Gamification as a way to induce behavioural change in mobility

Summary

The main goal of this measure was the improvement of mobility demand management and awareness for sustainable mobility by means of improving the perception of public transport (PT) quality. This was achieved by designing, implementing, prototyping and demonstrating mobility related behavioural change games and an interactive bus stop.

Implementing sustainable mobility

MARGe app (MadeiRA Gamified experience)

Initial creative exploration sessions, testing existing solutions and experimentation resulted in MARGe, implementation by means of a mobile application that resembles a mobile game. Using specific gamification techniques, the mobile game motivates users (particularly tourists) to use the bus to travel when exploring and discovering Funchal city, fostering a reward feeling. The MARGe application guides users and benefits them from having a narrative, by making each adventure a story, with progression until the end of the proposed / selected "discovery adventure". It also provides an awards page and a summary page of the total progression.

Interactive bus stop prototype

The design started with a “Bus Stop Design Challenge” with the aim of redesigning public bus stops of Horarios do Funchal (HF), the main public transport operator). Later, ARDITI developed a prototype around an architectural reference model enabling the delivery of relevant personalised content through big public displays to PT passengers and relying on proximity detection of the users. The bus stop makes use of a web server, which interacts with the PT operator API for retrieving bus line information. It also provides news headlines, customised public information (e.g., health alerts related to Covid19), weather information from CIVITAS DESTINATIONS stations (or from other sources), etc. Information can be customised for the user using his mobile phone app.

PT related promotional game aimed at students

The game promotes the use of PT while entertaining (e.g., students when waiting for the bus). It comprises the personification of an urban city in a map where the scenario is generated dynamically. The users, in a competition base, manage the operation of the passenger’s board process and all the traffic constrains to ensure the bus arrives on time to the destination and takes as much passengers as possible. A scoring system is included to induce competition between players, according to factors of the game such as the waiting time for the bus or the number of passengers transported.

More information

• Measure evaluation report - April 2021
• Flyer presenting the outputs available at https://cloud.arditi.pt/index.php/s/ZfpmdqEBEd2MAAe
   

Outcomes

• MARGe gamification Public Transport app (MadeiRA Gamified experience).
• An interactive Bus Stop prototype.
• A PT related promotional game.
• Seven related scientific papers presented / published in international peer reviewed conferences, plus 2 presentations, including one at the CIVITAS Forum 2019.