Effects of different mobility concepts in new residential areas

Abstract

Growing cities need new residential areas, which are often either not connected to the existing transport infrastructure or are poorly connected to it. A fast way to connect these areas is the construction of roads. However, this generates a car-depending mobility among the inhabitants, which is in conflict with several sustainability goals. Moreover, the impact of the implementation of new public transport options is only partly known and this fact reduces the willingness to invest in expensive public transport measures. In this work we examine different mobility concepts, including shared mobility, bicycle highways, a high-frequency bus service, suburban trains and car limitations in a new residential area of 2000 households in Berlin, Germany, which is currently under construction. The households and inhabitants are created synthetically using statistical data derived from a survey among the first people moved in. The age and size structure of these households turn out to be different from the neighboring households. Then, we implement all measures in a microscopic travel demand simulation and quantify the potential modal shifts for four different mobility concepts. The results show that weak and short-term mobility concepts show no significant change in mobility behavior. Only highly integrated projects like bicycle highways into the inner city combined with suburban trains can reduce the need for car-dependent mobility. Shared mobility only fills in the gaps for special occasions but not for daily mobility due to the high costs. In a final step we examine the usage of the introduced public transport services and compare the change in the occupation of the buses and trains. Here our work shows that interchanging from bus to subways and suburban trains drastically reduces the attractiveness of public transport. Introducing a new suburban train changes this situation and the whole region shows a drop of 40% of car trips.