Impacts of Advanced Travel Information Systems on Travel Behaviour: Smartmoov’ case study

Which are the effects of multimodal real-time information on travel behaviour? Significant amounts of money have been invested to implement such systems in urban environments, but until now only few assessments have been done to verify if they contribute to a modal shift and to more sustainable mobility. This research aims at thoroughly assessing the effectiveness of multimodal real-time travel information systems, pointing out the limitations before their use and recording the changes induced on the travel behaviour. Two questionnaires were designed and executed before and after a five-month period of testing a multimodal real-time travel information application for Smartphones (Smartmoov’) implemented in 2013 in Lyon. Descriptive analysis, parametric and non-parametric tests, factor analysis and binary logistic regression were used as statistical approaches to analyse the collected data and evaluate the effectiveness of Smartmoov’. Before the test, participants declared an interest on Smartmoov’ and a positive attitude towards its use: almost everyone was able to use technological tools and was familiar with the concept of Smartmoov’. At the onset of the test, travellers’ evaluation towards the travel planner was slightly positive, but this decreased over time, while the use of the different modes remained stable after the test, albeit a small increase of the car for the most frequent trip was observed. Consistency on the most used mode, on behavioural patterns and attitudes show that mobility is strongly related to habits and, thus, to the frequency of the past behaviour.