Tailor-made “Mobility-as-a-Service”

MaaS stands for “Mobility-as-a-Service”. The concept integrates various types of mobility services – such as public transport, car sharing, bike sharing, e-scooters, taxis and even air travel – into a single digital mobility platform, and can contribute in this way to the transformation of the transport sector. The Whim app is one of these platforms and currently provides its services in seven regions of the world. In Berlin, the main public transport company Berliner Verkehrsbetriebe (VBB) has teamed up with a number of partners to launch the Jelbi app. This also shows how MaaS is always organised differently according to where it is being used.

In the seminar Open MaaS L.A.B.S. @Futurium – Developing Mobility in an Open and Socially Relevant Way, which was led by Professor Dr Antje Michel together with Futurium’s Rosalina Babourkova and Jasmin Minges, students at the University of Applied Sciences Potsdam dealt with the issue of mobility as a service. The goal was to explain the MaaS principle to laypersons – in the most simple and plausible way possible. The students opted for a visual approach in the form of a decision game – in line with the interactive narrative style of the Futurium exhibition. The seminar produced three everyday stories in comic-book format.

The Idea: visitors were asked by means of a tablet application to head off with the characters Emilia, Luca and Mina on a journey, during which they were asked to make decisions about how the three should move around and, just in passing, got to learn how MaaS functions. “The students gave us some exciting impulses, which helped us further develop the exhibition on the topic of mobility. We found it particularly enriching to embed the concept in the everyday stories of young people,” says Jasmin Minges about the cooperation.

Here’s one of the comics as an example: go on a journey with Emilia and her friends and click through the MaaS story!

Professor Antje Michel and Christian Berkes from the University of Applied Sciences Potsdam are MaaS experts. They form the University of Applied Sciences Potsdam’s project team in the large consortium project “MaaS L.A.B.S.” (2019–2023, funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research). The research project aims to make the cities of Potsdam and Cottbus fit for the transformation of the transport sector by offering innovative and digitally linked mobility services. For this purpose, over a period of three years, the cities will become living laboratories for the testing of software, new transport systems and incentive structures aimed at changing people’s behaviour towards a more climate-friendly mobility.

Study: Digital Traces Potsdam

The study Digitale Spuren Potsdam (Digital Traces Potsdam) conducted by the University of Applied Sciences Potsdam, the University of Siegen and the German Aerospace Center (DLR) used the DLR Moving Lab Appin a mixed-methods approach to collect data on the mobility behaviour of Potsdam’s residents. For 29 days, 32 participants were digitally traced – on a total of 495 trips with 2,034 stages. They used a total of six different means of transport, including public transport, bicycle, car and ferry.

Even though the data is not representative for Potsdam, the study provided interesting insights: “Although the car is a frequently used means of transport – at 31 per cent or nearly a third of all trips – more than half of the participants regard their private car as a luxury good that they don’t necessarily need, and they consider cycling or walking as alternatives,” says Antje Michel. From this, it can be deduced that the car is also used for short trips. “That’s a good starting point for the in-depth development of residential neighbourhoods through climate-friendly mobility services, such as public transport, as well as the creation of a good infrastructure for cycling and walking,” adds Christian Berkes, Academic Assistant in the MaaS L.A.B.S. project.

Interesting results have also emerged from the operation of travel information systems: while participants on familiar routes tended to use local information systems (such as the public transport “VBB app”) – that is, if they used anything at all – they consulted global information systems (such as Google Maps) more frequently for routes that were new to them, and they usually did so fewer than 30 minutes before the trip. Michel: “This suggests that travel information and booking systems that are developed for specific areas and with the participation of users – such as MaaS offerings – could definitely find a ready market.”

However, app developers should consider very carefully which features they want to offer, analysing for this purpose where there might be gaps in the services offered by global information systems. “Our answer to this, which we're working hard on right now, is to make plain to locals – to really put it right up front – that the mobility services on offer through the app are of a local nature.”

Open MaaS for everyone?

“MaaS has already left the laboratory stage,” says Christian Berkes. “The global MaaS market is expected to see large increases in the coming years.” However, Christian Berkes doesn’t expect there to be just one single, unified MaaS concept for the whole of Germany: “At least we hope not, because it wouldn’t make sense on account of the different local conditions and also because we shouldn’t become too dependent on individual IT providers.”

Even for rural areas, MaaS concepts are conceivable and are in fact already being tested. However, the underlying assumption is always that the available public transport system must be solid and reliable. This needs to be analysed in advance. “Let’s take the district of Teltow-Fläming as an example,” Michel suggests. In this area south of Berlin, two regional railway lines run parallel from the capital towards the south. Since 2006, new public mobility services have been established as cross-connections between the two railway lines. This on-demand bus service is constantly being expanded. In addition, people can use bike sharing, e-bike sharing or car sharing services, which, however, are not yet fully developed. “The region doesn’t have a single integrated MaaS offering yet, but there are several apps for these services and there’s definitely real potential,” Michel is convinced.

The professor of information didactics and knowledge transfer emphasises that MaaS alone cannot contribute to climate protection: “Rather, the introduction of a MaaS offering needs a clear, climate-focused objective to ensure that incentive schemes such as rebates don’t have counter-productive consequences, as for instance they would if people were to prefer to use car sharing rather than the on-demand bus.”