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
Did you miss SUMC’s webinar on Objective-Driven Data Sharing for Transit Agencies in Mobility Partnerships?
View the webinar here. You can also read the white paper it supports, which draws on lessons learned from the Federal Transit Administration’s MOD Sandbox program and beyond to help transit agencies determine the right data-sharing approach for their projects.
SUMC Summer in Chicago Open House
New MOD Learning Center Case Study
The Shared-Use Mobility Center and Todd Hansen of the Texas A&M Transportation Institute collaborated on a case study about the Norwalk Transit District Wheels2U microtransit service in Norwalk, CT. Wheels2U, which uses branded complementary paratransit vehicles while they are not in service, built a wide base of support in part through innovative marketing initiatives.
Read about what they did and program outcomes on the MOD Learning Center.
Ridehailing/Carsharing/Carpooling
Uber puts diversity, inclusion, and equity goals on the agenda at last, aiming to boost the representation and promotion of POC employees to 14% in three years.
A new bill in Massachusetts aims to collect more detailed data from ridehailing services and sets provisions to improve safety for passengers. Meanwhile, Axios warns about the privacy and security concerns around ridehailing apps having too much access to transit data, touching on the industry’s shift into mobility-as-a-service and how that could create a complicated relationship with transportation data as a whole.
Chinese mobility giant Didi will now feature other ridehailing companies in its app, a first for a TNC.
Partnerships and Programs
More for the streets, less for the roads. The Complete Streets Act recently introduced in Congress wants to make states set aside “five percent of federal highway funds for complete streets programs.”
In the face of rising housing costs and the evolution of on-demand mobility, Minneapolis is developing a 10-year Transportation Action Plan to put equity and access at the forefront of the region’s transportation goals.
Lyft has a new program that helps late-night restaurant workers in Boston get home through subsidized ridehailing trips when transit isn’t running.
Transportation solutions company First Transit has partnered with Lyft to pilot on-demand, wheelchair-accessible trips in Los Angeles and San Francisco—all through the Lyft app.
Bikesharing and Micromobility
Mobility data company Passport is teaming up with Detroit, MI, Charlotte, NC, and Omaha, NE to test a structured parking management and distribution system for Spin dockless scooters to fine-tune scooter placement and fleet sizes.
Baton Rouge officially launched its bikeshare system with mobility operator Gotcha, bringing the city 500 electric pedal-assist bikes at 50 docks.
Speaking of Gotcha, the company also rode into Syracuse where it launched 200 of its pedal-assist bikes at 35 docks in the New York college town.
The first EV scooter-sharing program in Western Canada has arrived! Micromobility company OGO Scooters launched its dockless scooter service in Kelowna, BC.
Transit
The public and private sectors both need to improve their systems to help people with disabilities get accessible and reliable on-demand rides. People in Pittsburgh have found that local paratransit, along with ridehailing services, just don’t cut it.
Chicago’s Pace transit is banking on new rail-like features for its Pulse bus line, such as platform-level boarding and traffic signal priority, to speed up a busy route and grow ridership in a time when bus ridership is stunted around the US.
Staten Island officials pen a letter to Governor Cuomo asking to expand transportation options in the area with a microtransit pilot to complement current transit options.
Transit is more than just a means to get around. It ties together a community and creates better social connections according to a new working paper coming from the National Bureau of Economic Research.
Technology
Ford and Volkswagen will be sharing the drivers seat in an alliance announced earlier this year to work on autonomous and electric vehicle developmentthrough VW’s MEB electric platform and Ford’s self-driving tech subsidiary Argo AI.
Ridehailing company Via is working with local bus operator BusBot to launch an autonomous shuttle program in New South Wales, Australia with EasyMile self-driving vehicles.
The US Transportation Research Center has unveiled a 540-acre test site in Ohio to work on the development of autonomous and connected vehicles and other mobility technologies.
San Antonio has new, state-of-the-art Smart City Kiosks that incorporate smart screen tech to help people with multimodal trip planning and find real-time traffic and transit information.
Urban Sustainability
In a city super-dense city with high transit use, why are cyclist deaths for 2019 already almost double the entire 2018 count? Overlooked biking infrastructure and pedestrian/cyclist safety measures are two roots of the problem.
One big opportunity that could speed up the transition away from gas-powered transportation and into a more electrified future with more robust public transportation: the Green New Deal.
Two wheels will always be better than four. A new study from the UK’s Center for Research into Energy Demand Solutions found that electric bikes would be better fit for fighting urban traffic, sprawl, and social health than EV cars.
Let’s take a cue from Amsterdam. In the US, motor vehicle crashes are the #1 cause of death of children 19 years old and under yet a lot of parents still choose to drive their kids to school everyday. How does a city like Amsterdam like to take its kids to school? Bikes, of course.
Requests for Proposals, Qualifications, or Information
RFP: City: One Indianapolis Challenge
Indianapolis, Indiana
Deadline: August 6, 2019
RFP: Proposals for Paratransit Services
Hampton Roads Transit, Virginia
Deadline: August 8, 2019
RFP: Gateway Station District Development
City of Charlotte, NC
Deadline: September 11, 2019
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