Multimodal travel information services offer in parallel comparative information of different modes/means of transport (multimodal) and/or the combination of different modes/means of transport within the same route (inter-modal). The services offer information for at least public transport, car transport and usually pedestrian and bicycle transport.
The term multimodal is commonly used within the area of travel information services in the meaning of offering parallel information for more than one mode/means of transport. Intermodal services offer in addition the combination of several modes/means of transport within one route.
Multimodal travel information services can foster a modal shift towards reputed more environmental-friendly modes/means of transport and lead to a more efficient network operation as well as a better use of the transport infrastructure. The end users are enabled to select an appropriate and efficient mode/means of transport or a combination of different transport modes/means. Thus, the end users receive comprehensive information on alternative routes (including different means of transport) and the public mobility as a whole is facilitated.
Service benefit radar
ITS service key words
Multimodal travel information services offer in parallel comparative information of different modes/means of transport and/or the combination of different modes/means of transport within the same route. The services offer information for at least public transport, car transport and usually pedestrian and bicycle transport.
Multimodal travel information services require data from the different transport modes (road, rail, water- and airborne transport) from walking and cycling and from additional services such as parking.
The development of multimodal services has to be divided into two general parts:
Multimodal travel information services – back end system:
By entering travel demands (i.e. travelling from A to B within a certain time frame) on the Internet or on a mobile device the user receives multimodal information on travel options for road, rail, public transport, including if applicable water and air transport (including walking and cycling, e.g. to the first public transport stop on the route). The service normally includes pre-trip (and on-trip if available) public transport information as well as – if available up-to-date or predicted – road traffic information. Information given to the users can include: trip itineraries with predominantly static travel times; parking information/guidance; environmental impact; to a certain degree estimations of travel costs (e.g. for car traffic); and how to buy a ticket or book a service. The back end system combines all the different data sources to enable the comprehensive multimodal service provision as just described.
Multimodal travel information services – front end:
With the service of the front end, users interact directly and services of various carriers are provided via:
Internet portals (websites) offer a well-structured access to multimodal travel information and trip planning. There are two major design options for such portals:
Portals can offer Travel Information Services with static and/or dynamic data. Information can be given at regional, national and international level.
In the past years, the former separation of pre-trip and on-trip services has more or less disappeared through the development of services offered on smartphones and their growing penetration in the public.
Multimodal Travel Information services can foster a modal shift towards more environmentallyfriendly modes/means of transport and lead to a more efficient network operation as well as a better utilization of the transport infrastructure. The end users are enabled to select an appropriate and efficient mode/means of transport or a combination of different transport modes/means. Thus, the end users receive comprehensive information on alternative routes (including different means of transport) and the mobility service as a whole is facilitated.
Currently a widespread patchwork of heterogeneous services exists across Europe. These services are partly operated by public transport companies, public authorities, but also private providers. Most services are limited to local or at most regional geographic coverage, which often corresponds to political and administrative borders and not necessarily to road user and traveller needs. These services are almost mature and are under a steady improvement process.
The multimodal service coverage on European level is mostly a blank area. Only few services exist at this level and are mostly operated by big private companies like Google or HERE Maps. However, there have been recent initiatives to define systems and services that link existing national system/journey planners into an European-wide service. For example, the European projects LinkingDanube[2] and LinkingAlps[3] have produced some significant results. Both projects developed and tested pilot implementations of multimodal, cross-border journey planning using interconnected national journey planners. The results of the projects provide a feasible solutions for linking of services, which is one of the key requirements of the MMTIS DR.
For the determination of a multimodal route it is necessary to apply data from different sources, in particular from data bases of traffic management systems, public transport data bases and parking data bases.
Furthermore, a geographic data base is required, which includes the entire road network as well as the public transport network with stops, lines and stations and parking facilities.
When providing a customer oriented MMTIS, it might be necessary to merge two or more of the core services in a modular way in order to better satisfy the end-users needs. The most important properties of a MMTIS are:
Figure 27 gives an overview of the interface architecture of Multimodal Travel Information service.
Figure 28 gives an overview of the functional architecture of Multimodal Travel Information service.
Some of the components presented in Figure 28 have sub-modules as listed below:
Functional requirements:
The following functional requirements are derived from Figure 28:
Interface requirements:
Organisational Architecture / BusinessModel
A general overarching description of the key actors, their roles in the value chain and the related conditions for TTI service provision are outlined in Chapter 3.1. More information on new models of cooperation between public and private partners can be found in chapter 4.1.4.2
The following text interprets the four main organisational areas (organisation of the TTIS, obligations for TTIS provision, data used in the TTIS, business model of the TTIS) shown in Chapter 3.1.4 in relation to Multimodal Travel Information services requirements.
Organisation of the TIS
It is very important to distinguish between A.1 to A.5. These 5 categories show finally who is responsible for the service. For each of the five models from A.1 to A.5, the entity directly providing the service will be either private or public. However, for some models, the responsibility for the performance of the service is not clearly separated between private and public. For example in A.2 the provider is private but it acts according to its contract with the public entity. To enable OR2 and OR3 the following organisation is recommended:
Organisational requirement:
Additional and/or added value services according to A5 schema should define recommendations to provide appropriate services.
Data used in the TTIS
Multimodal Travel Information services consist of different data sources. One can distinguish between data under public scope (C.1) which might be operated by private companies but on behalf of public, and data under private scope (C.3), for instance travel profiles from telecommunication companies or both, data under public and private scope (C.2).
Business model of the TTIS
Organisational requirements:
Note: Multimodal services aiming towards reducing private car use may integrate only some functionality dedicated to private car transport. In this case unbiased comparison is not relevant.
Note: In some Member States the public sector is not involved directly in the service provision but is compiling and maintaining a transport information data base, which the private service providers (A.5) may use in any way they wish. In such cases the public sector supports private services (A.5) by maintaining all or part of the data bases utilised by the services but has no other role in service provision.
Furthermore, as most services consist of providing information only, it has so far proved to be difficult to create a business model for private service provision. However, it is possible that this situation might change and create a market for value-added services run by private operators. In any case, there should be a service available free of charge.
Transport operator obligation
A further important point is the need to regulate respectively oblige transport operators (e.g. private bus companies operating scheduled services, light rail franchisees etc.) to provide information in a common standardised format so as to enable multimodal journey planning services to be efficiently provided and reduce the not inconsiderable public funding required.
ITS directive (2010/40/EU)
Article 3 of the ITS directive (2010/40/EU) explicitly names the EU-wide provision of multimodal travel information services as priority area for the development of and use of specifications and standards. In priority areas the European Commission shall adopt the specifications necessary to ensure the compatibility, interoperability and continuity for the deployment and operational use of ITS. This includes “the definition of the necessary requirements to make EU-wide multimodal travel information services accurate and available across borders to ITS users, based on:
Delegated Regulation on MMTIS (EU2017/1926)
The Commission Delegated Regulation EU 2017/1926 defines the necessary specifications to ensure multimodal travel information are implemented in a harmonized and consistent way across the EU. The Regulation lists service and data categories, service requirements and a phased implementation timeline per service categories.
Most multimodal travel information services are designed for the world-wide-web. These internet applications developed their own user interface which is normally oriented at market leaders in the specific domains the service offers, e.g. map navigation oriented on market leaders. Public services must comply with the DIRECTIVE (EU) 2016/2102 OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF THE COUNCIL on the accessibility of the websites and mobile applications of public sector bodies.
The following chapters are oriented on highly sophisticated services and market leaders and are the basis for the elaboration of multimodal services with a common look & feel.
The colours for the route indication in maps may be used as follows:
Common Look & Feel requirements:
The map presentation (only when the service offers this feature) is a main part of a Multimodal Travel Information service. MTTIS are very comprehensible services and the map presentation helps users among others to have a better orientation (in the sense of a geographical as well as a comprehensible transport relevant information orientation). This is also a reason to include so called POIs (points of interest) into the map presentation and also to use these POIs very often as predefined origins and destinations for multimodal routing services. Besides these POIs, many Multimodal Travel Information services show traffic relevant information (e.g. congestion warning, road closures etc.) in maps.
For the European citizen it is of high added value to harmonize the map presentation (icons used and also the colour scheme for route indication of different means of transport) of such comprehensible and thus also often very complex Multimodal Travel Information services. The users of these services will experience a much easier and understandable HMI when the map presentation respectively the icons are being harmonized.
Common look & feel requirements:
Common look & feel requirement:
The requirements for the ICT infrastructure that supports the development and operation of Multimodal Travel Information Services can be divided into three sections:
Technical requirements:
The availability of world-wide-web technology and sufficient (broadband) connectivity is a basic requirement for most backend and frontend systems. It is likely that the mobile devices used for the service will also serve the purpose of data collection and reporting on incidents, delays and other relevant multimodal information.
Technical advice:
Multimodal Travel Information Services require the co-operation of actors from a wide range of different transport modes. The actors can be public and private.
Static data sources are required, e.g.: road/public transport network data, travel times, timetables for scheduled means of transport (short/long-distance), databases for evaluating environmental impacts of different means of transport/types of vehicle, maps. Also, suitable dynamic data can be used e.g.: road works, incidents, cancellations or deviations of public transport trips.
Information provision standards:
The Operating Environment concept as defined in the Handbook cannot be applied to the MMTIS as it focusses very much on the TEN-T network, while MMTI services have a broader scope. Moreover, quality requirements for all MMTI services cannot be provided. The reason is that, because of the complexity of MMTIS, the EU EIP Activity 4.2, on which the quality concept of this Handbook is based, defined requirements only for a selection of the MMTI services referred to in the Service description.
The “Levels of Quality table” for the definition of quality criteria for MMTIS services, which differentiates data quality into “basic”, “enhanced” and “advanced” (for detailed information see Quality of S Real-Time Services – Quality package) reflects the requirements for the data quality which are needed for Multimodal Travel Information services. This table is not end-user oriented as Table 28.
Level of Quality advice:
Table 24 gives the Level of Service recommendations for a Multimodal Travel Information service. The background of this concept is descripted in chapter 2.6
Table 24: Level of Service recommendations for Multimodal Travel Information services.
[1] see Delegated regulation EU 2017/1926, article 7 recommends linking of services.
[2] http://www.interreg-danube.eu/approved-projects/linking-danube
[3] https://alpine-space.eu/projects/linkingalps/en/home
