“The best of both worlds?” Linking tourism and transport functions in MaaS – A review of selected European and Asian-Pacific exemplars

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Leung, Abraham Chik-Keung
Baumeister, Stefan
Pavanini, Tiziano
Matsumoto, Yukimasa
Le, Thi Phuong Linh
Scott, Paul
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2022
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Tampere, Finland

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Background: This paper explores the functions of apps that incorporate both mobility and transport services, which we refer as Tourism-MaaS (T-MaaS). Previous research in MaaS has been fixated in Western world examples and urban commuter markets. As MaaS now faces challenges in scalability and commercial viability, understanding how non-transport functions can be integrated into MaaS becomes paramount. Incorporating tourism functions, such as accommodation, attractions, events, dining and other functions may help improve the appeal of MaaS. Methods: An in-depth review of eight exemplar cases, from five countries/regions across Europe and Asia Pacific, was conducted. We developed a scoreboard ranking scheme to measure i) the size current or potential user base; ii) the coverage of mobility services; iii) the coverage of tourism services; iv) the level of integration (information, service bundling and policy aspects), and v) other additional functions. Findings: Our scoreboard review with a wider geographical coverage and the inclusion of tourism functions suggests there is a thriving MaaS scene in the Asia Pacific region. Finland is one of the pioneers of tourism apps with a strong focus on connecting far-flung tourist destinations. Japanese and Italian apps tended to be developed from destination marketing organisation or public transport companies, focused on the integration of existing tourist reward schemes. Southeast Asian and Korean MaaS took form of “super-apps”, usually being an offshoot from taxi/ridehailing services that enjoy the benefit of a very large user base, being self-sufficient, and has built connections with travel service providers. Implications: This research developed a novel framework to evaluate T-MaaS. Incorporating non-transport functions (e.g. booking and events) may help create the demand for travel, which may help to provide a new source of customers. Challenges remain in how to ensure the social policy goals can be balanced with commercial profitability.

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3rd International Conference on Mobility as a Service (ICoMaaS)

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Transport planning

Tourism management

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Leung, AC-K; Baumeister, S; Pavanini, T; Matsumoto, Y; Le, TPL; Scott, P, “The best of both worlds?” Linking tourism and transport functions in MaaS – A review of selected European and Asian-Pacific exemplars, 3rd International Conference on Mobility as a Service (ICoMaaS), 2022