Key points from the MOBI-MIX MaaS scene insight report
27/07/2021
The Sustainable & Smart Mobility Strategy sets a high ambition for the EU: by 2030, European passengers should have access to seamless multimodal transport, facilitated by integrated electronic ticketing. To reach this goal, Mobility as a Service (MaaS) solutions will play an important role.
MaaS represents the integration of different forms of transport services (public & shared transport, parking, etc.) in a joint digital channel (e.g., a smartphone app). Depending on the integration level, MaaS enables users to plan, book, and pay for multiple types of mobility services. Unlike traditional transport services, MaaS offers an opportunity to approach mobility from the user's perspective, matching individual travel needs with customised mobility packages. Like other mobility solutions, its positive impacts are intricately connected to the quality of infrastructure, policy, and communication.
The MOBI-MIX MaaS Insight Report - the first of a series of four reports - compiles a state-of-the-art outlook on the potential impact of MaaS on urban environments. The report draws from previous European projects and publications, as well as interviews with MaaS experts and practitioners from across Europe. It investigates the MaaS ecosystem and its potential configurations, the roles and interests of different stakeholders, as well as some crucial considerations that make MaaS affordable, resilient and sustainable.
The report also contextualises the Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans (SUMP) principles within MaaS, and offers some ways to analyse a city's readiness for MaaS. Seven case studies – Nijmegen, Ghent, Madrid, Budapest, Gothenburg, Helsinki, and Antwerp – depict different applications and lessons learned from across Europe.
Key Takeaways
MaaS requires a well-functioning hard infrastructure (public transport, active & shared mobility), to be part of the solutions for decarbonising transport.
Local authorities & public transport authorities are generally seen as trusted partners.
Local authorities should set certain policy goals or requirements for MaaS, to ensure affordability and sustainability
Stakeholders are willing to participate and invest in a pilot project for experimentation and learning purposes, but pilots might be short-lived.
Technology is almost never the biggest issue, the will to collaborate or the lack of trust can be.
Data should primarily be collected at mobility provider level/street level, and not only at MaaS level, as the latter offers primarily insights into multimodal travel.
MaaS in MOBI-MIX
The MOBI-MIX project supports five European cities to plan, implement and analyse their mobility solutions, aiming to decarbonise road transport and reduce private cars. Among the partner cities, Antwerp is working with three different MaaS operators to implement business-to-business MaaS pilots. MaaS operators are mainly targeting companies that offer their employees' mobility budgets and company cars, although other companies can join, too. The overall aim is to reduce car use, through different approaches and incentives:
Bonus for action (rewards for not using parking spots or for choosing to carpool)
Gamification (integrated games and rewarding elements)
Trial offers for using alternative services to private cars.
The public authority plays an important role as an enabler, having integrated the MaaS pilots in the city's multimodal route planner, Smart Ways to Antwerp. Through it, the city facilitates the communication and connection with local private businesses. Besides, Antwerp has also hosted a webinar during which the MaaS operators promoted their products to different companies.
The pilots last for 18 months, and each operator must report a series of KPIs to ensure milestones are reached. In addition, Antwerp will conduct surveys, to better understand mobility behaviour and how to continue reducing private car use. One of the main objectives of the MOBI-MIX project is to develop a method for evaluating and monitoring the impact of shared mobility and MaaS solutions. This has been a challenge until now, yet a tentative exploratory analysis conducted for the MaaS B2B pilots in Antwerp suggests a potential carbon reduction between 154 and 373 tonnes of CO2 per year. These results will be validated in the following impact assessment stages. The validation will use survey data that tracks users and non-users, before and after the pilots, to produce robust causal impact estimates.
The insight report was developed by Laura Babío (POLIS) and Lorena Axinte (Bax & Company), drawing on a longer study led by Hossein Azadi, Corneel Casier, Tom Storme & Frank Witlox (Ghent University).