Enhancing Mobility for All: affordable, reliable, and accessible multimodal transport for inclusive rural and urban connectivity – Societal Readiness pilot

Expected Outcome: Proposals should address all of the following outcomes: Strategies, best practices and innovative solutions are made available to local authorities and actors to improve the availability, accessibility, and affordability of rural-urban transport and provide rural and urban populations in a vulnerable situation with better access to services and opportunities; Integrated multimodal solutions, which ensure seamless transitions between rural and urban transport modes improving first- and last-mile connectivity, are piloted and related implementation plans are developed for/by local authorities and transport operators; Responsiveness to a deeper understanding of the needs and concerns of diverse social group involved in or potentially affected by the R&I development, thereby increasing the potential for beneficial societal uptake, and building trust in results and outcomes. Development of options for behavioural change towards healthier, safer and more sustainable mobility and lifestyles in rural and urban populations in a vulnerable situation. Scope: EU policies, such as the Sustainable and Smart Mobility Strategy and the European Green Deal, emphasise the need for inclusive, efficient, accessible and sustainable transport systems that leave no one behind. Transport poverty refers to individuals’ and households’ inability or difficulty to meet the costs of private or public transport, or their lack of or limited access to transport needed for their access to essential socioeconomic services and activities. Considering the national and spatial context, transport poverty affects both rural and underserved urban areas. Addressing this challenge requires innovative multimodal transport solutions which integrate various modes efficiently, leveraging digitalisation, shared mobility, and demand-responsive transport to enhance affordability, reliability, and accessibility, thereby ensuring Mobility as a Right. Proposals should address all the following aspects: Building on the outcome of previous calls and existing knowledge (e.g. SMARTA-NET [1] , the study on Novel policy ideas for a shift to low-carbon mobility [2] , the study on Transport poverty: definitions, indicators, determinants, and mitigation strategies [3] and other relevant EU-funded projects [4] ), and drawing on the feedback experience of existing innovative mobility solutions (e.g. SMARTA-NET Catalogue of rural shared mobility solutions [5] ), investigate strategies to enhance availability and accessibility of sustainable and inclusive transport services in sparsely populated regio…