This initial report which focused on North American developments and context, was followed up a year later by a report offering world wide coverage put out by the US Department of Transportation under the title, Paratransit: Survey of International Experience and Prospects (Eric Britton and Associates, EcoPlan International. U.S. Dept. of Transportation, Urban Mass Transportation Administration, 1975). These first two studies were followed up by hundreds of others, and if you turn to References here you will find a preliminary listing of some of the best known of these.)

And what's the big difference with these same concepts many of which have been around for decades? It's the technology, stupid! Stay tuned and get involved.

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What is xTransit

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xTransit is not . . .

• Private auto-motive - i.e., not self-propelled or self-driven transport
  • Private cars, privately used (SOV etc.)
  • Motorized two/three wheelers
  • Cycles (in their traditional individual ownership and use pattern)
  • Walking, running, etc
• Nor traditional "public transport"
  • Rail: metro, conventional rail, light rail, tramways. etc.
  • Bus: Fixed route, scheduled services, school buses, etc.

Antecedents: Other ways of getting around:
In any old order for now and just to get us going. What the following have in common is that they all are, or could be, candidates for, shared ride services, more or less well articulated, more or less well supported by SOA technology. For now we cluster these in groups of roughly like concepts and operations:

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The other half of the xTransit: ICT, logistics

• IT/ICT
• Central dispatching services
• Back-office systems and services
• Call centers and processing
• On board information and communications systems
• Advanced traveler information systems
• Internet/website information (may or may not be interactive)
• Internet/website reservation/ordering (interactive)
• Ride matching
• Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS)
• GPS
• Mobile phones
• Mobility centers
• . . .

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xTransit Building Blocks

This section is presented here as work in progress and we invite your comments and suggestions for improvement.

Small diagram here? Your suggestions?

What we call xTransit or paratransit is a series of shared transportation service arrangements - not private cars, not public transport - that have cropped up over the years in many places in many forms. If you click here, for example, you will see not far from one hundred different system types and names. It is a rich area of transportation practice, innovation and adaptation, though it is also one that is in general poorly defined and understood both in actual practice and in the transport lexicon more generally. In most cases historically xTransit just happens: it crops up as a make-do seat-of-the-pants solution to people's felt requirements to find ways to get around.

There are seven main "vectors" or building blocks which shape xTransit systems when you get down to the details:

1. Vehicle
2. Ride
3. Access
4. Technology
5. Finance
6. Subsidies
7. Infrastructure

Vehicle: The sharing of the vehicle can be done either simultaneously (think, parallel access ) - such as the case with group ride taxis, car/vanpools, hitchhiking and the like. Or it can be handled temporally (i.e., serial access) - as is the case with carsharing and bike sharing where the vehicle is used and then made available to others in the organized group.

Ride: The ride can be shared either by organized closed groups (carpools and vanpools). Or can be open: taxi sharing, hitchhiking, slugging.

Access: Pre-arranged: semi fixed (car, van pools). Dynamic: based on hailing (the various taxi type system, slugging, hitchhiking. Group access: as with carsharing and bike sharing.

Technology: Historically xTransit and its many varieties had no more technology content beyond that of the vehicle itself. In the late sixties we began to see more technological content for organization, dispatching and routing - but in general and especially in comparison with what is currently available, these were quite rudimentary and did not suffice for either high quality or economically viable services. Smart ParaTransit however takes this into entirely new dimensions, building directly on the two decades of innovative and largely successful operating experience with computerized taxi dispatch systems and high-technology package delivery services such as those offered by Federal Express and DHL, among many others.

Finance: How the services are paid for? No payment: casual hitchhiking, much informal ride-sharing. Agreed hand-to-hand fares, no subsidies (shared taxis in all their varieties). Fixed price/cost sharing (car, vanpools, slugging, traditional taxis). Service packages (as with carsharing and bike sharing programs). Dynamic, automated: Smart ParaTransit will automatically bill your credit card based on pre-agreed rates.

Subsidies: Traditionally xTransit systems were not subsidized. Starting in the seventies however as they began to serve specific and generally underserved groups, such as the elderly and handicapped, more complex subsidy arrangements started to be developed so as to provide needed survives to these groups at prices they could afford. Looking to the future, there is great scope for improving our understanding of how wise subsidies can be built into these systems

Infrastructure: If you look at the history of these systems they were pretty much obliged to get along as "last among equals", thereby having access to the street system quite as any other private vehicle but with no provision for their special public role and requirements (pick up facilities, parking, etc.) Gradually over the last decade, we are seeing some of the pool services and more recently carsharing and bike sharing as starting to gain more appropriate access given their public functions. And w can anticipate that this is going to be a very important vector of their future success. They are going to need this level of privileged access if they are to play their full role as sustainable transportation.

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The strategic context of xTransit

"How street space is allocated, priced, and managed tells people how to travel".
- Michael A. Replogle, Environmental Defense, 5 Jan 2005 and said right here

A full and proper understanding of the actual context of this thing we are calling xTransit is vital to figuring out what if anything to do next with this concept and way of helping people to get around in our cities, and, yes, small communities as well. Without the context by way of background this is only one more of those many ideas, maybe good, maybe bad, that we can chat about forever and as the damage from the old dysfunctional system continues to mount day after day. But as I hope you know that is not what we are trying to do here at the New Mobility Agenda.

For a pretty good and fairly detailed introductory overview on the overall problematique as we see it, we can refer you to the "Here's our problem" opening section of the Kyoto World Cities 20/20 Challenge at www.kyotocities.org. But in the meantime and with one eye to the clock, what about accepting the following as a rather good surrogate for the rest when it comes to the dysfunctionalities -- thereby putting aside for the moment our very real concerns with pollution, economic costs, health impacts, taxpayer burden and the long list goes on (as you will see if you turn to the full treatment)? But let's simply for the purpose of putting xTransit into perspective think about all this for now as if the only problem that concerns us immediately is that of . . . the (egregious) space requirements of the "old mobility" (that is car-dominated) system.

The key to the New Mobility Agenda in cities lies in what is basically a two pronged approach: (a) aggressive, strategic infrastructure management and (b) parallel creation of a wide range of first class, desirable alternatives to the old mobility system which is now to be gently moved out of the city (or more realistically be greatly reduced in target areas and times), all while being left as a personal option for other transport as people may wish. (Bearing in mind that recent studies provide evidence that Swiss and German city dwellers who get to work and into the center by non-car means, nonetheless for the most part continue to own and use own cars for less dense travel and in the off peak).

The strategy is to withdraw steadily street space from "normal mixed use" and transfer it to more space efficient users, via programs of signage, traffic management, surface treatments and compliance monitoring. And this long list runs all the way from people walking and cycling in safety to traditional scheduled public transport plying fixed routes. That's a beginning, but is not going to be enough in most cities and their environs where the actual pattern of origins, destinations, and times of desired travel has exploded to a point that new means are going to be required to cater to at least a portion of this growing total.

Which is where xTransit in all its varieties comes in: space efficient transport (that in most cases has yet to be fully developed and put into place) that is by dint of load factors a rightful participant user of the new high density streets and lanes.

That's the broad strategic vision; now for the details.

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Why has it lagged?

When the first demonstration systems began to appear in the mid/late sixties, most ran into the dual problems of: (a) the technology was not there yet; and (b) insufficiently entrepreneurial skills on the part of the organizers. What was achieved however is that these first systems broke the ice and various groups and people started to look more closely at these group ride, 'third way' concepts.

An even less successful series of attempted innovations -- PRT or Personal Rapid Transit Systems (these entirely off the road, on their own guideways and (too) ambitiously computer controlled from start to finish) -- which despite being the beneficiaries of one, two, even three orders of magnitude more investment also bit the dust. But they too started various players around the world to thinking about high levels of service, and the ways in which new technologies might provide the glue to keep them together.

But the most important barriers that have delayed the progress and on-street introduction of these systems have been above all the result of the many ways in which the old system protects itself form innovation and change. Here are some of these which have been at times examined by researchers, public sector agencies, entrepreneurs, activists, and others hoping to create a more open framework for innovation in this badly constrained sector that is transport in cities.

Which brings us to what is doubtless going to be the most important single target, challenge and eventual contribution:

• "Channeled thinking" on the part of the authorities and most others concerned in shaping the transport context of the city

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Next steps

Some of the key issue areas that now need collective attention if xTransit is to advance in time to make a difference, both as a global concept and in its various parts:

• Better knowledge of preconditions for success
• Institutional, legal, regulatory and other barriers (incl. local ordinances)
• Integration, coordination issues
• Relationship with public transport and other providers
• Financing: Who pays what
• Role of fare box
• Subsidies
• Integration of fares with other carriers
• HOV priorities
• Labor union (resistance)
• Trade resistance (mainly from taxi operators)
• Insurance, liability
• Safety, security\
• Driver training
• Vehicle maintenance
• Privacy
• Support of demonstration projects, on on-going services
• Relationship with local business community
• Getting the message across

The model for our collaborative efforts: Perhaps, until something better pops up, our collaborative efforts over the last decade via the World Carshare Consortium?

It might also be useful to recall that this is an example of what we call a Self-Organizing Collaborative Network, for which you will find further background in the also in-progress Wikipedia entry on this here (own window). You might also wish to have a look at their entry on Knowledge Building, which relates closely albeit without the ever-important component of collaboration for change.

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