Universal Basic Mobility and Mobility Wallets Pilots

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Introduction

Access to transportation and access to economic opportunities go hand-in-hand, but not everyone has access to affordable, reliable, and frequent transportation options. Universal basic mobility (UBM) means that “all citizens should have a decent range of affordable transport options, regardless of their socioeconomic status or disabilities,” and various cities are piloting ways to achieve this. UBM helps cities around the world meet climate goals, reduce congestion, reduce car vehicle miles traveled (VMT), and overall improve the quality of life for its residents.

The Mobility Innovation Collaborative (MIC) is a Shared-Use Mobility Center (SUMC) program run in partnership with the Federal Transit Administration (FTA) to provide technical assistance to nearly 50 FTA grantees and share lessons learned from innovative projects from around the country. Each quarter, the MIC team organizes a meeting to explore in-depth issues related to mobility trends. During the MIC Quarterly Meeting on October 27, 2022, SUMC invited three agencies to present their UBM pilot projects, share challenges, and reflect on outcomes. Speakers included:

• Colin Piethe, Transportation Planner at Oakland Department of Transportation; 
• Tosh Chambers, Senior Program Director at the City of Pittsburgh; and
• Jillian Gallard, Transportation Planning Associate at the Los Angeles Department of Transportation

About the Pilot Projects

Oakland Department Of Transportation

The City of Oakland Department of Transportation (OakDOT) piloted a UBM program in East Oakland between Fall 2020 and December 2021. With a budget of $243,000, OakDOT wanted to increase transit, walking, biking, and shared mobility trips to complement a new bus rapid transit route called TEMPO that runs along International Boulevard. 

Through the pilot program, 543 participants received prepaid debit cards loaded with up to $300 that could be spent on public transit, shared bikes, and shared electric scooters. About 85% of participants in this pilot were people of color, and about 75% of participants made less than $40,000 per year in household income. The majority of pilot program participants were already core transit riders who used the bus and BART as their top two modes of transportation, followed by driving a car.  

Throughout the course of the pilot, OakDOT administered surveys to see how participants’ travel patterns changed with their prepaid debit cards. 40% of participants shared that their travel behavior changed. Data showed that more participants were using the bus and Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) –  90% of funds went to AC Transit which runs the buses and to BART- and fewer participants were driving a car, using rideshare, walking, and biking. 

Now that the pilot has ended, OakDOT is exploring how to use the outcomes from this pilot in other parts of the city like West Oakland.

City of Pittsburgh

In 2019, the City of Pittsburgh formed the Pittsburgh Mobility Collective (PMC) – a consortium of mobility providers with the goal of connecting public transit, micromobility, and carshare to build a holistic transportation system for Pittsburghers. The Pittsburgh Mobility Collective is currently in the late stages of developing a guaranteed basic mobility pilot program for selected residents in the Manchester neighborhood, a primarily low-income and person of color (POC) neighborhood across the river from Pittsburgh’s central business district and out of reach from light rail stations. The pilot received a total of $175,000 from the RK Mellon Foundation and Spin, and is expected to launch in November 2022 and will run until November 2023,

This UBM pilot includes 100 total participants, 50% of which will be in a control group that will not receive transportation subsidies and the other 50% will be in the test group that will receive transportation subsidies. Eligible participants will get an unlimited transit pass, unlimited 30-minute trips for POGOH bikeshare, five daily 30-minute trips for shared e-scooters, and a Zipcar carshare membership with a $60 monthly credit. As a part of the pilot, participants in the pilot must document travel patterns, share this data with PMC, and participate in several surveys. 

From this pilot, PMC hopes to examine how reducing transportation barriers can impact social and economic outcomes and test subsidized mobility to identify trends, inform research, and determine how UBM can benefit low-income residents both in Pittsburgh and elsewhere. 

Los Angeles Department Of Transportation

The Los Angeles Department of Transportation (LADOT) is in the beginning stages of its South Los Angeles Universal Basic Mobility Pilot. The mobility wallet pilot emerged from a $13.8 million California Air Resources Board (CARB) grant to fund transportation equity projects throughout South Los Angeles, with a $7.9 million match from LADOT and its project partners. The focus area is a majority POC community and a largely disadvantaged area where 29% of households are below the poverty level. 

The mobility wallet pilot has two phases and a total of 2000 participants. Phase I will launch in Winter 2022, and 1000 participants will receive prepaid debit cards with $150 to spend on transportation loaded onto it each month for 12 months. Phase II will launch in the Spring or Summer of 2023, and 1000 participants will have Transit Access Pass (TAP) cards as a payment method for multiple mobility services.

Through the UBM pilot, LADOT hopes to increase access to transportation for POC communities, reduce VMT, and study travel behavior by providing not only a mobility wallet but a suite of complementary clean mobility options such as an e-bike library, EV car share services, and more. Survey and trip data will be analyzed to examine whether mobility wallets increase access to opportunities, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and improve economic and health outcomes. 

Key Takeaways

Though all of these pilots have not been implemented and do not have clear outcomes, there are several key takeaways that have emerged that shed light on UBM project implementation. 

Partnerships Are Key to Bringing Universal Basic Mobility to Fruition 

These projects would not be possible without partnerships between transit agencies and other local organizations. 

OakDOT partnered with various CBOs and city administrator offices to spread awareness of the pilot, partnered with the University of California Davis and Spin for research and is working with local bike shops to extend options for participants to use their prepaid cards. 

For the South Los Angeles Universal Basic Mobility Pilot, LADOT is partnered with several local organizations, government agencies, and other city departments:

• Los Angeles Clean Tech Incubator to supply an e-bike lending library, electric mobility workforce training, and a Zero Emissions Delivery pilot; 
• Los Angeles Trade Tech College to run EV technician certification courses and Youth Ambassador Program; 
• Blink Mobility for expanding the BlueLA EV car share program;  
• LA County Metropolitan Transportation Authority to implement the mobility wallet pilot with the University of California Davis and the University of California Los Angeles as research partners;
• South Los Angeles Transit Empowerment Zone and CicLAvia to assist with stakeholder engagement and resident advisory committee 

PMC formed various partnerships to work on its Guaranteed Basic Mobility pilot. Some of those partnerships include:

• The RK Mellon Foundation and Spin for funding support;
• Pittsburgh Regional Transit, Spin (scooters), POGOH (bikeshare), Zipcar (carshare), and Transit App;
• Carnegie Mellon University’s Metro 21 Lab to conduct research;
• Mobilify, a transportation consulting firm, to serve as a technical assistant for the pilot;
• Local neighborhood organization Manchester Citizens Corporation, which assists with community outreach and helps PMC better understand local needs;
• Innovate PGH for project management;
• The Alleghany County Department of Human Services, through a data sharing agreement which allows PMC to track financial outcomes and benefits; and
• Pittsburgh’s Department of Mobility & Infrastructure which has the final say on program directives.

Universal Basic Mobility Increases Use of Shared Transportation

OakDOT’s pilot program’s preliminary data shows how subsidized transportation can shift peoples’ travel habits. At the end of the pilot, 40% of the participants changed how they travel, with public transit trips frequently substituting personal vehicles and ride-hail trips. OakDOT’s pilot suggests that when people are given a subsidy for shared transportation, they are likely to use shared transportation. 

Meet People Where They Are and With Their Primary Language

Agencies interested in UBM programs can work with existing institutions like libraries, community-based organizations (CBOs), or other trusted voices in the project area to understand the community’s pain points and to cocreate the pilot. Once those community voices are gathered, compensate them for their time participating in meetings, events, and surveys. Finally, ensure that translators for the major spoken languages in the pilot area are available to assist during community engagement efforts. 

Customer Experience

OakDOT learned that about 90% of their pilot participants use their prepaid debit card for the bus or the BART. From this data, OakDOT has learned that in the future, they can provide an option to receive money directly on their Clipper card, which is the region’s contactless fare payment car for the bus and BART.

Reward Existing Shared Mobility Riders

While these pilots aim to support POC and low-income neighborhoods, there are people who are low-income and already use shared mobility modes as their primary source of transportation. Reward existing riders who are likely to need financial support the most with transportation subsidies.  

Technology and Data Considerations

Technology and data collection can pose unforeseen challenges, and it is important for agencies to be prepared and ready for any potential setbacks. 

Data privacy laws and policies can make some logistics difficult. For instance, OakDOT has strict personal data policies surrounding what personal information can be collected and used. This policy made it difficult to distribute the prepaid cards to participants, as they had to mail vouchers without a name and apartment number. Because of this, many potential participants mistook the vouchers for spam mail, and OakDOT ultimately saw lower participation than initially anticipated. 

In terms of technology used for data collection, when OakDOT staff administered surveys to participants through iPads. Some participants had difficulty reading the screens and using the iPads, which impacted the quality of survey responses. Making a survey or focus group accessible may mean being prepared with paper copies in different languages and translators on hand. 

Finally, data-sharing agreements can take time to set up and navigate, and it is best to include legal input early on in the process. PMC encountered this on the research partner’s side, and found that some of the work regarding data-sharing agreements had to be replicated once lawyers were involved in the process.

Conclusion

Affordable and convenient access to transportation can bring economic, health, and social benefits to people’s lives. Though a relatively new idea, UBM can be an effective strategy to make transportation equitable and encourage residents to use shared mobility services. These pilots can demonstrate the impact that UBM can have on those communities and pave the way for other pilot programs throughout the country.