Customizable, User-Centric, and Innovation-Driven Mobility Assistance System Empowering Diverse Impaired Users Groups to Access Public Transportation Seamlessly Cross-Modal and -Regional in Hamburg's Metropolitan Area and beyond.

Over 100 million Europeans have disabilities that limit their mobility and social inclusion. In Hamburg, they encounter barriers to seamless travel due to a fragmented public transport system featuring various modes of transportation, which is operated by multiple providers in three federal states. Currently, there is no free digital assistance tool to support transport users with disabilities, making mobility a major obstacle to their full societal participation.

Building on past success, the CUSTOM project aims to implement a comprehensive accessibility app that delivers a cross-modal, cross-regional solution. It will support people with visual, hearing, cognitive and physical impairments to navigate all public transport modes seamlessly. Through co-design workshops with groups of transport users with impairments, and system integration across the transport network, CUSTOM promotes autonomy and reduces social exclusion.

Following the Two-Senses Principle, to ensure information is accessible through at least two of the three senses of hearing, sight and touch, CUSTOM offers a holistic, scalable enhancement to existing systems rather than creating isolated new solutions. The app has the estimated potential to support up to 147 million public transport journeys - out of a total of 1.1 billion annual line-specific trips recorded in the HVV network (2023). It will also establish an open innovation model and policy framework to support replication across Europe, fostering inclusive mobility for all.