Small vehicles, big impact: The concept of fine mobility

Fine mobility is mobility on foot and with means of transport in the spectrum between shoes and cars. The concept is based on considering vehicles and mobility aids according to their size on a scale from “fine” to “coarse”. Fine mobility thus forms the counter concept to traffic with ever larger and heavier motor vehicles.

Thomas W. Zängler used the term fine mobility as early as 2000 and equated it with micromobility (1). (2) Without knowledge of this source, Konrad Otto-Zimmermann developed the term fine mobility in 2021 and used it as the basis for an initiative involving working committees of the Verkehrsclub Deutschland e. V., the Association for Urban, Regional and State Planning. V. and the University of Kassel were involved. You have developed the initial technical foundations for this work. It was about “disarmament in urban traffic to means of transport on a human scale, the move away from gigantomania” as an essential component of the transport transition. (3)

Features of fine mobility

Mobility according to the economic-ecological principle

Fine mobility is mobility on a human scale and corresponds to the postulate of both economic and ecological mobility: changes in location are carried out using the smallest, lightest, finest, quietest, most resource-efficient, lowest-emission and most cost-effective option in the spectrum of all means of movement in individual transport and light commercial transport for the respective area of ​​application .

Foot mobility

Fine mobility also includes walking as basic mobility. Pedestrian traffic is used to move or transport people, e.g. B. children and physically disabled people (walkers, wheelchairs, strollers, etc.) and loads (trolleys, carts and carts), a range of means of movement that can be considered as foot supplements.

Car growth challenge

The size of passenger cars has increased over the last few decades. The footprint of new car models sold in Europe alone increased by around 18% between the 1960s and the 2010s. (4)

Fig. 1: Width growth of a vehicle model (without mirror) (own illustration based on manufacturer's information)
Fig. 2: Segment distribution according to the KBA’s ZFZR (December 2022)

In fact, a threefold increase in car growth can be observed in Germany and the EU:

1. Many cars have become larger and heavier from model series to model series (see Fig. 1 for the growth in size of the VW Golf).
2. Many car owners switch from their existing vehicles to larger models (crossovers, SUVs, off-road vehicles) when purchasing replacements. The proportion of SUVs and off-road vehicles in new registrations in Germany has been growing continuously for years and is now over 40% (see Fig. 2). (5)

3. Car numbers and car density (cars per 1,000 inhabitants) continue to rise: from 2010 to 2022 alone, the car density in Germany grew by around 14.5% to 583 cars per 1,000 inhabitants. (6)

The magnitude of the threefold growth in cars can be clearly illustrated by the increase in the size of the German car fleet from 2017 to 2023. The space occupied is defined as the volume of the cuboid around the outermost dimensions of all inelastic components of a vehicle when it is ready to drive.

Since the quantitative stock in Germany has increased by around 6% to over 48 million cars and the market share of large car models is also increasing when purchasing replacements, the volume of the stock has recently increased by a total of around 18.5% or . 100 million cubic meters increased. This corresponds to a gross spatial volume of around 10,000 single-family houses or the cuboid in Figure 3 with the dimensions 2000 mx 100 mx 500 m, which illustrates the extent of this space-taking in cities. (7)

Fig. 3: Increase in space taken up by newly registered cars compared to buildings from 2017 to 2023 (own illustration)

As the number and size of the car population grows, there is an increase in problems:

The trend towards ever larger cars continues unabated. This means that city and traffic planning, but also the planning and construction of buildings and infrastructures with a lifespan of 40 to 60 years, would have to adapt to significantly larger vehicles than those on the roads today. The infrastructure currently built for today's vehicle fleet would soon no longer be sufficient and could later prove to be a bad investment. Figure 5 shows the extrapolation of the growth of an example car model from three past decades to three upcoming decades.

Fig. 5: Extrapolation of the size growth of a car model series (own illustration)

However, the market-driven increase in car sizes and the increased switch from cars to off-road vehicles and pickups does not necessarily have to be reflected in road and traffic legislation and infrastructure planning. A move away from pure adaptation planning and towards target planning for lighter, more maneuverable, more environmentally friendly, more climate-friendly and more space-saving vehicles is not only necessary, but also possible.

Dimensional change as a component of the transport transition

The transition to finer vehicles is an important component of the transport transition. This requires one Mobility transition to reduce forced mobility, one Transport transition with a shift from cars to the environmental network, one Use change from driving a private car alone to sharing vehicles and journeys, one Drive turnaround towards environmentally friendly, climate-neutral drives as well as the Dimensional turnaround towards fine mobility (see Fig. 6).

The extent to which the digitalization and automation of vehicles could lead to a reduction in accident risks and environmental impacts of vehicle traffic and thus form a component of the transport transition can be considered an open question.

Fig. 6: Dimensional change as a component of the transport transition (own representation)

What is important is that even if vehicles are shared, drive electrically or autonomously, it makes a difference whether small or large or more or less space-consuming vehicles are used.

Notes

(1) Critical examination of the term: Konrad Otto-Zimmermann, Time to question ›micromobility‹, online supplement to
International Transport, May 2021

(2) Zängler, TW (2000), Microanalysis of mobility behavior in everyday life and leisure, published by IFMO Institute for Mobility Research, Springer Verlag, Berlin Heidelberg New York.

(3) Otto-Zimmermann, K. (2021), Does micromobility make sense?, International Transport (73) 2/2021, pp. 52 – 53.

(4) ITF (2022), Streets That Fit: Re-allocating Space for Better Cities, International Transport Forum Policy Papers, No. 100, OECD Publishing, Paris.

(5) Federal Motor Transport Authority (KBA) (2023), fdzoff.zfzrbt.2023.1, doi: 10.25525/kba-fdzoff.zfzrbt.2023.1.

(6) Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) (2023), car density again at a record high in 2022 [Pressemitteilung]. Wiesbaden.

(7) Federal Motor Transport Authority (KBA) (2023), fdzoff.zfzrbt.2023.1, doi: 10.25525/kba-fdzoff.zfzrbt.2023.1

(8) Infas, DLR, IVT and infras 360 (2018), Mobility in Germany (on behalf of the BMVI).

(9) Expert Council on Climate Issues (2023), 2023 audit report for the buildings and transport sectors. Examination of the assumptions underlying the measures in accordance with Section 12 Paragraph 2 of the Federal Climate Protection Act. Available online at: https://www.expertrat-klima.de.

(10) Infas, DLR, IVT and infras 360 (2018), Mobility in Germany (on behalf of the BMVI).