The impact of emerging technologies on the transport system

At the request of the European Parliament’s Committee on Transport and Tourism, CE Delft and TNO have provided a review of Smart Mobility and the underlying emerging technologies as well as their impacts on the transport system and society at large. The main challenges for deployment of Smart Mobility applications are identified and (policy) actions defined that can be taken to address these challenges.

The combined development of various emerging technologies like smart sensors, connectivity, blockchain, big data and artificial intelligence is boosting innovation in Smart Mobility, a development likely to accelerate in the coming decade as the technologies become more mature. The applications projected to have the greatest impact on the transport sector and society at large are Cooperative Intelligent Transport Systems (C-ITS), Connected Cooperative Automated Mobility (CCAM), Mobility as a Service (MaaS) and Self-organising Logistics (SoL).

Smart Mobility is expected to have significant benefits for individual transport users, including increased comfort and lower costs. For society as a whole, too, there may be significant benefits: a reduction of GHG emissions, for example, and improved traffic safety. To what extent this potential will materialise depends on design, implementation and government action on legislation, funding, piloting and public-private cooperation. If suitably managed, Smart Mobility options will prove beneficial, but otherwise they may find little or no application and may even have certain negative impacts. At present, moreover, the only available evidence on impacts is from small-scale pilots, scenario studies and stated preferences studies. There are therefore still major uncertainties on the actual impacts of Smart Mobility and further research including large-scale pilots is required.