疫情使城市重新考慮公共交通規劃

道格·約翰遜

During the ongoing COVID-19 crisis， some city buses and trains have run empty， while others have been packed. In Los Angeles， for instance， ridership on the LA Metro has dropped from about 1.2 million to around 400，000 a weekday. Meanwhile， Detroits number 17 bus route and various lines in New York City have run at a potentially dangerous capacity.

To address this and other issues during the pandemic， some cities—including LA， Lincoln， Nebraska， Abu Dhabi， United Arab Emirates， Berlin， and Palma de Mallorca， Spain—are turning to on-demand programs called microtransit. They operate like Uber or Lyft， but the technology companies create the digital routing and ride-hailing platforms for transit agencies. According to Jerome Mayaud， lead data scientist with microtransit company Spare Labs， cities can use the platforms with public transit to fill specific niches and to offer rides that can be more affordable than solely private operations.

“Imagine Uber and a city bus had a baby，” Mayaud says.

Since the start of the pandemic， cities have turned to microtransit to offer essential rides， like moving seniors to pharmacies or nurses to hospitals. Proponents of microtransit say the technology behind these apps could be used to combat COVID-19 in other ways. For instance， the apps could help track the spread of infection and alert riders if they shared a ride with someone who later tested positive， a tactic called contact tracing.

Experts are mixed on the proposals. Some say contact tracing， for instance， poses privacy issues， and that there will be technical challenges in implementing other strategies through the platforms. Others say microtransit could play a useful role as city streets begin to return to normal.

Cities partnered with Via Transportation may use their own shuttles， vans， or public buses for the service， or have Via source the vehicles for them， while those partnered with Spare usually repurpose public vans and buses for the service. Transit agencies determine their own fare—rides in LA using Via are currently free， while in Lincoln， Nebraska， where a bus ride is normally $1.75， microtransit service is $5. Meanwhile， the Utah Transit Authority set its microtransit rides at $2.50， the same as a bus ride. Rides can either go directly from， say， a persons house to their job， or to and from locations chosen by the transit agency.

Microtransit companies also say cities can use it to provide affordable rides for people in communities that are already under-resourced. These demographics—including seniors， a population the disease hits particularly hard—have largely been stuck making trips on public transit， according to data from Transit app， a journey-planning application based in Montreal that operates in more than 200 cities and regions worldwide.

Other tools to reduce the spread of the disease can be， or are， developed within the platforms themselves. Cities can set a rider maximum per trip—informing drivers not to pick up any more than that set number—functionally enforcing social distancing on the rides. LA set the rider limit at one， while Lincoln set theirs at two， for instance.

Microtransit companies are also looking to develop pre-screening functionalities in their apps. Hypothetically， any time a person hails a ride the app could ask them questions about potential symptoms and how much they have self-isolated.

One of the more controversial functions some microtransit companies are considering in the wake of COVID-19 is contact tracing. Broadly， the method makes use of the near-ubiquity of smartphones. Users who fall ill report it through an app on their phone， which in turn notifies anyone they had been in close contact with of the risk. But critics worry about giving governments that amount of information about their citizens.

Many countries around the world are working on contact tracing applications. China， an early adopter1， has used contact tracing since February. In March， Singapores government released one that uses Bluetooth transmitters in peoples phones， and made the source code openly available. Australia launched its own app in April， using the code. Also in April， Apple and Google announced their own proposed Bluetooth approach， in which phones would log whenever two or more people are close enough together for a long enough period of time to contract the disease. This proximity information is stored on users phones， and used to notify people who have potentially been exposed.

For contact tracing to work well， the companies or health agencies need to know who is infected and where they have been—and when—to establish and communicate a possible chain of infection. For instance， Chinas contact tracing system lets the state know the locations of the phones running the app. Chinese citizens are also issued digital barcodes on their phones， or QR codes， that dictate if they are allowed to be in public. The approach slowed the spread of the disease because it allows officials to alert people directly about their chances of infection， or to self-quarantine.

Microtransit could still be valuable as social distancing ends and more people begin to move around cities. Because it is quite flexible， it could replace some fixed-route transit routes in the future. Further， one of microtransits biggest strengths， normally， is getting people to and from bus and train stations， making it easier for people to use traditional public transit. It could also be used in rural areas with infrequent public transit service and large distances between stops.? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?在新冠肺炎疫情期間，有些城市的公交車和地鐵上空無一人，而有些城市的公交車和地鐵則人滿為患。例如，洛杉磯地鐵系統的工作日乘車人數從一天約120萬人下降到約40萬人。與此同時，底特律的17路公交車，還有紐約市的許多公交線路，乘車人數都很多，造成了安全隱患。

為了應對這一問題及疫情期間的其他問題，一些城市——包括美國的洛杉磯市、美國內布拉斯加州的林肯市、阿聯酋的阿布扎比市、德國柏林市和西班牙的馬約卡島帕爾馬城——采用了名為“微交通”的按需服務公交項目。這些項目采取了與優步或來福車等網約車類似的運作方式，不過這些技術公司為公交運營商開發數字路線和即時用車服務平臺。據微交通公司Spare Labs的首席數據科學家杰羅姆·馬約介紹，城市可以在公交體系中使用這些平臺，填補一些公交系統未能覆蓋的空白領域，并給乘客提供價格遠低于純粹私人運營的交通出行方案。

“就把它想象為優步和城市公交的結合之物吧。” 馬約說。

自疫情暴發以來，城市采用微交通的形式來提供一些關鍵服務，例如送老人去藥店或送護士去醫院。支持微交通的人士認為這些應用程序使用的技術還可以用在抗擊新冠疫情的其他方面。例如，這些應用程序可以用來追蹤病毒傳播的路徑，假如有乘客后來檢測結果陽性，該應用可以提醒與之同車的其他乘客，這種手段被稱為“接觸者追蹤”。

對于這樣的提議，專家們反應不一。例如，有些專家認為接觸者追蹤技術帶來隱私問題，而且通過這些平臺來執行其他部署還會出現各種技術上的挑戰。有些專家則認為隨著城市街道開始回歸常態，微交通可以派上用途。

與美國共享出行公司“威盛交通”合作的城市可以使用自己的接駁車、面包車或者公共汽車來提供服務，也可以由威盛公司來為他們提供車輛。而與Spare Labs合作的城市通常會將公共面包車或公交車輛轉用于此項服務。交通運營商可自行定價。在洛杉磯由威盛公司提供的服務目前是免費的;在內布拉斯加州的林肯市，公交費用通常是1.75美元，而微交通的費用則是5美元。與此同時，猶他州交通局將其微交通的價格定為2.5美元，與其公交費用相同。乘客可以自行選擇路線，例如可以直接從家到工作地點，也可以在運營商選擇的地點上下車。

微交通公司還說，城市可以此來給那些本已資源不足的社區人群提供可負擔得起的交通服務。Transit是以蒙特利爾市為總部、在全球200多個城市和地區運營的一款出行路線規劃應用軟件，該軟件提供的數據表明，上述人群大多只能依靠公交出行，包括受疫情打擊格外嚴重的老年人群體。

另外一些可以用來降低疾病傳播速度的工具能夠，或者說已經，在這些平臺上研發。城市可以設置每趟車的最高載客人數，告知司機不接載規定人數以上的乘客，從而在功能上強制實現乘車時的社交距離。例如，洛杉磯的載客數限定為1人，而林肯市的則是2人。

微交通公司還在其應用程序上嘗試研發一些預篩選的功能。按照構想，乘客在每次叫車時，應用程序會詢問他們一些涉及潛在癥狀和自我隔離程度的問題。

在新冠肺炎疫情暴發之后，一些微交通公司考慮研發的功能中，最引發爭議的一項就是接觸者追蹤。概括地講，這個功能就是利用幾乎無處不在的智能手機。使用者在病發后通過其手機上的一個應用軟件來報告病情，該軟件隨即通知患者曾經密切接觸的所有人這一風險。但是，批評者擔憂這樣一來會給政府提供過多的公民隱私信息。

全球有許多國家已經開始研發接觸者追蹤軟件。中國作為最早的一批應用者自2月以來一直在使用該技術。3月份，新加坡政府發布了一款使用手機藍牙發射器的接觸者追蹤軟件，并將源代碼向公眾公開。4月份，澳大利亞發布本國的一款應用軟件，使用的便是上述代碼。同樣在4月份，蘋果和谷歌公司宣布了自己的藍牙項目方案，方案中，兩人或多人一旦近距離接觸時間長到足以感染病毒，手機就會進行記錄。這種近距離接觸的信息會儲存在使用者的手機里，用以提醒那些可能身處感染風險中的人。

為了使接觸者追蹤軟件有效地發揮作用，運營商或者衛生機構需要知道感染者的身份，以及他們曾經在何時去過何處，從而構建一個可能的感染鏈條并令公眾知曉。比如，中國的接觸者追蹤系統允許國家掌握運行該軟件的手機的具體位置。中國公民還會通過手機獲得電子條碼，或稱二維碼，以確定他們是否可以在公共場所活動。這一手段降低了疫病傳播的速度，因為它允許官員直接提醒民眾他們的感染機率，以及是否需要自我隔離。

隨著保持社交距離的需求結束，更多的人開始在城市中走動，而微交通仍然具有其存在價值。因為它的彈性十足，可以在未來替換一些固定線路的公交路線。而且，微交通一個最大的優勢就在于它通常是覆蓋人們來去公交站或地鐵站的那段距離，令使用傳統公共交通更為便利。它還可以用于公交路線稀少且站間距離較遠的鄉村地區。