Welcome to the Shared-Use Mobility Center’s weekly guide to the most impactful news, thought-provoking articles and innovative technologies that are shaping our transportation future. We believe in sharing information, just like sharing cars, bikes, and scooters, so if there’s anything additional you’d like to see, just drop us a line.
Announcements
Early Bird Registration Extended Until Friday!
We want to give everyone the opportunity to register and save up to $100 on the foremost shared mobility summit in North America. This special pricing will end on Friday, January 10, 2020.
National Shared Mobility Summit
March 17 – 19, 2020 | Hyatt Regency McCormick Place, Chicago
RSVP for our TRB reception before we sell out!
Network with colleagues from the public sector, private sector, nonprofit, and university arenas at the Shared-Use Mobility Center’s TRB kick-off event on Sunday, January 12 at DC’s Baby Wale. You’ll be treated to drinks, appetizers, and brief, engaging speeches from SUMC and reception-sponsor Via.
Ridehailing/Carsharing/Carpooling
BMW Group- and Daimler-backed Share Now, formerly Car2Go, will be shutting down all of its North American operations on February 29 as well as Brussels, London, and Florence, citing volatile markets and rising infrastructure costs. And that’s not all, as Indianapolis’ electric carsharing service BlueIndy will also be shutting down with slow adoption rates and the region’s reliance on personal car use named as the culprit.
Officials in Arizona are hopeful about the results from a ridehailing service for Medicaid patients with non-emergency medical trips, but are still learning about the program’s ups and downs in getting the service right.
The Green Tech Education & Employment nonprofit is planning to set up a mobility hub in Sacramento’s Del Paso Heights area with electric vehicle fast chargers, a connecting transit stop with EV buses, and an EV/hydrogen ridehailing service to offer clean alternatives for low-income residents.
Partnerships and Programs
Downtown Brooklyn could become more pedestrian and bike-friendly thanks to a green new plan from The Downtown Brooklyn Partnership that redesigns a 240-acre area.
Governor Cuomo struck down a bill that would have legalized electric bikes and scooters in New York due to, “the lack of a mandatory helmet requirement and other safety concerns.” This bill would have been a historic step forward in decreasing the state’s reliance on solo car trips and needs to be signed into law.
Dakota County, MN has a 6-month pilot program that makes free bus rides available for people to get to public county services like court appointments and meetings with social workers.
Virginia is making big moves in electrification with 50 new electric school buses from Thomas Built Buses, the largest single order of EV school buses to date.Phase two of the EV bus replacement program will add an additional 1,005 buses between 2021 and 2025.
Bikesharing and Micromobility
The momentum of e-bikes is an exciting development that has a real chance at taking people away from auto dependency, if cities can prepare for the radical shifts needed in regulation and infrastructure to make it happen.
Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo’s plan to ramp up cycling infrastructure, called Plan Vélo, is steadily moving towards its goal of 870 miles of bike lanes as eager Parisians have been pedaling on and boosting bike use in the capital by 54% since 2018.
Dockless scooters are coming to Chandler, AZ after the City Council approved a one-year pilot that would allow up to 150 scooters per company.
Can shared e-bikes help break the stranglehold that cars have on commuting in the US? Transportation tech company BOND Mobility thinks so, if they are fast and on-demand.
Transit
San Fernando Valley, CA, has big plans to make much-needed public transit improvements. On the docket: getting the Sepulveda Transit Corridor rail project underway and upgrading the Orange Line BRT in LA with grade separations and EV buses.
The Federal Highway Administration has approved a change in its traffic control manual for city streets that will officially allow the use of red paint for bus lanes without going through a special approval process. Three cheers for transit-dedicated bus lanes. Break out the paint!
Germany is dropping the fares of long-distance rail trips by 10%, which hasn’t been done in about 17 years, in an attempt to boost train travel in the country as part of a new climate protection measure.
The Port Authority in Pennsylvania is making its real-time bus crowding data, which is gathered by infrared lasers on each bus, completely accessible to the public online and via mobile apps to help riders see how full the bus is along specific routes.
Technology
OurStreets is a crowdsourced traffic data app that will help residents in DC report and document traffic and street violations to enforcement agencies for a more community-focused approach in ticketing bad actors.
A new study from Cornell University details the benefits of autonomous vehicles in cities but warns that the traffic-calming and safety effects would be lost unless cities upgrade their street infrastructure with smart tech that can talk to AVs.
Dubai is looking to the future of electric and autonomous vehicles with the government supporting EV charging infrastructure development for a more sustainable transportation ecosystem.
Hey Alexa, where’s my bus? A new feature in the open-source OneBusAway app crafted by a researcher from the University of Florida now enables real-time bus stop and route updates in Amazon’s Alexa and recognizes different voices for multi-user transit households.
Urban Sustainability
2019 saw a massive movement in cities to combat climate change with some metros making bold promises to go emissions free in a few years, ramping up plans to electrify their bus transit fleets and passing congestion pricing proposals. Let’s hope these trends continue and grow in 2020.
Since 2009, pedestrian deaths on highways have risen 60%, while fatalities on all roads are up 53%. Streets need more pedestrian-friendly design and infrastructure that makes room for everyone, in order for us all to have a safe, multimodal future.
Get ready for a car-lite thoroughfare as Market Street in San Francisco will be officially closed off to most civilian vehicle traffic starting January 29. Transit, bikes, taxis, and paratransit vehicles will still be allowed.
From delivery vehicles to transit buses to consumer cars, the electrification of transportation will be a large trend in 2020 with cities, governments, and companies racing to charge up as pollution gets worse across the board.
Requests for Proposals, Inquiries, and Information
RFQ: Broadway Project
City of Shawnee, Oklahoma
Shawnee, Oklahoma
Deadline: January 17, 2020
RFP: Florence-Firestone Transit Oriented District Specific Plan and Program Environmental Impact Report
Los Angeles County Department of Regional Planning
Los Angeles, California
Deadline: January 22, 2020
RFQ: District 1 Neighborhood Plan
City of Clive, Iowa
Clive, Iowa
Deadline: January 22, 2020
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