To promote low-carbon mobility, including public transport, breaks in the mobility chain must be avoided. It starts with the information given to users on trips.
In cross-border regions, information is often scattered and rarely visible at a glance by users. These latter must switch from one information system to another to plan their entire trip.
The Linking Alps project aims to set up a web service linking all existing multimodal information services to offer users a single point of access allowing them to view their entire journey, from departure to arrival.
Cerema is one of the 14 partners of the project. Specifically, it is in charge of the interface with the communities of the Sud - Provence Alpes Côte d'Azur region to build the methodology for the development of their route planners.
It will also facilitate access to the national access point to multimodal data in conjunction with the French Agency for Multimodal Information and Ticketing. Finally, it will organise the ultimate event of the project in June 2022 in Aix en Provence to promote the results and their immediate and future variations.
Linking Alps: towards a standardised passenger information exchange service
Linking Alps is a European Inerreg project, a programme for the development of innovative actions as close as possible to the territories, which aims to federate actions at the level of border regions with the dual dimension of consistency with the orientations of European policy while respecting the principle of subsidiarity.
The aim of Linking Alps is to create a standardised travel information exchange service between the various providers of travel information services in the Alpine space. In this way, information can be exchanged between different information systems and compiled into a continuous travel chain.
The project is a continuation of the recently completed LinkingDanube, which demonstrated the feasibility of a uniform information exchange in the form of the Open Journey Planner (OJP) developed under the project. Linking Alps will now take OJP to the next level, providing an operational service in the Alpine space. The Alps are one of the most popular holiday destinations in Europe and therefore have a high travel volume. Major Alpine transit routes, such as the Brenner route, cross several countries and regions. Hence, travellers must be provided with consistent and high-quality travel information.
Mobility information services and information on cross-border travel, operators and modes will be shared among the project partners, in order to offer the best option for the end user. The approach includes pilot activities and tests for a decentralised transnational travel planning system.
Launched in October 2019, the project is planned over 3 years. Funding, to the tune of 3 million Euros, comes from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF).
From the interconnection of modes to the interconnection of services
The aim of the Linking Alps project is to set up a single web service linking all of the existing multimodal information services to offer the user a single point of access for programming the most economical transport in terms of carbon emissions.
The principle is that of door-to-door multimodal navigators. This Linking Alps principle is linked to the observation that a single multimodal navigator for the whole of Europe does not work as European Commissioner Slim Callas had imagined in 2012. The Linking Alps project, like the Linking Danube project, is based on the principle of route calculation divided between the various tools developed locally.
Each local tool calculates the route in its geographical area and shares the result with the others. Local route planners can be grouped into two categories:
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Asset: In this case the route planner, based on the origin and destination information, determines the other route planners involved in the door-to-door calculation. It queries the other planners, collects their response and assembles them to submit one or more solutions to the person who requested the calculation.
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Passive: in this case, the route calculator simply responds to the requests of the active planners by calculating the local route(s) meeting the criteria transmitted to it.
14 partners, Cerema present in several phases of the project
Cerema is one of the 14 partners [1] of the consortium bringing together six Alpine Space countries (Austria, Germany, Italy, Slovenia, Switzerland and France). As part of Linking Alps, travel information service providers have committed to making their data accessible through an API (Application Programming Interface) service so that end user services can expand to provide cross-border routing.
Cerema participates in the various phases of the project.
Locally, it represents the interface with the communities of the Sud - Provence Alpes Côte d'Azur region to build the methodology for the development of their route planners.
At the same time, Cerema will establish a methodology aimed at helping stakeholders with a multimodal route planner to assess their ability to integrate the OJP (Open Journey Planner) standard to make it compliant with the provisions of delegated regulation 2017/1926. It complements the ITS directive and targets multimodal information for passenger transport at the European level. It should allow the linking of services as a solution rather than a single European integration by regulating the provision of and access to data, along with distributed route planning.
Cerema will also facilitate access to the national access point to multimodal data in conjunction with the French Agency for Multimodal Information and Ticketing.
Finally, it will organise the ultimate event of the project in June 2022 in Aix en Provence to promote the results and their immediate and future variations.
[1] List of project partners: