Intermodal mobility in cities and its contribution to accessibility

Abstract

Cities offer a wide range of different mobility options, including a dense public transport network and good conditions for walking and cycling. They provide good basic requirements for using and combining different modes of transport in people’s everyday mobility in a flexible, individual and situational way. In larger cities in particular, intermodal mobility plays a significant role and is being discussed as crucial to minimizing traffic congestion, emissions and the demand for parking space. Although a common practice, intermodal mobility has so far received little attention in empirical and theoretic mobility research. This contribution addresses this gap. It compares unimodal and intermodal travel modes, and discusses their effects on accessibility in cities. Using the city of Berlin, Germany, as example, it explores intermodal mobility practice to and the extent to which this relates to accessibility in cities compared to unimodal modes. Based on empirical survey data and calculations of spatial accessibility indicators, we present the performance of unimodal and intermodal travel modes using accessible locations and distance over time, and set them against the frequency of using the various modes of unimodal and intermodal travel. The combination of empirical and modeling data provides new insights into how accessibility measures based on structural data fit together from a user’s perspective and can complement each other. Based on this, we discuss further aspects of accessibility relevant for intermodality.