When blind and visually impaired people want to use public transport, they face special challenges. A barrier-free infrastructure is often lacking, and they depend on support from other people. Ensuring equal participation of people with disabilities in social life and enabling them to live a self-determined life is an important socio-political goal.
With the project "Sinn² - Die barrierefreie Zwei-Sinne-Fahrgastinformation" (Sense² - The barrier-free Two-Sense passenger information) the basis for a nationwide, barrier-free and real-time passenger information was created. The Sinn² app developed as part of the project takes into account the so-called two-sense principle, so that at least two of the three senses of hearing, seeing and touching are addressed. Especially in rural areas such a Sinn²-App is of importance, as the local public transport services are becoming more and more flexible (e.g. through call busses) and the independent locomotion via practiced patterns may not work anymore.
The Sinn² app was created jointly by the Institute for Railway and Transportation Engineering (IEV) of the Faculty and the Institute of Transport Sciences Stuttgart GmbH as well as - as a social science partner - the Institute for Applied Social Sciences of the Centre for Cooperative Research of the DHBW Stuttgart. The Ministry of Transport of the State of Baden-Württemberg supported the project within the framework of the funding priority "Sustainable mobility: knowledge transfer from research to practice".
The prize: With the German Mobility Prize, awarded since 2016, the initiative "Germany - Land of Ideas" and the Federal Ministry of Transport and Digital Infrastructure make intelligent mobility solutions and digital innovations publicly visible. In doing so, they are providing impetus for Germany as a business location. The chances of digitalization for tomorrow's mobility are to be demonstrated, which is why Deutsche Bahn and the Association of German Transport Companies are also partners in the competition. Each year, ten prizes are awarded in the Best Practice category.
Information on the project on the pages of the German Mobility Award [DE]