Mobility on Demand (MOD) is a continuously growing factor in the transit world. Riders have the options to choose from taking services that transit agencies provide to MOD services such as car-sharing, scooters, bicycles and emmerging autonomous vehicles. With all these services, how are transit agencies working to incorporate emerging services within current systems?
How are transit agencies continuing bus operations and incorporating first-mile-last-mile services within their systems.
Making smart cities
Smart cities are aimed at making transportation an ease for those who rely on it. Buses remain an important cog in the smart city machine, with continued developing technologies, buses are an attractive choice for riders.
Jennifer McNeill, vice president of sales and marketing at New Flyer, on the role of buses in on-demand mobility explained, “We think that there is actually a real paradigm shift in North America towards this idea of mobility more as a service. More than a thought of I’m taking a bus or I’m taking a train or a taxi, people want to get from point A to point B. We are focusing on integrated mobility and supporting smart cities in that way.”
McNeill said that trends in ridership have a high variable. Some cities are seeing bus ridership decreasing, whereas others have seen an increase.
MOD partnerships
“We have been talking to some of our customers and we understand while ridesharing is defiantly on the rise we also understand that there have been demographic or other changes in their cities that require them to reimagine their transit system. A number of key cities like Los Angeles, Washington D.C. and others are actually going through this major change to redesign their mobility services,” said McNeill.
One clear leg up that transit services such as buses offer is the combination of reduced vehicles on the road and decreased emissions.
“Our infrastructure on our roads and our cities can’t really handle the congestion that would be created by a gazillion ridesharing services all running around the city doing MOD. The congestion and commute times would not get any better by that as a solution,” explained McNeil. “We think that the mobility as a service is going to include trains, and subways, ridesharing services, scooters and bicycles – and we think that buses will be included as well.”
In a moving city, not only is a decreased congestion easier for riders, but taking transit from their front doors, to the station and to work is too.
“At the end of the day I think the thing that people like about MOD is that they can be productive doing something else during the ride. We do think that all the vehicles that New Flyer, Motor Coach Industries and ARBOC manufacture are going to be part of mobility going forward. We just think of the shape of how mobility is offered to clients, whether via an app or a different way of finding your way from point A to B won’t change,” said McNeill.
Pilot programs to further develop connections
As MOD is an emmerging offering, transit agencies are working to plan how to best integrate on-demand mobility into current bus routes.
McNeill said that she is aware of a number of different agencies that are putting programs into place. There is a really profound push towards connected vehicles in AI and understanding ridership patterns and traffic patterns.”
The Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority (Metro) services a number of different counties, which covers a wide range of communities.
Joshua Schank, Chief Innovation Officer, Metro said, “There are two separate projects that we have for on-demand services, one is mobility on demand and the other is microtransit. MOD is a service that is designed to bring people from two or three different stations in L.A. County. It is an on-demand shared ride service and can only be used to and from the transit station, on one case it’s the bus, the other is light rail and heavy rail.”
Metro has areas in which it may be difficult for riders to reach their stations with ease.
“We picked those service areas specifically because people have challenges getting to and from those stations. This could be a better method for accessing those stations, especially for people that are low income, disabled or do not have smartphones. We’re opening up to all those groups,” Schank said. “We selected a specific service area boundaries that do not specifically compete with existing bus service, but are instead a new method of getting to and from the station. We worked with our service planning folks to make sure that we were not duplicating what was out there.”
L.A.’s microtransit program will launch in 2019.
“When it comes to microtransit it’s a separate project, we have not decided where those zones will be and what exactly it will look like, but part of what we’re doing on our NextGen bus study is looking at our network and deciding where does microtransit and how does microtransit fit in,” explained Schank. “We’re observing different parts of the county to see which service would be most appropriate for that part of the county.”
A more connected future
Schank explained that Metro is still in the experimentation phase of observing how on-demand mobility programs will fit in with the rest of the system. “My thinking has always been that the way this is going to work is through partnership between public and private sectors where we bring the best of both sides to deliver the best possible service. The private sector is inclined towards profit, but profit usually doesn’t include serving marginally inclined groups like the disabled or low income people or making sure that people who don’t have smartphones are served. This allows us to open into that demographic.”
Across the transportation industry, these programs will offer a glimpse into the future of how our cities will operate.
“The future is figuring out how the two sides can work together effectively.”
“At the end of the day transit agencies provide a really important service to communities and they’re looking for more ways to expand that service,” said McNeill.
