Flexible and environmentally friendly ways of getting around are the building blocks of a smart city. There’s a lot more to smart mobility than cars that can drive themselves.
Smart mobility encompasses cars, public transportation, biking, and even walking. The goal is to use multiple modes of transportation alongside cars and, ideally, replace gasoline-powered vehicles in favor of electrified ones.
This multi-modal approach requires a wide variety of technologies to work in tandem so that people and goods can move seamlessly between different modes in a timely and orderly fashion while also reducing the overall environmental footprint. Autonomous vehicles and even whole fleets must be managed and guided while also having the necessary infrastructure to support electrification and optimal paths for travel.
Aside from leveraging existing and emerging technologies, smart mobility creates new usage models and alters the traditional roles of vehicles, including the increasingly electrified and autonomous car.
Smart mobility is socially beneficial
Regardless of the mode of transportation, smart mobility is guided by five key principles: clean technology, efficiency, flexibility, integration, and safety.
The electrification of vehicles meets the clean technology criteria, as a goal of smart mobility is to move away from vehicles that cause pollution and achieve a target of zero emissions. Reducing gasoline-powered cars need not be inconvenient, either. The multi-modal approach of smart mobility is about making the movement of people and goods more efficient and more flexible. The right mode of transportation for the right trip means travelers get to their destination as quickly as possible with minimal disruptions. Smart integration means that using two different modes of transportation for a trip is still efficient — you can easily hop from local public transit onto an intercity train, for example, and go from one downtown core to another.
All this is designed to be done safely to reduce transportation-related injuries and fatalities, as well as improve accessibility and affordability — there’s a social benefit to smart mobility, not just an environmental benefit. It also changes how we use existing modes of transportation.
Cars are changing direction
Smart mobility is about picking the optimum mode of transportation for any given trip, which sometimes means getting people out of their cars and onto something less traditional, such as a scooter, or having them opt for public transit more often because it’s more reliable and more widespread.
For the car in particular, electrification to meet the clean technology criteria of smart mobility is the obvious change, while autonomous capabilities allow for better integration with a smart city to improve the efficiency and safety. But because smart mobility is multi-modal, usage models for the car will change, too. It will mean people are less likely to own a car and instead opt for an on-demand model, wherein they are able to easily access a vehicle as required with a mileage-based pricing scheme.
Another emerging model is car sharing, in which multiple people own and use a single vehicle as well as continued use of ride-sharing services.
This shift in car usage will likely see more of an uptick in urban areas, especially if remote work and “hybrid offices” become the new normal, as many people will see less of a need to drive a vehicle except for specific types of trips. The cars that will remain on the road will be more autonomous and more integrated with the environment around them — smart mobility is also part of the evolution toward a smart city.
Getting people out of cars has always required a reliable public transportation system, and an integrated one is the hallmark of a smart city. Multi-modal mobility requires that municipalities improve infrastructure and create larger, eco-friendly, and energy-efficient public transit fleets, including buses, streetcars, light rail transit, and even subways where feasible. Smart public transit systems need to serve everyone in the community if they’re to reduce traffic congestion from cars and connect people easily to other modes of transit, including rail and air when people want to leave the city.
Conversely, hyper-local smart mobility can mean getting people onto smaller vehicles, such as e-bikes or bicycles. It may not even involve a vehicle at all. Walkable cities where people can live, work, and play are just as much a part of the smart mobility equation, intersecting with ride sharing, bike sharing, and public transit options. The smartphone connected to a smart city plays a role in allowing citizens to plan out their travels because it allows them to map out their best route and select the optimal mode, whether or not that means getting behind the wheel of their car.
It’s not just about movement
Although cars will remain part of the smart mobility model, they will be increasingly electrified, autonomous, and shared. They will also be safer because their inherent intelligence will enable them to receive traffic updates in real time, while sensors and cameras will significantly improve safety. “Range anxiety,” the concern that an electric vehicle won’t have enough power to get to its destination, will be quelled by charging infrastructure that’s as ubiquitous as gas stations are today.
But smart mobility is just as much about parking as it is about driving. Many municipalities are leveraging data and technology to make their traffic and parking management systems smarter, and that means reducing available parking to encourage fewer single-car trips during peak hours while also making sure the use of existing parking spaces is maximized. In addition, those who prefer driving may find themselves paying for more as smart cities use technology to adjust parking fees based on demand, congestion, and even air pollution. Just as ride-sharing services have surge pricing during peak demand, so will parking spots. Mobile and in-vehicle apps enable drivers to easily find parking while reducing the number of vehicles vying for parking.
Smart mobility in a smart city requires that this intelligence be integrated, and that requires a variety of existing and emerging technologies.
Smart mobility is fueled by connectivity and data
Because smart mobility is dependent on data, secure and reliable connectivity is critical for sharing the data that makes flexible, multi-modal transportation possible. Without real-time, accurate data, citizens can’t plan their routes, and municipalities can’t predict demand and adjust service levels or efficiently deploy public transit fleets. Moving data is essential for optimizing the movement of people and vehicles of all kinds.
That means network infrastructure needs to be fully available to allow information to be collected, shared, and analyzed in real time. The integrity of this data must be maintained if it’s to be used in any decision-making, especially when safety is a factor. Privacy of data must also be ensured, as citizens’ personal data and their activity helps to inform smart mobility planning and implementations. Any network infrastructure that enables smart mobility will undoubtedly leverage the performance and flexibility of 5G.
Reliable and comprehensive network coverage is necessary for residents to access connected devices and vehicles and enables operators to manage fleets of vehicles more effectively, including predictive maintenance and electric vehicle charging.
When data isn’t in motion, it’s being stored and analyzed — sometimes at a central location in a traditional data center environment but just as often at the edge, where smart mobility is happening. Artificial intelligence using computer-vision technologies for inference tasks inhabits millions of devices at the edge to collect, analyze, and share information that helps citizens plot routes and choose their mode of transportation, while a smart city is continually built with the data collected as its foundation.
Technologies that enable data storage and movement, as well as those that help to derive insights from that data, all play a part in the smart mobility ecosystem. Intelligent, multi-modal transportation that includes walking and biking is an essential building block of a smart city that improves the quality of life for all residents and the health of the environment.
