MobiLab: Mobility living lab at the University of Stuttgart

MobiLab pursues three goals: Climate neutrality in mobility related to the university (daily trips of students and employees to and from the university, business trips) by 2030, car-free university campus Stuttgart-Vaihingen and mobility-related living laboratory at the university campus Stuttgart-Vaihingen.

To support the implementation of these goals, a mobility manager position was established at the University of Stuttgart in early 2021.

The approach of the car-free university campus Stuttgart-Vaihingen is based on the bundling of the parking facilities currently distributed across the campus at the edge of the campus in a large parking garage over the federal road B14.

To connect this parking garage and the S-Bahn station with the campus, supplementary services are planned. The e-scooter rental service will initially be offered with conventional e-scooters. In parallel, an autonomous e-scooter is being developed that can drive itself to its next location or the charging station. One autonomous e-scooter replaces ten conventional ones. The prototype that has reached the highest stage of development can currently drive remotely on its own, detect obstacles and stop independently in front of them. Autonomous electric shuttles connect destinations on campus either on schedule or "on demand." The shuttles are to be inductively charged while driving. Together with dynamic load management, this represents another field of research for the Vaihingen campus. The first shuttle, with which trial operation is now to begin, was handed over to the University of Stuttgart in July 2022.

At the same time, MobiLab would like to improve bicycle traffic and has set up a living laboratory with structurally different bicycle parking facilities (rack+roof, bicycle boxes).

Overall, MobiLab forms the test field "University Campus Vaihingen" with the components "research vehicle", "research road" and "research parking garage".