Designing for Sustainable Urban Mobility Behaviour: A Systematic Review of the Literature

Abstract

Urban mobility poses one of the pressing challenges in cities undergoing growing urbanisation. In order to cope with this issue, a shift in behaviour is necessary towards more sustainable means of transportation. Technology can mediate the process of behaviour change, and concepts such as persuasive technology and reflective learning are approaches in this context. In order to investigate currently envisioned or implemented technological solutions, particular in the context of the smart city notion, this paper presents a systematic literature review. Three areas are thereby of interest: the utilised technology, behaviour change strategies, and citizen participation in the development process of the interventions. A total of 14 different applications were included in the final review. The findings show that mobile devices are being prevalently used, persuasive strategies are foremost mentioned, and end-user involvement is happening late in the development process and serves primarily testing purposes. This points out that there are still various unexplored possibilities in the aforementioned areas. It is suggested that future research should explore opportunities stemming from ubiquitous technology, employ behaviour change strategies grounded in reflective learning, and approach the current shortcomings in citizen involvement with participatory methods. IntroductionCities are increasingly gaining in importance and are considered driving forces of the future [1]. This development stems foremost from growing urbanisation, with more and more people moving and living in urban areas. As of 2016, 54.5% of the world's population were estimated to be living in urban settlements, current trends forecast an increase to 60% in 2030 [28]. Rapid growth assigns cities a significant social, economic and environmental function [1], but also lets them face complex challenges in the process. In this context, the concept of "smart cities" has been coined to indicate cities that devise strategies to mitigate those challenges in a smart way [12]. Some of these challenges are indicated by greenhouse gas emissions. According to Hildermeier and Villareal [18], urban transport makes up approximately a quarter of CO 2 emissions with respect to overall transport. With 73.7% cars represent thereby the prevalent form of travel. Urban transport hence exerts ample influence on the quality of life in a city, being a causer of traffic congestion, noise-and air pollution [18], having harmful effects on public health. Consequently, cities need to respond to this issue by reducing car usage and increasing the utilisation of more sustainable means of urban mobility, such as walking, biking or public transportation, in other words a change in behaviour is inevitable. Technology is noted for being a "key driver" within smart city initiatives [12]. It can also be utilised to foster behaviour change, here the notion of "persuasive technology" is well-established. Persuasive technology, that is "any interactive computing system designed to change people's...

Sustainable Mobility: A Review of Possible Actions and Policies

“…In the literature, several reviews can be found on sustainable mobility or some of its single topics; limiting to some of the most recent ones only, here we refer to [4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18]. In [4], the effects of technology on promoting the shift in behavior towards sustainable transportation modes are investigated. Gonzales Aregall et al [5] reviewed green port strategies for reducing negative externalities on hinterlands.…”

Tiles-Reflection: Designing for Reflective Learning and Change Behaviour in the Smart City

“…In a previous work, we surveyed technological applications for behaviour change in the city [16]. A systematic literature review was conducted, exploring previously envisioned or implemented solutions, addressing urban mobility behaviour change.…”

“…Participatory design approaches facilitate democratization of design, empower people, and not least, emphasize diversity in the groups they include [26]. However, user involvement in the development of behaviour change applications is scarce in the smart city domain [16,28], as well as in other research fields concerned with sustainability themes [4]. Only a small percentage of works report the adoption of participatory design methods, or other forms of user engagement, during the design phase of the applications.…”

“…The work presented in this paper aims to facilitate end-user participation in the design of behaviour change applications for cities, which utilize IoT as mediating technology, and reflective learning as behaviour change strategy. This is motivated by a systematic review of urban mobility behaviour change applications, which highlighted several opportunities in areas of technology usage, behaviour change strategies, and enduser participation in the design and development process of such applications [16].…”

“…Slow change acknowledges that change may take a long time, being an endless and difficult process that should not be forced on people, essentially requiring people to take the first step [29]. Recalling identified issues of persuasion [16], reflection may prove as an alternative strategy for behaviour change. Reflection has been described as having a strong social dimension and being often accomplished collaboratively [17].…”