Ensuring a reliable and well-functioning mobility supply can pose serious challenges, especially for rural districts and municipalities – because it is not only an essential criterion for the attractiveness of rural areas, but also a task of public services. But what form of mobility do citizens actually want? How do they currently “get around” and how would they like to do so in the future? Can they imagine using digital tools to organise their individual mobility?
These are the central questions of the “OhneAutoMobil_OPR” project, which is being funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) as part of the federal “MobilitätsWerkStadt2025” competition. The aim of the project is to make local public transport in the district of Ostprignitz-Ruppin (OPR) more flexible and demand-oriented and to use the possibilities of digitalisation to achieve this.
As a scientific partner, aconium GmbH is determining and analysing the demand and acceptance of the district’s population for demand-oriented forms of mobility as part of the project. The study focuses firstly on the district town of Neuruppin and secondly on the sparsely populated surrounding area to the south of the district town, the so-called “Horstdörfer”, and thus on two structurally very different study areas.
In a predominantly online survey, citizens were asked about their general mobility behavior, but also about their wishes, expectations and needs with regard to a demand-oriented on-demand service. This form of mobility offers great potential, especially for rural areas, and is already being implemented in more remote areas of the OPR district in the form of on-demand buses. However, the buses still stop at fixed stops and have to be ordered by telephone. In the future, they will also be able to run without stops and thus pick up passengers with complete flexibility. At the same time, digital booking of the on-demand service is to be made possible via an app.
The adaptation of the corresponding legal framework expected by many players in the mobility industry through an amendment to the Passenger Transportation Act (PBefG) could also establish such on-demand operations as part of general scheduled services.
The results of the population survey show clear trends. In general, 83% of respondents in the Horst villages would be willing to use an on-demand bus that can be ordered digitally. In addition, 75% could also imagine using a driverless autonomous bus – a technology that could help to increase services in the medium term while reducing personnel costs for the leading transport companies.
In Neuruppin, around two thirds of respondents could also imagine using an on-demand bus – even if it were an autonomous bus.
However, the analysis also shows some notable differences between the two test areas (urban and rural). In the district town of Neuruppin, for example, the bicycle dominates as the preferred mode of transport – even ahead of the car – while in the Horst villages it plays a comparatively subordinate role. In contrast, most households in the very sparsely populated Horst villages often have two cars at their disposal, whereas in Neuruppin one car per household tends to “suffice”.
The detailed evaluation of the population survey will be incorporated into a feasibility study prepared by aconium GmbH, which will also contain specific recommendations for the design of the corresponding on-demand services in the areas surveyed.
The aim of the funding project is to successfully submit an application for a second project phase, in which the mobility concepts developed will be implemented and evaluated in an experimental setting from June 2021.
Further information on the project can also be found at: https://mobil-opr.de/