Smart Mobility Geneva: data, tools, a concept

In order to improve traffic flow and safety in the canton, a vast Smart Mobility programme was launched by the Geneva Cantonal Transport Office. BG fully supports this process – which is extremely complex due to the territorial particularities of Geneva – through a Smart Mobility concept, based on the collection and analysis of a large amount of data and with the objective of implementing mobility management plans and the design of user information signage.

Geneva is struggling with its mobility. Its urban area is subject to a very high traffic density and its network is regularly saturated. Surrounded by France, cut in two by the Rhône and wedged between lake and mountains, the city is limited in the development of its traffic axes. If we add to this that the canton has approximately 500,000 residents and that they make an average of 3.6 trips per day, we understand how much the programme of operational measures of the Road Action Plan, decided by the Cantonal Office for Transport and aimed at improving the fluidity and safety of intermodal traffic, is essential for the quality of life of the inhabitants of the Greater Geneva basin.

This programme, which was validated in 2010, is now in line with the cantonal law for coherent and balanced mobility (LMCE), which was voted on 5 June 2016 by 68% of the population and which gives priority to soft mobility and to public transport. Its ambition is to reorganise the management of all mobility flows between the different modes of transport, namely the car, the train, the Geneva public transports (TPG), bicycles, scooters and pedestrians. “This requires two optimisations”, explains Ludovic Magnin, project manager at BG. “Firstly, control of the network and knowledge of scheduled events and unexpected events, and secondly, the feedback of information on these events, with rational and pragmatic communication to users thanks to a dedicated plat form.”

In this context, BG is acting on a “Smart Mobility” mandate focused on four missions. The first mission is to establish Mobility Management Plans (PMG) to identify the actions that operators must take to manage planned events, such as demonstrations or work, or unplanned events, such as accidents; the second mission must define the traffic information signage intended for users (PIV) to allow them to anticipate and take detours, through signage containing messages on the site of the disturbance and the alternatives available; the third mission provides for the installation of around 100 video surveillance cameras, with upstream studies of relevant locations in order to obtain the right information for the management of road junctions; and finally, the fourth mission provides for the deployment of the traffic management system.

By informing users about means of transport other than the car, “Smart Mobility” is in line with the objectives of the Law for Coherent and Balanced Mobility (LMCE). “It makes it possible to reduce motorised traffic, to make traffic more fluid and to reduce CO2 emissions”, continues the project manager. “Thanks to Smart Mobility and the data we have collected and analysed, we are as close as possible to reality”, says Ludovic Magnin. It allows us to control and anticipate travel times, for example for a user who has a plane to catch, and to make the modes of transport more reliable by offering existing alternatives”. The management of the analysed data is an integral part of urban strategies and the way in which they are articulated, both at city and regional level.

(Article taken from BG Magazine 2021, updated version on the site)