Public Transport in Rural Areas
Matter of debate between supply-quality and affordability

A good public-transport-system is one of the key-features to maintain the attractiveness of living and working in rural areas outside of the bigger cities.

Certainly public transport in these areas often gets under economic pressure due to a low and in some regions even decreasing density of population. Challenges for the providers are big, when they want to offer a high-quality and affordable public transport service at once.

Where this balance does not work people have to use their own automobile or move to bigger cities. Both trends already have increased over the years.

One way out of this development leads to new and adaptable forms of passenger traffic; for instance “on-demand busses”, ”peoples-Busses”, “shared taxis” or” route taxis on demand” – embedded in appropriate organizational structures. In this context cost effectiveness, functionality and user-acceptance of these systems are the main factors of success.

An important contribution to the environmental protection can also be made by a strengthening of the public transport in the rural areas, as the environmental impact by the individual traffic can be clearly limited by the increased use of common means of transportation.

Already today there are many attempts to counteract against the decreasing quality of public transport in rural areas by proving adaptable operating forms of public transportation. Thereby found approaches to solutions shall be compared internationally and criteria shall be developed how to implement adaptable and flexible forms for public transport as an inherent part of passenger transport systems in rural areas.

The following aspects will be focused during the common work of the international project-partners:

• Comparison of the challenges for the public transport in the rural areas
• Comparison of the organizational forms of the personal transport providers
• Comparison of the different forms of public transportation in rural areas, in particular those models beyond classical regular traffic with firm timetables and cost structures
• Comparison of factors of success and failure
• Consideration of the influence of
  the different basic conditions on the parameters named above
• Assistance to solution statements in the partner regions
• Development of a decision guidance system (e.g. software) for the application of adaptable public transport systems in the NSR
  
  

Together with the European partners the following results shall be achieved

• Recommendations for suitable surrounding conditions for the strengthening of an adaptable and flexible public transport in
  rural areas
• Political recommendations for the direction of the public transport in rural areas Indicators as a regional decision guidance for public transport supplier
• Software-solution as a decisive aid system for the specific mix of different passenger transport forms in one region subject to the indicators relevant for the public transport; inclusive the modelling of different scenarios
• Guide for the decisive help to rural regions

All the results will address to the rural areas in the whole NSR and in addition also to comparable regions in other parts of Europe which are afflicted with similar challenges.

• Leastwise 4 international partner-countries iin the NSR are destined
• Project-partners should be     
  - Public institutions, responsible for public transport (in rural areas)     
  - Public transport provider in rural areas
  - Relevant research facilities