies have been properly applied and the data has been aggregated in a sufficiently coarse way.
Ultimately, it is a matter of interpreting the GDPR correctly and in a normatively meaningful way and acting within its legal framework in a public interest-oriented manner. On which platforms and via which exact transmission channels this ultimately happens is another question.
We are in the final year of the project and are just starting our third usage scenario on data donation platforms. At the same time, we are preparing a conference for a more detailed exchange of practice, which will take place on 27 September 2023. And we are working on the design of an information platform for data protection-centred action with transaction data.
Above all, investments are needed, from personnel to infrastructure to the quality of the trains and buses. As long as there is no minimum level of attractiveness in terms of safety, speed, well-developed networks and reliability, the mobility revolution will be difficult. In the end, price is also a comprehensibly important component — sustainable mobility must not cost more money than simply continuing to drive a car.
I would like to see a clear promotion of active modes of movement from cycling to walking, accompanied by efficient public transport — in contexts where this can be sensibly implemented. Of course, data institutes are important, but they cannot be the only solution.
You step out of the house and hear people laughing and birds chirping. From there, you walk across a green space. You're intersected by a bike path, with many people gliding along on two wheels. At the next corner, you get on the bus that is just arriving. Although there are many people on the road at this time of day, you find a seat because there are enough buses. The e-bus quietly drives through the streets and drops you off in front of your office. On the way home, you get off in front of the supermarket and do your shopping. Since your bags are heavy, you rent one of the cargo bikes via an app. While you cycle home on the wide bike path, small electric vehicles transporting goods pass you on a narrow lane.
This - or something like it - is what mobility could look like in the climate-neutral city of the future, where combustion engines and private cars have become largely superfluous thanks to optimised public transport, a convenient cycling infrastructure, electrified sharing fleets and intelligent logistics. In rural areas, too, cars could be made dispensable in many places, with seamless and comfortable local transport available in the form of buses, trains, on-demand vehicles and autonomous minibuses.
We explore how this vision can become a reality and which role digital technologies play in the process.
Let's rewind to the present. Each new report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) calls for effective climate protection measures with increasing urgency, as we already live in a +1.2-degree world. Any further delay will lead to an additional rise in temperature. However, a look at different sectors clearly shows that, besides industry, transport is proving particularly resistant to reducing its CO2 emissions.
The transport sector, still mainly driven by fossil fuels, is one of the largest emitters of CO2 in Germany and contributes to around 20 percent of emissions. In 2019 alone, cars and the like were responsible for over 160 million tonnes of greenhouse gases. This is mainly attributable to emission-intensive transport means like cars and trucks, which cause almost all CO2 emissions related to road traffic.
This means we pay a high price to get from A to B and transport our goods. Not only are we fuelling the climate catastrophe, but we are also tolerating air pollution, noise, and high land consumption for parking spaces, roads and motorways. This determined by the German Advisory Council on the Environment (SRU) in its first report exactly 50 years ago.
According to the Climate Protection Act, greenhouse gas emissions from transport in Germany must fall to 85 million tonnes of CO2 by 2030. This means almost halving emissions in the next seven years. The European Parliament even calls for a 60 percent reduction by 2030 and the Federal Environment Agency recommends that CO2 emissions in Germany be reduced by at least 70 percent by 2030. Furthermore, the emissions must continue to be reduced from there, falling to zero by 2045, so that Germany becomes greenhouse gas neutral – as stipulated in the Climate Protection Act.
According to the 2022 Climate Protection Report, however, it is foreseeable that the targets of the Climate Protection Act will be missed by a large margin in the transport sector – unless something changes quickly.
First and foremost, this includes avoiding traffic by shifting to climate-friendly means of transport such as rail, public transport and cycling. Secondly, traffic must be handled in a more climate-friendly and efficient way such as low-CO2 electromobility and intelligent transport systems. Third, strong local infrastructure that allows for short-distance travel should be prioritised.
For the mobility transition to gain momentum, consistent political action and a social rethink are needed, as mobility expert and activist Katja Diehl emphasises in an interview with RESET.
In the implementation of the various measures, as in many other areas, digitalisation is playing an increasingly important role.
When it comes to shifting traffic to rail, public transport and cycling, promoting low-CO2 transmission, managing the transport system more intelligently, and enabling short-distance urban transit, digital innovations are playing an increasingly important role in the transport sector.
One approach for a more attractive, sustainable public transport system is to combine the comfort of individual transport with the advantages of local public transport. On the one hand, this includes planning based on actual demand. If there is a lot of traffic, larger vehicles will run at closer intervals; if there is little traffic, smaller vehicles will be sent out at adapted intervals. On the other hand, passengers must be provided with information that is important for their journey and easily accessible. Will the bus be on time? Are there enough seats in the next vehicle, and will the bicycle still fit?
The prerequisite for this is that the important data for this information is collected and made available. With the help of artificial intelligence (AI), among other things, it is already possible to create accurate forecasts of occupancy in public transport.
Within the framework of NV-ProVI, a project between Stadtwerke Gießen and the data analysts at Brodtmann Consulting, for example, an AI-based algorithm was developed to generate forecasts for public transport in real-time using GPS data from buses and trains, timetables, route networks, historical data, weather data, and information about holidays and major events.
In addition to various traffic and real-time data, movement data will also be of interest for optimised planning and forecasting. However, as these can reveal a lot about people, they should be handled very carefully.
In rural areas, life without a car is hardly possible today. The way to work, to the doctor, or simply to shops cannot be done in 10 minutes by bike, and many remote areas are inadequately or not at all connected to public transport. For the approximately 30 million people who live in rural regions in Germany and whose share of total passenger transport is about 37 percent, switching to public transport is challenging.
On-demand shuttle services are now being tested in many places to bridge the divide between shared public transport and individual car journeys. One of the largest projects in Europe is On-Demand Mobility for the Frankfurt/Rhine-Main region, which aims to reduce CO2 emissions in transport by filling gaps in public transport services with zero-emission vehicles. Route- and timetable-independent transport is organised through a digital platform. Passengers can book the appropriate route via an app, and the software behind it takes care of ridepooling, which combines the requests of different passengers for similar routes.
Autonomous vehicles have potential in local public transport as small, driverless shuttle buses could help to massively expand local networks.
Various pilot projects are already testing the possibilities. In Darmstadt and in the district of Offenbach, a pilot operation will start in May 2023. Deutsche Bahn, the Rhein-Main-Verkehrsverbund (RMV), and local transport companies will send automated shuttles on the road, which, equipped with camera and sensor technology, will direct on-demand operations.
Automated vehicles hold great promise for driving more efficiently and saving energy compared to traditional cars. However, the energy consumption associated with automation and vehicle networking has been largely overlooked (as noted in SustAIn Magazine). According to a study by Agora Verkehrswende, the potential of automation can only be realized if these vehicles are used collectively and integrated into public transport, replacing passenger cars. To minimise additional energy consumption, efficient components should be selected and big data analysis processes employed to keep data transmission to a minimum.
Carpooling is another way to fill gaps in public transport and reduce CO2 emissions from individual car journeys. In any case, there is not enough space for additional passengers in most cars: in the EU, the average car carries less than two people. But with each additional passenger, the journey becomes more CO2-efficient. Regular carpooling in particular can therefore significantly reduce the negative impact of the mobility sector on our environment and, in the long run, even make owning a car obsolete.
New car-sharing platforms, such as PENDLA, are emerging as a solution. This crowd-based carpooling platform is designed for districts, cities and municipalities to facilitate the formation of regular carpools. Drivers can add their routes to the platform, which automatically compares them with those of other users to find the best match. The app then displays the matched routes on a map. PENDLA is specifically tailored for regular rides, allowing riders to choose the days of the week they drive the route and enabling other users to join these rides on a regular basis.
Simulations have long been crucial in managing traffic flows in cities. They inform when traffic lights should turn green and guide the placement of important traffic signs and overall road organisation. Furthermore, simulations can aid in reducing CO2 emissions.
The German project with the somewhat unwieldy name KI4LSA, for example, is developing AI for optimising traffic flow. The technology is designed to help passengers get from A to B faster, reduce road noise and, most importantly, reduce air pollution. The technology is designed to autonomously learn strategies to optimise traffic flow in real time and improve over time. The data collected is then made available as open data, which means that theoretically the whole world could use this technology.
Applications like these have the potential to decrease transport emissions. However, it is yet to be determined whether they will only make driving more convenient, which could lead to increased demand, or if they will truly reduce CO2 emissions in significant amounts.
Bicycles and e-bikes are the most environmentally-friendly mode of transportation when it comes to CO2 emissions and noise. The increased usage of two-wheelers directly improves air quality in cities, reduces traffic congestion, and frees up space previously reserved for cars, enabling other activities. Digital solutions like bike-sharing and rental systems, navigation, and route-planning apps make cycling more convenient and accessible.
For instance, Bike Citizens strives to integrate bike-friendly route planning with better infrastructure for two-wheelers. The navigation app displays cycle-friendly routes, and the data voluntarily recorded by users helps to better comprehend cycling. The objective is to equip cities and municipalities with the necessary knowledge to optimise cycling.
Hamburg's PrioBike has a different approach: its app aims to create a green wave for cyclists. "In a sense, the app generates a 'pseudo green wave': if cyclists adjust their speed based on the app's recommendations, they can enjoy a type of green wave within certain limits," says Sven Fröhlich, who leads the project at TU Dresden. The app's speed recommendations are based on a forecast that combines data from traffic light circuits, information about the current traffic situation, and the position and speed of the cyclists.
Achieving climate-neutral mobility requires embracing electromobility, but adoption of electric vehicles has been slow in many countries. Apart from the lack of political incentives, doubts about the range and availability of charging options have contributed to this. New digital solutions aim to address these issues by mapping charging stations and making it easier to plan routes for electric vehicles.
The apps Plugsurfing and PlugShare, for example, not only show free charging stations that are suitable for one's vehicle, but also provide information on how reliable and convenient a station is. Likewise, concepts like Monta's lay the foundation for a scalable and sustainable charging infrastructure. The open-source app and platform is a B2B software solution for companies that want to offer charging options for e-mobility on their business premises.
Bicycle couriers have become the norm for pizza delivery in most major German cities, with many food and parcel delivery services also turning to cargo bikes or small, electric pedal-powered vehicles to deliver packages. These modes of transport are ideal for navigating narrow streets and busy city centres, saving time and resources by avoiding traffic jams and the search for parking spaces. Compared to cars, cargo bikes produce only one-tenth of the emissions, making them a sustainable and efficient option, particularly for last-mile logistics.
To support cargo bike delivery in urban areas, the SmartRadL project is developing an innovative software solution. The route planning software is specifically designed for delivery bike transport and continuously connects riders to the delivery management system. With real-time updates, the route plan can be quickly adjusted to accommodate new shipments.
But what about long-distance transport? In Germany, this is mainly carried out by road. Of course, the first priority should be to shift goods transport from road to rail and to switch to e-trucks. Compared to a truck, a goods train requires only about 20 percent of the energy per tonne-kilometre and produces only about 25 percent of its climate-damaging emissions, according to Agora Verkehrswende.
Digital solutions have the potential to increase the efficiency of rail transport by leveraging automation and data analysis to optimize capacity utilization and integrating freight transport with passenger transport. The CargoSurfer project aims to develop and implement a platform for brokering freight capacities, which will also include an AI-based forecasting tool to ensure the timely delivery of goods by optimizing transport connections.
If the so-called "freight on transit" concept works, existing infrastructure would be much better utilised and even remote places in rural areas could be integrated into the already existing public transport network.
Simply enter your starting point and destination into your phone, and the app will provide you with the best route based on your preferences – whether that be the quickest, most comfortable or most environmentally friendly option. The route may include walking, cycling, public transport, or even an on-demand shuttle depending on what is available. Real-time traffic information will also be displayed on the screen. The goal is to move from A to B using a variety of transportation options rather than relying solely on owning a personal vehicle. This concept is called Mobility-as-a-Service.
Mobility-as-a-Service works by using traffic and real-time data like GPS data from buses and trains, timetables, route networks and traffic reports. These data sources are linked together using digital tools and platforms. This creates an optimised and situational mobility experience where public transport is still a primary mode of transportation, but also integrates other regional services.
When different mobility services work in sync, users can experience seamless movement without worrying about traffic jams or parking. This integration can also lead to a reduction in transport-related CO2 emissions, less noise and air pollution, and more public space for everyone.
stadtnavi is a great example of how multiple sustainable transport options can be connected seamlessly to help people reach their destinations. It links various modes of transportation available in the Herrenberg region, enabling residents to plan and execute multimodal journeys with ease. Jana Zieger, who is in charge of the project, highlights that combining several eco-friendly transport options can save significant travel time. Apart from route planning, stadtnavi also provides location-specific details like the nearest bike station, ride-sharing options, availability of rental bikes, and cargo bikes.
Furthermore, creating and running a mobility app can serve as a tool for local authorities to handle the intricacy of their own mobility data. This includes analyzing the quality and availability of existing data, generating missing data, and utilizing newly acquired data to support eco-friendly transportation solutions.
There are already several municipalities and regions that have adopted their own mobility platforms inspired by stadtnavi Herrenberg. Additionally, many major cities have their own public transport companies that offer mobility apps like Jelbi in Berlin or Switchh in Hamburg. However, there are many other models as well, and the field is constantly evolving with many more platforms being developed and planned. According to Zieger, it's a very dynamic field with a lot of movement.
Digitalization is important for the mobility transition, but it raises questions about data protection and sustainability. The hardware and software required for digital mobility solutions consume resources and energy. Therefore, it's important to ensure that digitalization is pursued in a sustainable and responsible manner.
As the transportation system becomes increasingly automated and interconnected, it becomes more important to address questions related to data ownership, processing, and protection. Transparent and responsible data management is crucial to ensure the trust and acceptance of users. At the same time, easy access to data can foster innovation and the development of new mobility services.
To ensure trust and acceptance of users, it is crucial to have transparency in the processing of personal data for both manufacturers and operators. This can be achieved by providing easily understandable information to users about the data collected and its intended use, and allowing users to decide which data they release. Privacy by default, which includes data protection-oriented default settings, can make this possible. By implementing such measures, the goal of fostering innovation and new mobility services can be achieved while ensuring data privacy and protection.
Anonymisation or pseudonymisation procedures can be used to process data in a way that allows larger data sets to be collected without violating data protection laws' principle of data economy. This approach is also recommended by Agora Verkehrswende for big data applications.
The freemove project, funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), is looking at possible technical solutions for anonymising movement data, such as differential privacy. With this procedure, information can be published while maintaining privacy without encrypting it. For this purpose, the data is provided with "noise" so that no clear statements can be made about certain properties of the data.
Having a good data basis is crucial for new digital solutions, but data availability and quality in Germany can still be a challenge, especially for small municipalities and projects. While the Mobilithek of the Federal Ministry of Digital Affairs and Transport (BMDV) makes some traffic data openly available, it can be costly to ensure good and machine-readable quality. Additionally, open and free access to data for everyone is still not a common practice.
An open data law has been proposed by Agora Verkehrswende to improve data availability and quality for digital solutions in transportation. Such a law would establish regulations for disclosing data in standardized formats and ensuring its availability through an online portal.
Furthermore, municipalities and cities can benefit from the progress made by others if mobility apps and other applications are made available as open source without license fees and can be replicated and improved upon. Despite the success of stadtnavi Herrenberg and similar projects, open source applications remain uncommon in the transportation sector.
Reducing the environmental footprint of digital tools and services is crucial, and can be achieved through various means such as using efficient devices and algorithms, and sourcing renewable energies for development and operation. Policymakers play a critical role in setting the appropriate framework conditions and promoting the development of sustainable devices, as well as improving recycling processes.
At the same time, it is important to digitalise moderately ("as much as necessary, as little as possible") and to weigh the actual impact against the use of resources. The example of autonomous driving shows what is at stake: as already mentioned, autonomous minibuses are seen as a possible solution to promote environmentally friendly mobility in rural areas. However, autonomous driving only works through the use of many sensors and algorithms. In order to be able to assess the actual impact, it is therefore necessary to realistically evaluate how environmentally friendly the AI integrated in them and the resource consumption of the vehicles really are, as Andreas Meyer, research associate at the Distributed Artificial Intelligence Laboratory of the TU Berlin, states. To this end, the question must also be answered to what extent emissions are actually reduced by the new service because car journeys are eliminated or whether the resource consumption of the minibuses actually causes even more emissions.
Answers to many of these questions have yet to be found, as the resource consumption of digital applications is still not consistently included in impact analyses.
If the mobility transition, which is so urgent for effective climate protection, is to succeed, the essential measures must be implemented quickly. Digitalisation in particular can play an important role in this:
The Mobility-as-a-Service (MaaS) approach makes our smartphone the most important tool and navigator for diverse alternative mobility options. With apps that link public transport with cycling and ridesharing services, we can quickly find the fastest routes in real time. Our digital footprint also provides valuable data for creating and developing new mobility services, as well as for effective transport research and planning. In logistics, the digital networking of all road and rail-based modes of transport in a communicative system will lead to new solutions for reducing CO2 emissions. This will not only enable the seamless management of complex transport chains across different modes of transport but also promote more efficient use of existing structures.
Despite the availability and growing use of various mobility solutions, such as the ones mentioned earlier, the reduction of CO2 emissions in the transportation sector has been minimal in recent years. The number of internal combustion vehicles on our roads has not decreased, and the expansion of the rail network and public transport has not been substantial. Therefore, it is evident that the necessary transformation is not just a matter of knowledge but also a challenge of implementation.
Therefore, a strong policy is needed to create a framework for a successful mobility transition. This policy should include instruments to limit car traffic and reduce emissions, such as consistent parking space management, taxes and levies on combustion engines, CO2 charges, speed limits, and the expansion of rail and local public transport. In addition, specific funding programs and practical projects that promote new and innovative mobility solutions should be encouraged. Strengthening new alliances of actors that involve politics, administration, private sector, civil society, and science is also essential. Such cooperation can lead to the development of new, integrated solutions and achieve broad support and acceptance for the necessary changes.
At the same time, it is important to explore all possibilities for a rapid transformation and rethinking. As the example of stadtnavi shows, municipalities and cities can set an important course for the mobility transition on site by promoting intelligent solutions themselves. Companies can initiate the mobility transition by implementing sustainable concepts such as e-fleets, charging stations in car parks or ridesharing apps for their employees. Citizens have the opportunity to initiate sustainable digital mobility concepts in house communities and cooperatives, such as digitally supported cargo bike and car sharing.
Digitalisation is transforming the entire transportation sector, and we are only at the early stages of this transformation. The rapid advancement of automation, increasing networking, and the emergence of new collaborative mobility solutions will undoubtedly trigger further changes in mobility behaviour and the transportation system. However, given the challenges posed by digital transformation in transportation, it is clear that this process must be actively shaped by policy-makers to become the sustainable mobility of the future.
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