The end-users of the platform could be various target audiences. Different audiences are tied differently to the platform, leading to different governance models around the platform. Technically, platforms can have very similar functions, but the organisational design of a platform aimed at tourists is very different from a platform aimed at the citizens of a region.
Key words: Collectivization
The PETRA platform is set a generic platform design, which is primarily set up to provide travellers with an improved trip through the network, optimized for on intermodal options and based on modelled conditions and real-time information. The traveller is seen as the end-user, for whom the experience has to be optimized, balancing between his individual goals, providing them with an attractive advice, and more collective goals, providing mobility patterns in line with public values. Introducing this last part in the end-users evaluation, we will call collectivization of the platform: end-users adopting the nudging or incentivizing of the platform to contribute in their travel to governmental goals.
Both the demonstrators as well as the cases show the variety of definitions of the end-user possible within those bounds of “the traveller”. In the demonstrators, travellers are defined very differently. In the first Rome demonstrator (as in the original Tel Aviv demonstrator), the end-user consists of variety of travellers, including commuters, very much in line with the original perspective of the PETRA platform. In the second Rome demonstrator and in Venice demonstrator, the end-user is seen as the tourist in the area. In the Haifa demonstrator also a generic set of travellers is seen as the end-user. However, the focus from the municipal partners, being the traffic control centre, seems to be more on the car driver and the flow of vehicles through the network, given the existing mobility patterns in that city.
With that variety of end-user definition, alignment with public values (collectivization) becomes an issue.
First, jurisdiction alignment now can become an issue. Romans are likely to identify themselves with the city, its governance systems, and its pubic values. As the government developing the platform operates on the metropolitan level, there is an expected link between the goals as set by a democratic (metropolitan) government and the identity and goals as set by the targeted traveller. Tying the citizens of the platform can build on that.
Several aspects can hamper this relation. First, in the Haifa demonstrator, the expected end-users are mostly car drivers in the region. In addition, the platform owner is the road traffic control centre of the city. A key value the traffic control centre is asked for is smooth flows of traffic and reduced waiting times at traffic lights. At the same time, the project also aims to provide better information to public transport passengers. The focus of the implementing entity will drive the optimization the platform provides and could be focussing on improved network flows, whit limited potential for collectivization. The potential for collectivization is limited by the alignment of the values of the implementer of the platform with the broader mobility related public values in the area.
Second, the Haifa demonstrator occurs in an area with a great deal of commuters in and out of the city. These end-users live in different jurisdictions with limited relation to the platform owner. Their identification with the policy priorities on mobility for the city will likely be limited.
Third, the second Rome demonstrator and the Venice demonstrator consider tourists the end-users. The relation between the tourists and the cities is very different. There is no long-term relation. Now the identification with the policy priorities on mobility for the city are likely even more limited.
In case of the more limited identification with the jurisdiction of the owner of the platform and the policy priorities as formulated by the governmental entity of that jurisdiction, the expectations of the end-user is likely to tend towards single end-user value: give me the quickest or more reliable trip. In such case, the platform will have to resort to providing alternative incentives to the end-user to foster more collective behaviour. If not, the platform will be more like a traditional travel planner. Travel planners generally attract users through simple single value optimization: the planner makes the trip of the traveller quicker or more reliable and the end-user is only looking at this from the planner.