Summit: In Pursuit of the Ideal Commute
At this year’s Techfestival in Copenhagen, we’ve been tasked to define the ideal commute. To do this, we’ve invited some of the most prominent thinkers and doers in the urban mobility space to join us on September 5th from 10 am to 4.30 pm for a full-day summit on Urban Mobility. Interested in joining us? Apply here.
Identifying the ideal commute
Introduction: Co-host Jens Martin Skibsted, Co-founder of Strategic Design Group. Co-host David Kester, Managing Director at David Kester & Associates
Even as the world changes, with the climate crisis and emerging transformative technologies, humans will continue to commute regularly in urban environments. As the urban population grows and the density thickens, so does the complexity of improving urban mobility. How to design the ideal commute for the city, the community and the planet is far from obvious. Mechanisms such as individual priorities and inherent behaviour have to be balanced with the systemic needs of the city in order to find sustainable and ideal solutions.
The main object of this summit is to identify and discuss the key mechanisms that influence “the ideal urban commute”.
Jens Martin Skibsted and David Kester will expand on how to search for the ideal commute and on how we’ll approach this discussion from four different perspectives: Optimal throughput, owning sharing, driverful experiences and how to break silos.
Optimal throughput
Speakers: Jens Martin Skibsted, co-founder of Strategic Design Group. Jan-Olaf Willums founder of Zero Emissions Transport, co-founder Move About.
Identifying a city’s optimal throughput is critical to improving energy efficiency and mobility, and thereby the quality of life. Throughput is determined by the capacity to move people through a defined space and by the amount of energy required to do so.
Optimising throughput should have us look beyond classic mobility categories and typologies while also avoiding hype and still considering traditional contextual factors such as a city’s scale, layout, density and vehicle types.
Owning sharing
Panel: Thomas Heltborg Juul, Managing Director at Green Mobility DK. Kristian Agerbo, Head of Public Policy and Market Development at voi. Erdem Ovacik, CEO, Donkey Republic.
Speaker: Robin Chase, Co-founder Zipcar, Veniam & New Urban Mobility(NUMO) Alliance.
Present-day consumer patterns define how we share and care for products. Shared products and services are often vandalised, abandoned and poorly integrated with city and services. The reason may be, that ownership or responsibility is not naturally attributed with shared solutions. If everyone is sharing an e-scooter, then who is responsible for its welfare, re-usage and second life? The user, manufacturer or urban environment?
As consumerism hasn’t evolved to answer this question yet, the discussion of owning sharing is integral for future urban mobility. This calls for a rethink of the ecosystem, and of the sharing partnerships and objects that populate it.
Driverful experiences
Speakers: Peter Sorgenfrei, CEO at holo, Jens Martin Skibsted and Klaus Bondam, CEO at Danish Cyclists’ Association.
Technology is changing experiences, but should we change an experience just because we can? Rather than letting technology drive the change, shouldn’t we instead ask ourselves how we want to spend our time in commute? By going the shortest or the scenic route? Will we be satisfied with a driving experience where we are detached from the city and passive?
We automatically gravitate towards enjoyable and rewarding experiences in a battle between emotional and rational choices — driverful vs driverless experiences. Experience focused mobility is more appealing to us than the optimal way to get from a to b and that’s why we should discuss the commuting experiences of the future.
Breaking silos
Speaker: David Kester, Managing Director at David Kester & Associates.
In pursuit of the ideal commute and looking at the potential of Mobility-as-a-Service we will discuss how to create frictionless multimodality. This entails going beyond private versus public, blending macro and micro and breaking down sectors, silos and typologies. What are the future ecosystems, partnerships and business models needed to create ideal urban mobility?
How can we break down sectors, silos and typologies to ensure seamless mobility across the public and private sphere to enable viable business for all stakeholders?
Outcome
Our four perspectives each serve as points of departure to provide a different take on defining the ideal commute. Throughout the day, we’ll explore each perspective with a view to identifying the key parameters that constitute the ideal commute, and the actions needed to get there. Our facilitators will ensure documentation which will be collected and shared with participants after the summit.
Key questions to explore during the summit
- How do we balance sustainable efficiency and systemic needs against desirability and inherent individual behaviour?
- How do we avoid being blinded by mobility hypes?
- How do we calculate and design for ideal throughput?
- How do we induce desirability and responsibility in the sharing ecosystem?
- How do we create attractive commuter experiences?
- How do we achieve frictionless multimodality and go beyond sectors and silos?
Do you want to join us?
Or through the Techfestival website.
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