Disruptive Technologies Driving 'Dramatic Shift' in Multimodal Transportation World, Says ABI

The multimodal transportation environment is primed for a “dramatic shift” due to disruptive technologies, including smart watches, which will accelerate a seamless in-and-out-of-the-car experience, said ABI Research Practice Director Dominique Bonte in a report summary Wednesday. Bonte cited BMW’s iRemote Apple Watch app and ride-booking services such as Uber that are “starting to blur the boundaries between public and private transportation.” Uber is offered as an option in multimodal journey planners by Google and mxDATA, said Bonte. The trends are also leading other car OEMs including Jaguar Land Rover and Ford to offer solutions beyond the “narrow context” of the vehicle to meet the needs of a broad integrated intermodal system, said Bonte. He cited mounting traffic congestion, growing concerns about environmental issues and the focus of public and private companies in the automotive and transportation industries as drivers of multimodal transportation solutions, which include real-time public transport timetable information, multimodal journey planners and smartphone-based pedestrian guidance applications. Real-time parking space availability content providers, relying in some cases on crowd-sourced data, are also playing a critical role in removing the “friction points” between different modes of transportation, said Bonte. He identified Parking Spotter, one of Ford’s 25 smart mobility projects, co-developed with Georgia Tech University, which allows information about open street-side parking spaces identified by roaming vehicles equipped with advanced driver assistance systems sensors to be shared with other drivers via the cloud. Telematics-enabled public transport allows the integration of real-time transit-schedule information into journey planners, he said.