What is smart mobility?
Smart mobility is a way of life that emphasizes sustainable transportation modes such as walking and biking, rather than relying on automobiles. It also includes efforts to reduce the amount of energy we use, the waste we produce, and our carbon footprint.
Smart mobility has several benefits. First, it improves the health of our communities. It promotes physical activity, lowering our risk of chronic diseases like diabetes and obesity. And it saves time and money—in fact, according to a study published by DOSM, Malaysians spend about RM 611 a month in 2019, or 13.5% of total spending. The spending doubled from RM 327 in 2010.
Smart mobility can help alleviate these costs by encouraging more people to walk or bike to work, school, or other destinations and reducing our reliance on automobiles.
Smart mobility also improves our quality of life and our overall well-being. It helps us maintain a healthy weight and live longer. And it reduces pollution and the need for fossil fuels.
Finally, smart mobility makes good economic sense. For example, in the United States alone, they spend about $150 billion per year on healthcare costs related to motor vehicle crashes, injuries, and fatalities, and about $85 billion annually on the cost of air pollution.
These costs are a significant drag on our economy. If we invested those dollars in ways that improved our health and environment, we would save money.
What are the issues and challenges in smart mobility?
Smart mobility is a growing movement that addresses many complex social and environmental problems. Here are some of the issues and challenges we face today:
- Healthcare – Increasingly, people are taking their health into their own hands by making lifestyle changes such as eating more healthfully and exercising more often. But we must also change how we move through the world, which is why smart mobility is an essential part of any comprehensive strategy for reducing the burden of obesity, diabetes, heart disease, and other chronic diseases.
- Carbon footprint – The transportation sector has become the single largest source of carbon pollution in the United States. Yet, even though transportation accounts for nearly 30 percent of the nation’s total greenhouse gas emissions, we have not made meaningful progress toward addressing this problem. This is why smart mobility is an essential tool in the fight against climate change. While the benefits of smart mobility are clear, we are still far from achieving these goals.
- Funding – Many communities are still dependent on automobiles, and a lack of funding for safe and accessible sidewalks, bike lanes, and other forms of active transportation continues to limit access. We need to invest in smart mobility infrastructure and programs that promote it. We also need to make smart mobility a priority in developing and implementing public policies.
- Private sector engagement – Finally, we must engage the private sector to make sure that it is prepared to meet future challenges.
How does technology help to solve mobility issues?
Several technologies can solve the mobility issues:
- Internet of Things (IoT) – sensors that can be deployed to gather data about the efficiency of the congestion and conditions of the road of the transportation infrastructure
- Data Analytics – With the vast amount of data gathered from the city’s infrastructure and daily infrastructure, we can derive better future planning insights.
- Autonomous Cars – safer driving and less taxing for drivers when these are offered for public transportation
- Electric vehicles – saves carbon footprint and less consumption on fuel.
- Flying taxis – better mode of transportation to move from one place and another
We’re trying to live a more sustainable lifestyle, and one of the ways we’re doing this is by driving less and using more sustainable transportation modes.
Smart mobility will be one of the critical Smart City applications to be deployed. With the increasing number of people living in the city, technology plays a vital role in helping them ease the stressful day of moving around in the city.