Mobility is as individual as we are and a basic need: our areas of life - work, home, leisure, and shopping - are often far apart. If we want to satisfy our needs, we all must be able to move. The term "mobility" is used to describe the possibility or ability of people to reach their desired destinations.
Mobility is often what makes participation in social life possible in the first place. The accessibility of places plays a significant role in almost all life decisions. This includes the choice of where to live and work and the choice of shopping facilities and leisure activities.
Mobility is about more than just getting from A to B. It means accessing education, culture, employment, and leisure using safe, swift, environmentally friendly, affordable transport options. In cities and conurbations in particular, mobility means the ability to participate in society.
1. Social Mobility
This includes, for example, changing jobs or partnerships.
2. Mental Mobility
Mental mobility is when we picture our next vacation trip or plan self-determined activities.
3. Spatial Mobility
We also speak of geographical mobility: It encompasses all possibilities for transportation or a change of location from A to B, as well as the willingness to be mobile.
The origin of spatial mobility is one's physical strength. Over thousands of years, it was supplemented by pack animals and mounts such as horses, aids such as transport carts or simple boats in the 6th millennium BC. Technical progress continuously expanded the possibilities.
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Every person has daily goals they want to achieve. Therefore, we use our mobility options and abilities in various ways, from physical strength to electric cars and e-bike sharing. If mobility options and abilities are limited, it will result in disadvantages in everyday life: dissatisfaction, dependency, and less participation in social life are the consequences.
A high degree of mobility is a prerequisite for most activities nowadays. The infrastructure for this is being promoted and expanded by politicians, researchers, and businesses worldwide.
The mobility evolution is primarily about avoiding and shifting traffic. Avoidance is achieved, for example, through shorter distances in more compact cities, more consistent home office work for commuters, and by strengthening local supplies in rural regions. Technological developments have expanded transport options, making multimodal transport behaviours more accessible.
Motorised private transport must be reduced: too many cars cause emissions of greenhouse gases, air pollutants and noise, are mainly involved in accidents and traffic jams and require a lot of space. The latter points also apply to electric cars, so private transport must be reduced overall. Freight transport should shift to rail wherever possible, and road freight transport must be electrified to become climate-neutral.
«The mobility evolution will lead to less traffic and higher-quality mobility.»
Green or sustainable mobility ensures that transportation is environmentally friendly in the long term. Fossil fuels - i.e., energy sources such as coal, oil and natural gas - must gradually disappear, as the resulting emissions significantly impact climate change and air pollution.
A mobility concept combines concrete approaches to mobility solutions from infrastructure, building and planning law, consulting, information, and public relations work into an integrated overall strategy. The aim is to ensure sustainable mobility. Because all stakeholders are involved, resources can be used efficiently without mobility ending at spatial, system or administrative boundaries.
Innovative mobility options, e.g. in residential areas, are designed to reduce the need for parking spaces. Areas in public spaces are being rededicated. In addition to conventional transportation services, mobility concepts include specific benefits for the respective target groups: Car-sharing services, infrastructure for cycling, accessibility to public transport stops and the provision of tenant tickets.
Cities are changing roads, parking space for cars is being reduced, and cycle paths and sidewalks are being expanded and prioritised together with public transport. Dismantling car-centred cities increases the quality of life in urban areas: living and working spaces become more attractive and healthier.
In the next phase, shared mobility will be widespread and available everywhere. Following the overarching trend of regionalisation, it is no longer just the centres that will be provided with more and more options, but also the outskirts, especially as this is where the future real estate demand will be concentrated. Shared mobility offerings have the potential to provide flexible and independent mobility, making personal vehicle ownership less relevant.
Electromobility or e-mobility refers to using electric cars, e-bikes, electric motorcycles, and e-buses. All vehicles have in common that they are fully or partially electrically powered, carry an energy storage unit, and draw most of their energy from the power grid.
As with every car, the heart of the vehicle is the motor. This is powered by electricity. This electricity comes from a battery installed on the car's floor. The electric motor converts the electrical energy into mechanical energy by generating magnetic fields. The magnetic fields generate force by either attracting or repelling each other. This alternating work drives the electric car. When braking, the built-in electric motor becomes a generator, converting kinetic energy into electrical energy and feeding it into the battery. This process is called recovery.
Electric vehicles are more efficient, quieter, locally emission-free, and have a better environmental footprint than diesel or petrol vehicles.
Effective climate and environmental protection targets can only be achieved if road traffic contributes significantly. After all, this is where most transportation-related carbon dioxide (CO2), air pollutants, and noise pollution are generated. However, because many people are still dependent on their cars, short journeys and cycling are needed more than focusing solely on traffic avoidance. Road traffic must become more environmentally friendly, with fewer adverse effects on the climate and health and for a better quality of life in the city of tomorrow.
The combustion engine is on the brink of extinction. But is the electric drive an alternative, or are there better solutions? Here are some approaches to finding an answer to this question.
Using electric vehicles reduces noise during journeys and lowers pollutant emissions on site. There is no alternative to climate protection.
Increasingly in cities and municipalities, political framework conditions prohibit or make it more challenging to buy combustion vehicles. As there are increasingly clear phase-out dates for combustion engines from various manufacturers, their future is increasingly being questioned. From 2030, some cities will even introduce driving bans for combustion engines in their city centres.
Fleets such as public transport, the police and fire departments act as role models. The use of e-mobility in these areas can increase the acceptance of electric vehicles among the population.
The technological disruption towards electric cars is about more than just the shift away from the combustion engine. Vehicles with electric motors are attractive for fleet operators and their business model of transportation as a service. They also harmonise with renewable energies. Regarding vehicle development, there has been a trend reversal from e-buses to e-trucks, with around 200 new models coming onto the market. Battery production continues to take place almost exclusively in China.
The political efforts to significantly reduce emissions from trucks should be emphasised here. According to the EU Commission's plans, emissions in this area are to be 45% lower by 2030 and 90% lower by 2040 than in 2019. The proposal also envisages all city buses being emission-free by 2030.
The current growth in the expansion of charging infrastructure is no longer keeping pace with the sales figures for e-cars. Special efforts are needed here to ensure the market ramp-up of e-mobility. The number of public charging points in Europe will increase to 2.4 million by 2030, with most of these (80%) connected in the EU.
In 2022, e-cars consumed around 110 TWh of energy worldwide. Conversely, e-cars replaced about 700,000 barrels of oil daily, saving about 80 Mt of greenhouse gas emissions. According to the IEA (International Energy Agency), the global market value of electricity for charging electric vehicles will grow 20-fold and reach around USD 190 billion by 2030, around a tenth of the current market value of diesel and petrol.
Electric vehicles have lower operating costs compared to conventional combustion engines. This allows emergency response organisations to use their limited resources more efficiently. This is all the truer if the acquisition costs for electric vehicles continue to fall.
The Net Zero Scenario (NZE) is defined by the specific targets for the energy sector to achieve zero CO2 emissions by 2050 and limit the global temperature rise to 1.5 C. Compared to the GSP, the NZE emphasises the "ambition gap" that must be closed to achieve the 2015 Paris Agreement goals.
However, to achieve the NZE scenario target, the share of electric cars would have to reach 60% by 2030. This makes this scenario the most optimistic of the three.