Single, seamless app is wave of travel future, TransLink CEO says
TransLink’s vision for the future of transportation in Metro Vancouver includes people travelling seamlessly between cities and different modes of transportation using a single app and method of payment.
The transit authority ’s CEO said the region can’t rely on public transit to get people everywhere they want to go, and instead need a “constellation of services” to solve the mobility issues in the region and ease congestion.
“The best thing that we can do as transit providers is provide people with lots of choices,” Kevin Desmond said at a Greater Vancouver Board of Trade transportation forum on Tuesday. “It’s not just about our bottom line, it should be about mobility.”
Desmond described the idea of linking together disparate services, such as bike, scooter or car shares, ride hailing and transit in one app that allows a user to plan, book and pay for services as the next “big sexy thing” in transportation.
One of the most cited examples of a mobility-as-a-service success story is in Helsinki, where residents have been able to plan their transportation with an app called Whim since 2016.
Desmond said people in Metro Vancouver have a variety of choices when it comes to getting around — and more on the way — and they are accessed through technology, but they aren’t linked.
“It’s just a question of getting all the different entities and mobility suppliers talking and working together, because it is challenging,” said Rod Schebesch, a senior vicepresident with engineering company Stantec who was a panelist at the forum.
Eve Hou, a project manager for new mobility, strategic planning and policy with TransLink, acknowledged that there is a potential for competition between the transit agency and other service providers, “but there’s significant potential for collaboration.”
That’s true, in particular, she said, for the short trips that will get people to and from transit options they might not otherwise use.
For instance, TransLink is working with the University of B.C. on its public dock-less bikeshare pilot project, which began in August and will run until the spring. Desmond said the lessons learned from that project will be passed on to municipalities that are interested in similar services.
“TransLink wants to be part of that, whether we help finance things, whether we help study and then help to create some of the framework and guidelines that cities can implement to use these shared services,” Desmond said.