The research project eMORAIL established a business model that provides a public transportation ticket in conjunction with an e-car at the users’ place of residence and an intermodal e-car sharing option for their destination. Additional services like information, repairs and maintenance shall offer comfort and usability to public transportation customers. In a field trial, this integrated public transport service was tested in the rural communities of “Bucklige Welt” in Lower Austria and at Leibnitz in Styria. An intermodal e-car sharing offer was delivered and tested in the cities of Graz and Vienna. The power supply was delivered by specially designed renewable photovoltaic resources. The technological requirements in the fields of infotainment, disposition, data capturing, energy supply and energy controlling were prepared to assure a widespread use in whole Austria. In order to realize a high capacity utilisation the e-cars were rent out to business customers like the Postal Services, electricity companies and other local businesses.
The research project eMORAIL advanced focused on improving usability. Solutions that shall substantially increase the number of potential users were developed and tested to extend the existing eMORAIL-commuter system by an (e-)shuttle service, a ride-sharing solution to join the existing car sharing schemes as well as an eMORAIL-storage box foreseen for commuters who do not drive themselves. For business customers, a pooling option was developed for work related matters or touristic usage.