Innovation is key to the economic and social progress of cities. Increasingly, innovations are being introduced in our urban environments that improve the quality of life of the citizens who inhabit them and make their spaces more accessible, equitable and sustainable.
In this sense, and in order to meet the challenges faced by cities, a concept has been developing for years that allows the integration of the users and beneficiaries of products and services in the process of creating them, in order to meet the objectives they set and achieve a higher degree of satisfaction. With the idea of open innovation, living labs have emerged in different areas and fields, with specific adaptations of the environment for their deployment.
One of the areas in which they have been most developed is urban mobility. Urban mobility laboratories are based on the idea that mobility is not only a technical or infrastructural issue, but also involves social, cultural, economic and environmental dimensions that require a comprehensive and transdisciplinary approach.
With the aim of recreating the conditions in which citizens move and interact as accurately as possible, real experimentation environments have been deployed to serve as real testbeds for innovative prototypes, services or products, integrating mobility users in the validation and co-creation process.
These spaces allow, on the one hand, to adapt precisely to the needs and requirements of users; on the other hand, it allows collaboration between all agents through a process of open innovation, and it also brings technology and innovation closer to citizens.
This type of spaces integrate characteristics that make them infrastructures of great utility for the city and its innovation ecosystem, due to their quadruple nature, such as:
On the other hand, urban mobility laboratories need a specific normative and regulatory framework that favors and enables the development of the activities deployed, and that recognizes and legitimizes the value and impact of the solutions generated for society.
Numerous urban living labs are being developed within the European Union. An example of this is the Urban ICT Arena located in the science city of Kista, Sweden. This space is offered for testing mobility projects by recreating the urban environment, adapting the infrastructure, testing IoT projects, innovative vehicles or 5G connectivity developments.
Another example can be found in London, United Kingdom, in the Smart Mobility Living Lab Londondeployed on public and private roads in London where it is possible to validate innovation and mobility and transportation technologies in a real and connected environment.
In Greece, the Smart Mobility Living Lab of Thessaloniki, managed by the Hellenic Institute of Transport and the Hellas Research and Technology Center is one of the largest living labs in Europe, while the entire city is a testing platform for innovative technological solutions in mobility, autonomous vehicles, Smart City solutions, etc.
In Spain, within the framework of the Digizity project, the first urban mobility living lab has been developed with the Zaragoza Relevant Environment.
This living lab was deployed along 8km of the city's bus line 40 operated by Avanza. The environment was adapted by painting the track, deploying sensors in bus shelters, totems, on other vehicles, and adaptations in the traffic light controllers to test the functionalities of the efficient, intelligent and connected bus.
In a second phase, citizens were an active part of the validation and testing process of the project, where a special free service was created with the vehicle in which the systems were tested in real operation. There were a total of 968 passengers distributed in 125 trips, with a high evaluation of the experience.