International Experiences on Public Transport Provision in Rural Areas

Abstract

We are currently seeing a major change in the perception of 'public transport'. Development of open data and mobile information platforms are changing the way consumers conceive public transport services. Car-sharing and ride-sharing have gained ground in recent years and are being considered as real options for public transport service provision. Also new actors and innovative services are accessing the public transport market. Current legislation needs to be reconsidered in the light of these new services, enabling innovation while ensuring privacy and safety, among others. Demand-responsive transport is seen as one of the key options to meet public transport challenges in rural areas. Demand-responsive transport is considered particularly suitable for rural areas because of its flexibility, and ability to adapt to local needs. While on cost per trip basis it may be more expensive than 'conventional' public transport, experiences indicate a willingness for both car users and existing bus users to use these services at a higher fare than existing bus fares. However, demand-responsive services should be part of a broader, multimodal package of solutions, supplementing regular public transport services. Significant scope still exists for 'conventional' public transport. International experiences show that improving service quality, marketing and information provision can increase number of passengers and reinforce the commercial viability of the industry. Conventional public transport is not suited for all links and public transport provision in rural areas should be part of a broader transport strategy, integrated with local or regional transport plans. It is important to identify publicly funded minimum service levels regionally and locally. New forms of services should complement the conventional transport providing feeder traffic to strategically defined critical links. Better coordination between different types of services is required. This includes pooling of passengers, opening up special transport services to public and common planning and purchasing of publicly funded transport services. Transport services are currently administered, purchased and financed by several different authorities. There is a significant potential for savings and economies of scale through better coordination of these transport services, enabling also a more efficient use of the existing vehicle capacity. Relaxing quantitative taxi regulation can enable new innovative solutions. Taxis are an important complement to regular scheduled public transport services in many countries. International evidence suggests that restricting taxi numbers through quantitative regulation constitutes an unnecessary restriction on competition and reduces economic welfare. Removing supply restrictions have resulted in increased taxi numbers, reduced prices and reduced waiting times while also enabling a number of new innovative services to develop.

Regulation and governance supporting systemic MaaS innovations

“…Both the notion of the need to own a car and the role of public transport in daily mobility are undergoing a transition. Especially the development of open data and mobile information platforms are changing consumer perceptions of public transport services (ITF, 2015). For example, the rising popularity of carsharing (Shaheen & Cohen, 2016) in Europe has added real options for customers in supplementing mass transit services.…”

“…MaaS in this paper is used to describe the change from mobility as self-service and from the independent development of different transportation modes to genuinely integrated mobility made possible by new digital services. Currently, private MaaS operators are starting new service offerings in urban areas with larger customer bases, but private demand-responsive transport can also be seen as one of the key options to meet transport challenges in rural areas (ITF, 2015;Hazan et al, 2016). Regions and countries with strong natural transportation monopolies have witnessed a similar increase in ondemand mobility services, but they are often part of the service offering of these natural monopolies (e.g.…”