Shift2Rail’s (now Europe’s Rail) Innovation Program 4 (IP4) – a framework addressing and designing IT solutions for attractive railway services – has the ambition of making rail the true backbone of the (multimodal) transport system. Within IP4, the IP4MaaS research project – in which FIT Consulting is a partner – has sought to advance Mobility as a Service (MaaS) in Europe by available IP4 MaaS technologies in six demonstration sites in Europe: Padua, Barcelona, Athens, Warsaw, Osijek and Liberec, with the goal of creating and testing an improved multimodal travel system that would make daily travel more sustainable, flexible, and efficient for passengers, thereby reducing road congestion and contributing to the reduction of gas emissions.
The project, coordinated by UITP, involved a total of 26 partners, including numerous public transport operators and car sharing providers, for a total investment of 2.5 million euros over the two and a half years planned for its implementation.
The feedback from the IP4MaaS evaluation, gathered from all actors involved, led to the overall recommendation that the users’ mobility experience is closely linked to the availability of effective digital applications. However, to encourage consumers to change their habits and leave their comfort zone, defining a level of convenience for the change is needed.
IP4MaaS proved that the idea of integrating TSPs within a large and EU-wide network such as the IP4 could create the ideal conditions to promote this behavioural change and overcome some of the current barriers for a large-scale MaaS adoption. The evaluation methodology designed and applied in the project may act as a reference for future assessments when implementing complex mobility scenarios within EU cities.
The IP4MaaS project helped connect TSPs, travellers and their needs to the technologies developed within Shift2Rail. The project successfully organised demonstration activities in six European locations, involving both more-traditional and innovative transport modes. It also tested the IT solutions developed within Shift2Rail with hundreds of users in different contexts, allowing the project to test the technology and collect direct feedback from real travellers and TSPs. This in turn allowed CFMs to improve the ecosystem and make an additional step towards achieving the Shift2Rail (now Europe’s Rail) ambition of affirming rail as the backbone of the (multimodal) transport system in Europe.
The results of the project are published in the Project Brief available by clicking here.
The Outreach, Transferability and Recommendations handbook is also available; click here to download it.
For more information visit www.ip4maas.eu.
