Modelling Narratives of Sufficient Mobility: A case study for Germany in 2040 (Arnz et al. 2021)

The mobility transition is crucial for the rapid achievement of our decarbonization goals, but there is no uniform understanding. Many discussions concern urban areas and the switch to new drive technologies. Discussions about changes in mobility behaviour in the most emission-intensive segment of passenger transport – medium and long-haul routes – are comparatively rare. Sufficiency strategies, i.e. strategies for traffic avoidance and modal shift to more environmentally friendly modes, are urgently needed here. The research project “Modelling Narratives of Sufficient Mobility” is working with experts to develop drivers for the vision of sufficient passenger transport. The focus is on mobility behaviour between urban, suburban and rural areas in Germany. This is because traffic over these distances is responsible for about two-thirds of energy demand and emissions. The research team then develops narratives for sufficient mobility and translates the developed drivers into parameters of a traffic model that simulates the new transport system. The aim is to show how sufficiency strategies affect the decarbonisation of the transport sector and thus provide a starting point for socio-political discussions and further research.

The abstract summarizes the needs of modeling for sufficiency mobility and provides background information on the research field. In addition, the scientific methods used are described. The presentation was shown at the International Literary Modelling and Energy Transition Conference in Münster on 5 October 2021.

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