Abstract: The rapid emergence of transport network companies was one of the great surprises in planning and policy in the late 2010s. Many see these private operators disrupting the rigid institutional structures of the past by providing for out of mode transport immediately. Transport network companies (TNCs) have sought to build a range of transport options for consumers across the car transport system, ostensibly by coordinating a multitude of small operators and expanding their services into other forms of transport like bicycles and larger vehicles. Through these smart platforms, it is claimed, consumers can now access the entire car transport system with a single click. The technology revolution has embraced the transport sector, and planners and government agencies have been left scrambling.
Yet like the ride sharing start-ups of the late 1990s and early 2000s, this apparent revolution has occurred on an internal basis, with little nor no thought to how these transformative forces might be integrated with the wider public transport ecosystem. Without the need for any regulatory referent, profitability would appear to be paramount in the delivery of these services. Indeed, the postcode blackspot that was central Los Angeles prior to ex-ante regulation could well be a precursor to some of the more peripheral areas of other developed, α+ city regions. In addition, TNCs and taxi networks now control a substantial proportion of the business decisions of the participating operators.
Still, cities have been slow to learn, and several of these challenges remain unaddressed. As a result, many of the challenges of the past that need addressing in the future now appear to have been replicated on an even larger scale with private operators overtaking the traditional one-mode networks. Much of this is a consequence of the original formulation which assumed that transport equivalence would lead to an equal operating environment on both sides of the transport divide, despite clear evidence across research programs that there were service quality differentials between modes this assumption might benefit the private provider.
Keywords: Connected Mobility,Urban Transport Systems,Mobility-as-a-Service (MaaS),Smart City Infrastructure,IoT in Transportation,Autonomous Vehicles,Real-Time Traffic Management,Urban Mobility Analytics,Shared Mobility Solutions,Electric Vehicle (EV) Integration,Data-Driven Transport Planning,Sustainable Urban Mobility,Mobility Data Platforms,Multimodal Transportation,Dynamic Service Optimization.
Copyright Form