Sustainable Personal Mobility and Mobility as a Service (MaaS)

Impact of Private Cars on Environment

Sustainable personal mobility is an essential development goal (Sustainabledevelopmentun.org). Road transport makes a fifth of all UK  greenhouse emissions (Office for National Statistics, 2019) and private cars have a disproportionately damaging impact on the environment through the CO2 emissions of petrol and diesel cars (Lane and Potter, 2006). Only 5% of vehicles in circulation are ultralow emission vehicles (Ibid.). Even electric vehicles, although they are less polluting in their use phase, produce substantial environmental impacts in their material, manufacturing, and disposal (Patterson et al., 2011). In addition, even low emission vehicles pollute air and water resources with tyre and brake wear particles, which can be inhaled and may end up in the water cycle (Fuller, 2016). The number of private cars in circulation is an important factor in their environmental impact.

One possible strategy to reduce the environmental impact of personal transport is to encourage the diffusion of shared personal mobility, where travellers use vehicles that are shared with other consumers. One offering which enables shared mobility is Mobility as a Service (MaaS). MaaS consists of a personalised, one-stop travel management platform that digitally unifies trip creation, ticketing, and journey planning across all available modes of transport in an area, offering integration across public and private transport (Hoetal. 2018). A MaaS offering, Whim, is commercially available in Finland, enables users to manage travel through their smartphones and involves shared cars, bicycles, and public transport instead of driver only private cars.

In some cities in Finland, the use of private cars has fallen from 40% to 20% of travellers following the implementation of MaaS. A link to Whim’s activities can be found here: https://whimapp.com/uk/ (Links to an external site.) . MaaS had some success, but it is only used by a minority of users. In addition, as other forms of shared mobility, MaaS seems to present disproportionate risks to women’s personal safety. Indeed, there have been incidents where women have been harassed on diverse types of shared mobility, even by drivers, for example when using ?ber services (?ber is a platform that enables private individuals to offer rides at a charge). For this and other reasons, shared mobility faces resistance from an entrenched socio-technical regime featuring large organizations selling private cars to individuals who see their cars as a safe cocoon whilst they travel.

Sustainable and healthy food for communities - outline (formative assessment) Having considered the delay in implementation of MaaS and the issues identified, you are now required to investigate possible responses based on the theory discussed in this module.

These are the question below ; you can read the assignment brief attached below for more details . Having considered the delay in implementa1on of MAAS and the issues iden1fied, you are now required to investigate possible responses based on the theory discussed in this module Key.

Question: 1. What are the organizations Whim can set up relationships with, to aid the diffusion of their MaaS app in the UK?

Question: 2. How could strategic niches be formed and managed?

Question: 3. What issues could arise from managing strategic niches?