NonA Weekly: TRAVEL AND URBAN MOBILITY
Image by @for91days
Dear readers and friends,
The coronavirus outbreak had a profound effect on the way humans travel, especially across long distances. With ongoing closures and heavily restricted international borders, much of the world is still off-limits to a large portion of the population.
Although demand for private travel noticeably increased in 2021, customers from Europe, China, and the US are still hesitant to return to pre-pandemic levels of leisure travel.
Prepare yourself for a wild ride, as this week we will be exploring mobility around the themes of travel heritage, historical vehicles and musealization, and travelling for leisure.
1. GETTING AROUND THE CITY: WHY ELECTRIC RICKSHAWS ARE THE TUK OF THE TOWN
Anyone who has been in Bangkok, Delhi or Cairo will be familiar with the lawnmower whirr of the mighty tuk-tuk. For residents, they tend to be cheaper than taxis. For tourists, they offer the novelty of an open-air VIEW. Unfortunately, they are also noisy and highly polluting, with black smoke spewing from the exhaust.
2. FUTURE OF MOBILITY: IMPACT ON TRAVEL & LEISURE
From the impact of Mobility-as-a-Service on traditional car ownership and rental to the complete redesign of entertainment centres, once autonomous vehicles become more prevalent, the future of MOBILITY is set to have a significant impact on the Travel & Leisure sectors.
3. WHY YOU SHOULD MAKE USELESS THINGS
Not directly related to the theme, but with the purpose of fostering creativity, we share this joyful, heartfelt talk featuring demos of the wonderfully wacky CREATIONS by Simone Giertz where she shares her craft: making useless robots. “The true beauty of making useless things [is] this acknowledgement that you don’t always know what the best answer is,” Giertz says.
4. PARIS SET TO BUILD FOUR-KILOMETRE-LONG URBAN CABLE CAR
“Public transport in Île-de-France, the Île-de-France regions and the Department of Val-de-Marne decided in 2016 to add a new innovative tool for public TRANSPORT solutions which offered Île-de-France residents on their network the first urban cable car transport line in the region,” said the general director of IDF Mobilités Laurent Probst.
5. THE VEHICLES CONCEIVED BY GREAT ARCHITECTS
From Gio Ponti’s Linea Diamante and Le Corbusier’s Voiture Minimum to Buckminster Fuller’s Dymaxion car and the iconic Citroën DS. Automobiles and architecture share a closer RELATIONSHIP than you might expect. To find out more, read this interview with Roberto Giolito, head of the Heritage department of Alfa Romeo, Lancia, Fiat e Abarth.
6. THE FUTURE OF LONG-DISTANCE MOBILITY
Road and rail travel is expected to gain market share even in the US, where planes were previously used more than any other region. In fact, the share of personal air travel across all modes will reduce by 6% by 2024. Meanwhile, rail will increase by 9.4% and road by 2.4%. In private domestic TRAVEL, the shift from air to other modes will remain till 2030, and air traffic will fall by 6% while train use will increase by 15%.
7. OVERCOMING THE CHASM BETWEEN TRAVEL AND URBAN MOBILITY THROUGH DEVELOPMENT OF SINGLE-SOURCE MOBILITY
For travellers, it is unnecessarily complicated to MOVE around cities. Every urban area uses specific systems, applications, and customer interfaces. An overarching mobility platform, including urban mobility and travel products, is a feasible solution. It is also a chance for innovative mobility providers to catch intercity travelers as new customers. We interviewed three startups that are at the forefront of revolutionizing the industry and point the way to single-source mobility.
Stay creative and see you all next week!
Daniela
