Urban mobility options have substantially increased in recent years, enabled by the widespread availability of smart device software Apps, geo-positioning technology, and the ease of electronic financial transactions. These options are likely to be supplemented soon by the rapidly advancing development of autonomous vehicles.

Throughout the world, the reliability of public transport systems is constantly under review. Questions of reliability are particularly applicable to bus services, as they commonly share road space with other vehicles.

Public transport interchanges facilitate transfers between a wide range of motorised and nonmotorised transport modes, allowing users to move from feeder modes such as walking, cycling, private vehicles and local feeder buses to rapid transit, high volume modes such as heavy rail, light rail and busways. The efficiency of this transfer, and the size of the catchment, impact the effectiveness of the broader transport network.

This report explores barriers to the provision of sharing economy mobility services and highlights actions that can be taken by policy makers and other organisations to support their availability. The report finds that Australia cities have similar shared mobility issues that are evident in other places around the world.

This research is an investigation into new methods to provide urban and suburban public transport and active travel options that offer efficient, affordable and flexible trips while reducing reliance on private vehicle use. 

As public transport agencies increasingly adopt the use of automatic data collection systems, a significant amount of boarding data becomes available, providing an excellent opportunity for transit planners to access spatial-temporal data which can be used for a better understanding of human mobility and the performance of a transit system. Smartcard data can be used to examine a whole network regularly, and to make practical estimates of passenger origin-destination (OD) patterns and is a great asset in understanding public transport reliability issues.

From the end of World War Two, the use of public transport in Australian cities declined as the automobile industry grew and car ownership increased rapidly. Over time the car has evolved beyond being a means of transportation into being a subject of interest and a cherished part of their lifestyle for many people. In Australia, the car population is growing faster than the human population, and more than 90 per cent of Australians live in a household with access to a car. Traffic congestion has become a major problem, particularly in urban areas.

Prospects for the decarbonising of Australian cities will depend on opportunities for a reduction of transport energy use. This project focuses on the most significant challenge to Green House Gas reduction in urban transport -- specifically, that relating to provision of public transport and active travel options for low density suburban areas that are currently car dependent.