Call: Improving accessibility, inclusive mobility and equity: new tools and business models for public transport in prioritised areas

1. Excellent Science
2. Industrial Leadership
3. Societal Challenges

Within this programme Horizon 2020 will provide funding for a resource efficient transport that respects the environment, aims at a better mobility, less congestion, more safety and security, supports a global leadership for the European transport industry and targets a socio-economic and behavioural research and forward looking activities for policy making.

Transport is on the brink of a new era of smart mobility where infrastructure, transport means, travellers and goods will be increasingly interconnected to achieve optimised door-to-door mobility, higher safety, less environmental impact and lower operational costs.

Specific topics for the calls:

• Reducing energy consumption and environmental impact of aviation
• Reducing aviation noise
• Maintaining industrial leadership in aeronautics
• Breakthrough innovation
• Identification of gaps, barriers and needs in the aviation research
• Innovation for energy efficiency and emission control in waterborne transport
• Development, production and use of high performance and lightweight materials for vessels and equipment
• New and improved transport concepts in waterborne transport
• Complex and value-added specialised vessels
• Addressing aviation safety challenges
• Protection of all road users in crashes
• Safer waterborne transport and maritime operations
• Transport infrastructure innovation to increase the transport system safety at modal and intermodal level (including nodes and interchanges)
• Behavioural aspects for safer transport
• Euro-African initiative on road safety and traffic management
• Increasing the take up and scale-up of innovative solutions to achieve sustainable mobility in urban areas
• Supporting 'smart electric mobility' in cities
• Innovative approaches for integrating urban nodes in the TEN-T core network corridors
• Facilitating public procurement of innovative sustainable transport and mobility solutions in urban areas
• New ways of supporting development and implementation of neighbourhood-level and urban-district-level transport innovations
• Networked and efficient logistics clusters
• Innovative ICT solutions for future logistics operations
• Promoting the deployment of green transport, towards Eco-labels for logistics
• Potential of the Physical Internet
• Innovative concepts, systems and services towards 'mobility as a service'
• Large-scale demonstration(s) of cooperative ITS
• Roadmap, new business models, awareness raising, support and incentives for the roll-out of ITS
• Resilience to extreme (natural and man-made) events
• Optimisation of transport infrastructure including terminals
• The Port of the future
• Research, technology development and market trends for the European transport manufacturing industries
• Big data in Transport: Research opportunities, challenges and limitations
• Assessing future requirements for skills and jobs across transport modes and systems
• Improving accessibility, inlcusive mobility and equity: new tools and business models for public transport in prioritised areas
• Shifting paradigms: Exploring the dynamics of individual preferences, behaviours and lifestyles influencing travel and mobility choices
• Innovation awards for students and researchers in the context of the Transport Research Arena conference - TRA 2018

Accessibility is a concept used in order to address both travel patterns, attitudes and needs of particular social groups – e.g. gender specific needs, unemployed persons, vulnerable to exclusion citizens such as elderly, children, disabled, etc., as well as the mobility needs and transport use characteristics of people living in different types of areas such as rural, remote or deprived urban areas. To obtain a more comprehensive view which will allow the elaboration of measures and transport systems that will improve inclusive mobility and equity, and support social innovation in this area, it is necessary to incorporate both approaches considering specific geographical factors as well as the mobility needs and capabilities of particular population groups.

Rural areas, for example, are faced with continuous challenges linked to demographic, socio-economic and mobility factors such as: declining populations characterised by more pronounced ageing; income factors; reduced number of services and economic viability of public transport schemes; longer distances and different mobility needs related to public transport. Urban peripheral, suburban and deprived urban areas on the other hand are often characterised by population groups which face acute social, demographic and economic problems which impact on their mobility and on their ability to use available transport systems on equal terms.

In this context, the main challenge of this topic is to examine whether organisational, technological (including extended use of ICT) and social innovations in public transport can lead to improved accessibility, inclusive mobility and equity in prioritised areas, by responding better to their specific needs and demographic/socio-economic characteristics.

At least three legal entities. Each of the three must be established in a different EU Member State or Horizon 2020 associated country. All three legal entities must be independent of each other. 

The Commission considers that proposals requesting a contribution from the EU of between 1 and 3 million € each would allow this specific challenge to be addressed appropriately. Nonetheless, this does not preclude submission and selection of proposals requesting other amounts. Funding rate: 100% 

Link to the National Contact Point Finder.