The Role of Transit, Shared Modes, and Public Policy in the New Mobility Landscape

If combined with public transit and increased in scale, shared modes of transportation, such as ride-hailing, scooter sharing and bike sharing, can enhance mobility, equity, and sustainability in metropolitan areas. Cities, transit agencies, and shared mobility providers should collaborate in goal-setting, experimentation, testing, and implementation.

These are among the findings in TRB Special Report 337: The Role of Transit, Shared Modes, and Public Policy in the New Mobility Landscape, from TRB of the National Academy of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.

The report's authors recommend deliberate and strategic measures in order to realize the full and potentially transformative benefits of shared services. These measures include providing travelers with real- or near real-time information on combinations of available price and service offerings, smartphone applications that simplify the process of arranging and paying for the use of multiple transportation modes for a single trip, and more public sector coordination of services across modes and jurisdictions.