The mobility of the future, aimed at being more autonomous, affordable and safe, is set to revolutionise our production models and the distribution of the population.
Today, the challenge facing mobility is intimately linked to the progressive and continuous increase in population.
As Justo Sierra, President of Mindtech, pointed out during the second edition of the fair: “We are facing a fundamental mobility problem originating mainly in cities, but not the only one. The challenge is also to achieve a mobility of the future that is sustainable, compatible, shared, autonomous and connected.
SHARED PROJECT
BNEW experts say that the mobility of the future will necessarily have to be shared. This is due to a changing trend among younger people. This segment of the population continues to move around, even more than their parents or grandparents, but now they do so in a shared way, as many are no longer opting to buy their own vehicle.
In addition, we are increasingly moving towards overpopulation concentrated in cities: 55% of the population is concentrated in 2% of the land. This implies huge mobility challenges in these specific locations, where, increasingly, people are opting for carpooling, which beats more individualised mobility in terms of time and cost.
SUSTAINABLE MOBILITY
The need for more sustainable travel is increasingly demanded by society itself. This has led companies to look for more renewable and environmentally friendly solutions. But all of this must be combined, not only by companies, but also by government bodies, appropriate infrastructures and a change of mentality in society.
This change of mentality not only involves a wide range of clean energy vehicles, but also urban and intermodal mobility in line with current needs. The future lies in ideas such as autonomous mini-buses that adapt to people’s daily routines.
In addition, the railway is the backbone of interurban mobility, where hydrogen could be an alternative for this means of transport to become a clean, fast and safe mobility vehicle.
CONNECTIVITY
Emigration from rural areas to large cities is increasing over the years, which is why appropriate tools and infrastructures must be adopted to enable connectivity between areas and key points in large cities.
The Netzvision 2030 project aims to connect Europe’s key cities through a network of trains that will enable more affordable, comfortable and cleaner mobility. The promoters of the project aim to reduce the use of aeroplanes and cars, thus emitting less pollution into the atmosphere.
This is just one example of the need to make changes in lifestyles and cities, to make them smarter and with greater connectivity between populations, ensuring clean and fast transport.
ELECTRIFICATION AND NEW FUELS
The spearhead of future mobility lies in electrification. However, for this to truly represent a paradigm shift, alliances between private companies and administrations are needed to achieve a solid network of recharging points. Likewise, all manufacturers are already partly adapting their production lines to a change that is already imminent in industrial terms, since traditional combustion vehicles, as the United Nations has pointed out, will have to cease to be manufactured by 2040 at the latest.