Our personal mobility systems will undergo a significant transformation with the emergence of electrified drivetrains, shared services, and autonomous technology (Sprei, 2018). We can already plan door-to-door transport, share various mobility modes, drive fully electric cars, and several vehicles can assist with some driving functions like automatic braking or parking.
The three-way-innovation – sharing, autonomous, electrified – is expected to be the most significant disruption (Sprei, 2018; Greenblatt and Shaheen, 2015; Walker and Johnson, 2016). These shared autonomous vehicles (SAV) could significantly impact our day-to-day lives. Governments and societies should be encouraged to engage and respond to these inevitable transportation disruptions pro-actively. If they do not, it could have an undesirable effect on cities and society in the long term. We cannot only rely on technology, creating a desirable disruption. It is necessary to steer this disruption in a desirable way (Sprei, 2018). In steering this disruption, it is important to focus on the user and its needs in the future. As this disruption is highly complex, a holistic view is needed to design a desirable SAV- system. In this project, many different stakeholders’ views are considered, including future users, government, and involved companies. This project aims to formulate a user-centered vision for shared autonomous vehicles in the year 2040 and design a connected SAV-ecosystem for the Metropole region Rotterdam-The Hague (MRDH). The final goal is to create a user-centered solution that is feasible in terms of technology, societal desirability, and business feasibility that inspires involved stakeholders.