A review on the factors influencing the adoption of new mobility technologies and services: autonomous vehicle, drone, micromobility and mobility as a service

New mobility technologies and services could address a series of transport-related problems such as pollution, congestion, unpleasant travel experiences, as well as first- and last-mile in-connectivity. Understanding the key factors influencing adoption and enablers is critical to the rollout of the new mobility technologies and services. The objective of this paper is to conduct a systematic review of the new mobility technologies and services, especially on autonomous vehicles, drones, micromobility and Mobility as a Service (MaaS). The ultimate goal is to gain a deeper insight into the factors that affect the adoption or preferences of these technologies and services and thus provide policy implications at the strategic level. The results of the review identified several (1) shared, (2) exclusive, (3) opposing and (4) mixed impacts factors that strongly influence the uptake of new mobilities. The synthesised finding will contribute to policy decisions, particularly regarding the sequencing of the launch and development priorities of new mobility technologies and services. To encourage the uptake of new mobility technologies and services, further promotion would benefit from (1) embedding a spatio-temporal perspective, (2) undertaking a careful market segmentation and (3) a careful segmentation of technology and services based on features, application contexts and purposes

Incorporating social interaction into hybrid choice models

The aim of this paper is to develop a methodological framework for the incorporation of social interaction effects into choice models. The developed method provides insights for modeling the effect of social interaction on the formation of psychological factors (latent variables) and on the decision-making process. The assumption is based on the fact that the way the decision maker anticipates and processes the information regarding the behavior and the choices exhibited in her/his social environment, affects her/his attitudes and perceptions, which in turn affect her/his choices. The proposed method integrates choice models with decision makers’ psychological factors and latent social interaction. The model structure is simultaneously estimated providing an improvement over sequential methods as it provides consistent and efficient estimates of the parameters. The methodology is tested within the context of a household aiming to identify the social interaction effects between teenagers and their parents regarding walking-loving behavior and then the effect of this on mode to school choice behavior. The sample consists of 9,714 participants aged from 12 to 18 years old, representing 21 % of the adolescent population of Cyprus. The findings from the case study indicate that if the teenagers anticipate that their parents are walking lovers, then this increases the probability of teenagers to be walking-lovers too and in turn to choose walking to school. Generally, the findings from the application result in: (a) improvements in the explanatory power of choice models, (b) latent variables that are statistically significant, and (c) a real-world behavioral representation that includes the social interaction effect

Implications of COVID-19 pandemic on the governance of passenger mobility innovations in Europe

As the passenger transportation sector is disrupted by the emergence of myriad technological and business model innovations such as automated mobility, shared mobility and Mobility-as-a-Service, new and improved governance models are required. The COVID-19 pandemic can be seen as yet another disruption, stressing the need for a more proactive and inclusive governance. This article aims to juxtapose the need for collaborative, adaptive and outcome-based governance models in the mobility sector before and after the pandemic started. First, we analyse the governance needs and trends related to mobility innovations that were identified during two workshops with public and private actors in the mobility sector and through an extensive research of new governance models already applied in many European countries. Second, we analyse the impact of COVID-19 on mobility governance, focusing specifically on mobility innovations. Based on the analysis, we draw conclusions regarding the long-term trends in how the governance of mobility innovations will be affected by the ongoing pandemic

Mobility as a service Inclusion Index (MaaSINI): Evaluation of inclusivity in MaaS systems and policy recommendations

According to UN statistics, the population of people in vulnerable social groups, namely elderly people, people with disabilities, and low-income populations, has increased over the recent decades. It is projected that this trend will continue in the future. Thus, their mobility and access to transport services are important areas to study. Mobility as a Service (MaaS) is a digital platform (smartphone application) that aims to encourage more sustainable travel. MaaS is promoted as being accessible to all user groups. However, there are limited studies linking MaaS with vulnerable social groups and their particular needs. This paper comprehensively reviews studies on the emergence of such platforms since 2014 until today to identify the research gaps with respect to vulnerable social groups. A framework and MaaS Inclusion Index (MaaSINI) are then proposed to evaluate the inclusion in MaaS services, focusing on vulnerable social groups’ needs at a service level instead of a city/area level. The framework and policy recommendations proposed in this study will make a significant contribution in guiding stakeholders and policymakers in implementing accessible-for-all-users MaaS services targeting sustainable and inclusive transport

Behavioural Change Support Intelligent Transportation Applications

This workshop invites researchers and practitioners to participate in exploring behavioral change support intelligent transportation applications. We welcome submissions that explore intelligent transportation systems (ITS), which interact with travelers in order to persuade them or nudge them towards sustainable transportation behaviors and decisions. Emerging opportunities including the use of data and information generated by ITS and users' mobile devices in order to render personalized, contextualized and timely transport behavioral change interventions are in our focus. We invite submissions and ideas from domains of ITS including, but not limited to, multi-modal journey planners, advanced traveler information systems and in-vehicle systems. The expected outcome will be a deeper understanding of the challenges and future research directions with respect to behavioral change support through ITS.Comment: Intelligent Transportation Systems Conference (ITSC) 2017 Worksho

Car-Sharing Subscription Preferences and the Role of Incentives: The Case of Copenhagen, Munich, and Tel Aviv-Yafo

Car-sharing services provide short-term car access, contributing to sustainable urban mobility and generating positive societal and environmental impacts. Attraction and retention of members are essential for the profitability and survival of these services in cities. Yet, the relevance of a variety of possible business models’ features for car-sharing subscriptions is still under-explored. This study examines individuals’ preferences for subscribing to different car-sharing business models, focusing on the attractiveness of car-sharing-related features and incentives in different contexts. We designed a stated preference experiment and collected data from three different urban car-sharing settings: Copenhagen, Munich, and Tel Aviv-Yafo. A mixed logit model was estimated to uncover the determinants of each city’s car-sharing plan subscription. The achieved insights pave the road for the actual design of car-sharing business models and attractive incentives by car-sharing companies in the studied or similar cities. Our findings reveal that although some car-sharing intrinsic features are likely to be relevant everywhere (e.g., pricing, parking conditions), the local context affects the preferences of others. In Munich, respondents prefer car-sharing services with fleets composed of electric vehicles and value high accessibility to shared cars, so marketing campaigns focusing on the positive environmental impacts of car-sharing and strategic distribution of shared cars (e.g., hubs) are expected to be very appealing there. As for Copenhagen, a high probability of finding a car, the opportunity to book a shared car in advance, and having plans including other modes are more appreciated, making hubs in high-demand areas and Mobility-as-a-Service (MaaS) plans very attractive. Finally, in Tel Aviv, our findings highlight the advantages of exploring different pricing schemes and offering dynamic incentives to users for fleet rebalancing to positively contribute to car-sharing subscriptions and ridership

Aligning users’ and stakeholders’ needs: How incentives can reshape the carsharing market

Carsharing services provide users with a new way of approaching mobility and accessing shared vehicles. Since the initial pilot studies in the early 90s, technological innovations (e.g., advances in mobile technology, increased range of electric cars) and the establishment of new business models (e.g, station–based, free–floating, peer-to-peer, packages by time and/or kilometers) helped branding carsharing as a sustainable yet flexible and personalized mobility alternative. On the other hand, the carsharing market today is extremely scattered, as it can include multiple operators, which are often in competition among each other. While this variety of operators provides the user with a variety of travel options, without proper coordination, this competition can reduce the efficiency of the carsharing market and, in extreme cases, of the entire transportation system. In this context, this paper studies the needs of travellers, local authorities, and carsharing service providers, and analyzes how incentives can be used to align their goals. Taking Munich, Copenhagen, and Tel Aviv-Yafo as case studies, focus groups were used to identify thirteen different travellers’ needs, which are grouped into five main categories: ownership issues, coverage area, financial aspects, vehicle settings, and integration of carsharing with other modes. Moreover, to understand the needs of service providers and public authorities, in-depth interviews were conducted. The results indicate that regulatory barriers, integration with other transport modes, and social equity issues are the most critical elements for the thriving of carsharing services. Our results also suggest that incentives can be divided into two main categories, namely direct and indirect incentives. With regards to direct incentives, parking stood out as the most important incentive. Among indirect incentives, those associated with the integration of carsharing with other transport services, were prominent. As part of the methodology, the results of the qualitative study are validated through a quantitative analysis. A bigger sample of the population answered an online survey, which was used to validate the list of potential incentives that can help aligning the goals of stakeholders and users

Ανάπτυξη υβριδικών προτύπων για τη διερεύνηση της μεταφορικής συμπεριφοράς των εφήβων στις σχολικές και εξωσχολικές δραστηριότητες

Substantial changes in lifestyles, urban environments and transportation systems have led to changed physical activity patterns, especially among underage people. Although we may know the demographic and economic characteristics of underage students’ families and the communities where they live and attend school, we have little scientific evidence of the individual teenagers’ (12 to 18 years old) activities, travel behavior and attitudes. In traditional societies there was comparatively little discrepancy between adolescents and adults because they grew up in comparable worlds. However, with rapid change and social media bringing the outside world into teenagers’ lives, larger generational differences are emerging.This thesis contributes to the understanding of various factors that affect teenagers’ travel behavior. As a first step, we analyze teenagers’ activity patterns and time use in school days and in Saturday and the transport mode that they use, in order to identify their travel needs. The results indicate that teenagers conduct a number of trips, especially after-school trips, without the supervision of their parents, while the mode use patterns significantly differ among the trip purposes and among distinct geographical areas. As current teenagers spend significant amount of time on online social networking (OSN), we further analyze how much, why, and how teenagers utilize social media, and how its usage affects their travel behavior. Latent Class Poisson Regression models are developed in order to identify teenagers’ trip making behavior for social purposes of various OSN usage styles, while the results indicate that those who use OSN in a rational or addictive way, conduct more social trips than those who are indifferent to OSN, thus OSN does not substitute face-to-face communication. The developed framework offers significant insights to researchers for the data required in order to model the relationship between OSN and trip making behavior. The thesis is also concerned with investigating the effect of social influence on decision making and more specific the effect of parents’ walking patterns on teenagers’ attitudes towards walking and mode choice behavior. We present a methodological framework that incorporates social interaction effect into Hybrid Choice Models (HCM) and provide the required mathematical equations. The model estimation results indicate that, if the teenagers perceive that their parents are walking-lovers, then this increases their probability of loving walking too. Even though the application focus on teenagers, the framework is general and can be applied to modeling adults’ behavior as well. Moreover, this thesis contributes to the understanding of how teenagers perceive various built-environment characteristics and which of them work as constraints to active transport. We use their perceptions of built-environment characteristics, the actual built-environment characteristics of their routes from home to school and weather conditions in order to capture their effect on mode-to-school choice behavior. A latent variable model is developed for each urban environment to further investigate the differences among urban, rural and insular areas. The results show that the presence of wide pavements, greenery and traffic lights at major intersections affects positively the choice of active transport to school, while rain and bad weather conditions affect negative the choice of active transport. The most significant walkability constraint for urban teenagers seems to be the safety issue, while for rural and insular ones it is the absence of sidewalks, along with poor lighting. For the analyses and model estimation we use data that are collected directly from teenagers. The survey took place in two countries; Greece and Cyprus, while in Greece the survey took place not only in urban, but rural and insular areas as well. The sample from Greece consists of 3,293 adolescent students, while the sample from Cyprus consists of 10,093 adolescent students, covering the 21% of the total high-school population of the country. The contributions and innovation of this research cover several topics. First of all, to our knowledge it is the first time that such a large-scale survey on travel behavior, focusing only on teenagers, has taken place. Second, the questionnaire used for the data collection was designed specifically to investigate teenagers’ perceptions of travel behavior, not only by transport engineers but also by psychologists and economists, with the aim of approaching the multidimensional nature of transportation problems in depth. Third, this thesis contributes to the modeling of social influence effect on the decision making process by proposing an extension to HCM. Fourth, the Latent Class models that are developed contribute to the understanding of the relationship between OSN and trip making behavior. The findings of this thesis offer guidelines as to the types of transport policies that could promote active transport and increase environmental consciousness. Finally, the interventions at this age could develop the desired behaviors that could be retained in adulthood.Στόχος της συγκεκριμένης διατριβής είναι να διερευνήσει και να ποσοτικοποιήσει τους παράγοντες που επηρεάζουν τη μεταφορική συμπεριφορά των εφήβων (12 έως 18 ετών). Αρχικά αναλύονται οι δραστηριότητές τους, η χρήση χρόνου κατά τις σχολικές ημέρες και το σαββατοκύριακο και τα μεταφορικά μέσα που χρησιμοποιούν, προκειμένου να εντοπιστούν οι ανάγκες μετακίνησείς τους. Καθώς οι έφηβοι αφιερώνουν αρκετό χρόνο στις σελίδες κοινωνικής δικτύωσης (ΣΚΔ), αναλύονται περαιτέρω οι λόγοι που τις χρησιμοποιούν, οι δραστηριότητες που εκτελούν μέσω αυτών και το πως η χρήση ΣΚΔ επηρεάζει τον αριθμό των μετακινήσεών που πραγματοποιούν για κοινωνικούς σκοπούς. Στη συνέχεια διερευνάται το πως το κοινωνικό περιβάλλον επηρεάζει τη λήψη απόφασης και παρουσιάζεται ένα μεθοδολογικό πλαίσιο που ενσωματώνει την επιρροή του κοινωνικού περιβάλλοντος στα υβριδικά πρότυπα επιλογής. Η μεθοδολογία χρησιμοποιείται για να ποσοτικοποιηθεί το πώς η μεταφορική συμπεριφορά των γονέων επηρεάζει τις αντιλήψεις των εφήβων για την ενεργητική μετακίνηση (περπάτημα, ποδήλατο) και την επιλογή μέσου μεταφοράς για τη μετακίνησή τους στο σχολείο. Επίσης, η διατριβή διερευνά το πως οι έφηβοι αντιλαμβάνοται τα χαρακτηριστικά του περιβάλλοντα χώρου και πώς κάποια από αυτά λειτουργούν ως εμπόδια για την επιλογή ενεργητικής μετακίνησης. Με τη χρήση γεωγραφικών συστημάτων πληροφόρησης κωδικοποιούνται τα χαρακτηριστικά του περιβάλλοντα χώρου της διαδρομής των μαθητών από το σπίτι τους στο σχολείο και στη συνέχεια μελετάται το πώς αυτά τα χαρακτηριστικά επηρεάζουν την αντίληψη των μαθητών για τον περιβάλλοντα χώρο και την επιλογή μέσου μεταφοράς για το σχολείο. Συγκεκριμένα αναπτύσονται υβριδικά πρότυπα επιλογής με λανθάνουσες μεταβλητές για μία αστική, μία επαρχιακή και μία νησιωτική περιοχή προκειμένου να εντοπιστούν οι ομοιώτητες και οι διαφορές για την επιλογή μέσου μεταφοράς σε διάφορα αστικά περιβάλλοντα. Για τις αναλύσεις και την εκτίμηση των προτύπων χρησιμοποιούνται δεδομένα τα οποία συλλέχθηκαν απευθείας από εφήβους. Η έρευνα πραγματοποιήθηκε στην Ελλάδα και στην Κύπρο. Το δείγμα από την Ελλάδα αποτελείται από 3.293 εφήβους, ενώ της Κύπρου από 10.093 (21% του εφηβικού πληθυσμού της χώρας). Τέλος, τα αποτελέσματα της έρευνας προσφέρουν κατευθυντήριες γραμμές για τη διαμόρφωση στοχευμένων πολιτικών και εκστρατειών που ως στόχο έχουν την προώθηση της ενεργητικής μετακίνησης και την αύξηση της περιβαλοντολογικής ευαισθησίας των εφήβων, συμπεριφορές οι οποίες μπορούν να διατηρηθούν και κατά την ενήλικη ζωή τους

Car travel demand: spillovers and asymmetric price effects in a spatial setting

A novel analysis framework for the spatial aspects of car travel, measured by vehicle miles traveled (VMT), is introduced in this paper. The specification of a dynamic spatial Durbin model enables the analysis of VMT spatial spillovers and diffusion between neighboring areas in the short and long run. The framework is further developed to capture and introduce to a spatial setting potential asymmetry and hysteresis that can reflect reference dependence and habits. A panel data set is compiled at the subregional level, based on official car mileage recordings in England and Wales. In addition to the inelastic long-run responses of VMT to fuel price (−0.124) and income (0.116) changes, the results illustrate asymmetries and hysteresis in price elasticities with a significant spatial component. The impact magnitude on VMT from a number of factors, such as alternative fuel use, fuel deserts in rural areas, and road network and car fleet characteristics, is also estimated. The results are consistent with the car use saturation hypothesis through the positive impact of motorization rate to VMT. The negative effect of public transport infrastructure on car travel is only significant in the spatial models. The paper demonstrates the applicability and importance of spatial econometrics in transport research