Digital Platform to promote sustainable mobility and COVID-19 infections reduction: a use case in the Guadalajara metropolitan area Ramon A. Briseño Ph.D. Student in Information Technology CUCEA University of Guadalajara Guadalajara, México alejandro.bmartinez@alumnos.udg.mx Juan C. López Ph.D. Student in Information Technology CUCEA University of Guadalajara Guadalajara, México juan.lopez6936@alumnos.udg.mx Rocio Maciel Arellano Smart Cities Innovation Center CUCEA University of Guadalajara Guadalajara, México rmaciel@cucea.udg.mx Victor M. Larios Smart Cities Innovation Center CUCEA University of Guadalajara Guadalajara, Mexico victor.m.lariosrosillo@ieee.org Jesus Beltran Ramirez Smart Cities Innovation Center CUCEA University of Guadalajara Guadalajara, Mexico raul.beltran@academicos.udg.mx Carlos López-Zaragoza Head of Sustainable Culture of Mobility & Liaison Office Department of Mobility and Transport of the Municipality of Zapopan Jalisco, Mexico carlos.lopezz@zapopan.gob.mx Abstract— This work proposes a digital platform based in a multi-agent system to plot the different mobility alternatives to counteract the agglomerations in public transport and therefore decrease COVID-19 infections in the GDL. Following the recommendations of the World Health Organization (WHO) in the face of the health emergency of COVID-19, mainly keeping a healthy distance, the GDL can integrate sustainable mobility as the public bicycle system and reduce the users in regular transport routes to safe levels. For that endeavor, we develop an analysis of the behavior of the trips in the public transport of Guadalajara to explore the possibility of substituting the short transfers of bus travel by bicycle travels using the existing public bicycle infrastructure. We introduce a multi-agent simulation to plot different scenarios of mobility moving bicycles and buses. In this preliminary work, we show possibilities of the simulation integrating as variables not only the risk of COVID-19 infection but also the impact on economy and traffic reduction, CO2 Footprint, and health achieved with this multimodal mobility simulation. Also, the simulation can help to incentivize safer and efficient mobility strategies in the public transport system to reduce the use of private vehicles. Keywords— Digital platform, sustainable mobility, Smart City, COVID-19 infection, Healthy lifestyle, Multi-Agent Simulation I. INTRODUCTION A Smart City, as a complex system, a problem has several dimensions of impact. Information Technologies can accelerate to reach solutions and plot different scenarios with given conditions. For example, COVID-19 has an impact on Healthcare. However, with the risk of infection to prevent the distancing strategies, the shutdown of non-essential businesses and services impacts the economy, mobility, and the environment. Such is the case of the Guadalajara (GDL) Metropolitan Area that has the specific infrastructure in mobility and weather conditions able to reduce COVID-19 infections. However, for the stakeholders of GDL (Citizens, Authorities, Industry, Academia) they need to understand the risks and conditions to take actions, and the best way to start is with digital simulations. Once the simulations can plot scenarios, the best strategies can be selected to adapt and mitigate as possible the impacts in related Key Performance Indicators of the City to keep a good quality of life level. Where GDL is the model for this work, but other cities in Latin America or other countries on continents with similar conditions can adapt it. While the COVID-19 shutdown happens in GDL, the priority is to reduce the risks of infections to control de pandemic. GDL on its metropolitan area has a population near to 4.6 million, where 42.7% of them need to use the public transport system to develop its economic activity. Even with the campaign of staying at home for the home office, a small percentage impacted the use of public transport where those that can stay at home are the owners of private cars mainly. Another consideration for the public transport in GDL is that each bus © IEEE 2020. This article is free to access and download, along with rights for full text and data mining, re-use and analysis