Public transport on-demand? – Assessment of the potential for demand-responsive public transport services in Sweden

Demand responsive transport (DRT) has for decades been highlighted as an opportunity to offer cost-efficient public transport in areas with low demand and for special purpose services. However, experience shows that DRT is often expensive, and fail to deliver the expected benefits due to other barriers. The breakthrough of "smart" mobile phones in recent years has led to a renewed interest in DRT. Several attempts of implementation have been made in an urban or metropolitan contexts offering services aimed at the general public. Internationally, there are many ongoing initiatives based on the concept of booking a shared ride by using a smart phone, and re-routing vehicles based on real time demand.

The main aim of this project is to build knowledge, and increase the understanding of where such on-demand public transport services could be implemented in Sweden and how it then should be implemented. The project combines two approaches: A) a systematic review of experiences from current attempts with DRT. B) evaluation of different ways of DRT implementation by assessing costs vs level of service for a specific geographical area in simulations.

The results of the project will provide new knowledge on the conditions of where on-demand services could have a potential, how they should be implemented, and give an indication of the costs associated with such services without having to launch real tests.