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All our journeys begin and end with a walk and many are only walking. Walking is the foundation of how we move and is the essential ingredient in an integrated, multi- and intermodal transportation system, enabling access to local neighbourhoods services and to public transport services for destinations further afield.

Walkability is the cornerstone of the sustainable city that is space efficient and reduces congestion, air and noise pollution and carbon consumption. It is both a utilitarian mode of travel for trips to work, school, or shopping, and a health and recreational activity. It is a socially equitable mode of transport that is available to the vast majority of the population, across class, gender and age. Walking is the most accessible and affordable way to get exercise.

Walking promotes mental and physical health and is recognised by the WHO as an essential contributor to an individual’s physical activity needs. People who live in walkable neighbourhoods have higher levels of “social capital,” and are more likely to know their neighbours, participate politically and be socially engaged.

But how can local leaders deliver transformative change?

Walk21 provides training to support a city through these steps illustrated with international examples from other cities.

A mayor needs to communicate a vision for the city that values walking and liveability; commit to the principles of putting pedestrians first; commission research on walking behaviour and current walkability conditions; promote public participation in planning and in public life; review policies, standards and regulations; and encourage interdisciplinary collaboration to deliver the vision.

The 8 steps explore how civic leaders can Engage local communities to map their needs so that targeted actions can then respond at relevant locations with appropriate measures to benefit those with the greatest need, commission an assessment of current walkability and review policies, standards and regulations to enable walkability.

• Step 1: Is committing to making walking better, and Walk21 calls on leaders to sign the International Charter for Walking, a common policy reference with 8 key principles and 34 illustrative actions, developed by experts from more than 35 countries.
• Step 2: Practitioners must invest in understanding walking behaviour, and the International Walking Data Standard allows the demand for walking to be measured in a consistent way, a key tool for those working in the field.
• Step 3: Is identifying potential, and working with local communities to examine what is needed, when and where. For example Walk21 used their STRIDE tool in the City of Medellin in partnership with FundaPeatón, to engage with local school children. This tool has been further developed into the Walkability.app.
• Step 4: Identifying deficiencies is then required. According to Walk21, “It is important to understand the conditions for every district of the city, and then develop policies and plans for the total pedestrian environment,” and they are developing a Qualitative Measures tool which will assist with evaluating walkability.
• Step 5: Moves to the policy and legislative level, where it is critical to review policies, standards and regulations to enable walkability.
• Step 6: Time to draw up an action plan. Walk21 notes the necessity for a multi-disciplinary institutional framework for planning and delivering walking that is ambitious and adds new value to current levels of service requires leadership, partnerships, resources, commitment to research and training, and monitoring and evaluation.
• Step 7: Developing a use case which proves the value and impact of change to engage the public in the value of reshaping urban mobility around walkability. For example, creating a pedestrian plaza, or leading a behaviour change campaign can communicate vision and inspire action across the city, raise the value of walking and increase engagement with and understanding of the importance of walkability.
• Step 8: Time to roll it out!

How to make a City Walkable
Successful approaches will vary by culture, place, and city size. Nevertheless, a few attributes contribute to the quality of walkability in most urban and suburban settings and a comprehensive approach and commitment by the local authority can deliver more walkable communities. This commitment and approach is set out in the International Charter for Walking and is illustrated in the comprehensive walking system diagram below.

Key steps to success include:
1. Increasing inclusive mobility
2. Well designed and managed spaces and places for people
3. Improved integration of networks
4. Supportive land-use and spatial planning
5. Reduced road danger
6. Less crime and fear of crime
7. More supportive authorities
8. A culture of walking

To find out more and view all the training tools, click here.

Save the Date for Urban Mobility Days 2023 taking place from 4-6 October in Seville, Spain.

The Urban Mobility Days conference provides the ideal opportunity to network, debate key issues, and exchange ideas on emerging transport trends and technologies, the latest developments in sustainable urban mobility planning, and solutions to make mobility in cities and towns more sustainable.

It will provide the chance to hear from the cities, people and projects driving innovation in smart, inclusive and sustainable mobility, including those putting the SUMP concept into practice.

It will bring together politicians, local authorities, industry, and urban transport practitioners with the European Commission to connect, share and discuss the path forward for a sustainable, innovative, and equitable future for Europe’s urban mobility.

As 2023 is the European Year of Skills, Urban Mobility Days will have a specific focus on transport skills.

The event is being organised together with the upcoming Spanish Presidency of the Council of the EU.

For more information, see here. To check out the previous conferences, click here.

The European Climate, Infrastructure and Environment Executive Agency (CINEA) is pleased to announce that registration is OPEN for EUSEW 2023!

Under the theme “Accelerating the clean energy transition – towards lower bills and greater skills”, the European Sustainable Energy Week (EUSEW) 2023 will take place in Brussels and online on 20-22 June 2023, 10:00-17:00 (CET).

Speakers and attendees can participate both in Brussels (in the European Commission’s Charlemagne building and the Martin’s Brussels EU Hotel) and online. Information about the exact location of each session will be available closer to the event.

The programme is available online. Speakers include Paloma Aba Garrote, Acting Director for CINEA, Paula Abreu Marques, Head of Unit Inter-institutional, Policy Coordination and Planning at DG Energy, as well as representatives from industry, NGOs and public authorities.

EUSEW 2023 will include:

• a policy conference
• the EUSEW Awards
• an Energy Fair with stands
• the fourth edition of the European Youth Energy Day.

EUSEW2023, is the biggest event dedicated to renewable energy and energy efficiency in Europe and brings more opportunities than ever to connect & engage!

More information is available here.

To register click here.

Country: Europe-wide

The city of Glasgow in the United Kingdom will begin the operation of its Low Emission Zone (LEZ) on 1 June 2023. Vehicles entering the zone will have to comply with the specified emission standards or their owners will be fined.

The preparations for the operation and enforcement of the LEZ are underway: LEZ signage has been installed at all of the entry points to the zone, and infrastructure for automated number plate recognition to enable the enforcement of the zone has also been put in place. The necessary cameras will be installed during April 2023, after which they will be tested to ensure that they are ready to enter into operation before the official start of the LEZ.

Non-infrastructural preparations, such as compiling the list of exemptions and registering taxi operators so that they avoid being fined, are also well underway. Exemptions to the LEZ standards will be given to emergency vehicles and the vehicles belonging to those who are registered as disabled, while residents living in the zone will have an additional year time to comply. Since December 2022, Glasgow has also been running an awareness campaign, “Plan Ahead for the LEZ”, to inform and familiarise people with the scheme. The campaign will continue beyond the start of the operation and enforcement of the LEZ.

Councillor Angus Millar, City Convener for Transport and Climate said: “Glasgow’s Low Emission Zone is an essential measure to tackle unacceptably high levels of harmful air pollution that has long persisted in the city centre. … Generally, diesel vehicles registered after September 2015, and petrol vehicles registered from 2006 onwards will meet LEZ standards. However, to be certain you can enter your registration number into Transport Scotland’s online vehicle checker, details of which are on our LEZ webpages.”

Glasgow’s LEZ can also:

• help accelerate the uptake of less polluting vehicles
• encourage people to move away from private car use
• increase the safety, attractiveness, and amenity of our city centre

Free-floating electric scooter sharing services have been the source of debate in many cities recently. Discussions often centre around excessive speeding and blockage of pedestrian movement, as in the case of the Estonian Capital Tallinn.

In the light of the upcoming e-scooter season, representatives of Estonian state and local authorities met with e-sooter rental providers to discuss road safety and parking. The idea is to give local authorities the option to set up own rules on speed limits, to regulate where to park and to impose these rules on e-scooter rental providers.

Tanel Kiik, Tallinn’s Deputy Mayor for transport, supports to empower municipalities in answer to road safety challenges: “When managing traffic, we must always seek a balance between speed and safety. The current legal speed limit for a personal light electric vehicle is 25 kilometres per hour, which is almost five times greater than the walking speed of an average pedestrian. At the same time, the number of electric scooter users and related accidents is clearly on the rise, according to police figures. As a result, we are proposing to lower the speed limit to 20 kilometres per hour, and even lower in the Old City and in more congested areas.”

His colleague, Deputy Mayor Vladimir Svet, responsible for urban environment and public works, stressed the need to stop parking e-scooters carelessly and blocking the path of pedestrians, especially for people with reduced mobility. Ideas to address e-scooter parking include a complete ban in streets with narrow sidewalks, and to restrict parking to dedicated locations only.

Link: 

On Sunday 2 April 2023, Parisians voted, with an overwhelming majority, to remove shared e-scooter services from the city. The local referendum was organised by the City Council of the French capital, although it had a very low turnout with only 103,000 people voting of the 1.3 million who were registered (so less than 10%). As a result, the authorities will ban shared e-scooter services from the city’s streets, thus becoming the first capital that has decided to do so.

The debate on whether or not to ban shared e-scooter services has aroused passion in recent months on both sides, with arguments that are often repeated in other cities around the world. The result is not legally binding, but the Mayor of Paris (since 2014) Anne Hidalgo had promised to respect its result. If she keeps her promise, the City of Light, one of the first to open up to this type of mobility, will no longer have shared e-scooters by September 2023. As of today, three companies currently operate in the capital (Lime, Dott and Tier), with a total fleet of 15,000 vehicles; their contracts end on 31 August 2023.

Hidalgo, whose current term ends in 2026, has spent months positioning herself against e-scooters, which she considers dangerous, unecological (due to the short duration of their lithium batteries) and a source of conflict in public spaces. In order to settle the debate and make a decision about the future of e-scooters, at the end of January she decided to organise a public consultation. The vote does not affect electric scooters owned by individuals, who will be able to continue to use them.

Shared e-scooters first appeared in Paris in 2018, when more than 12 operators offered their services. Since then, they have proliferated, sometimes creating friction with pedestrians, motorists and cyclists. While for some residents of the capital they represent an easy and cheap way of travelling around at any time, others see them as dangerous vehicles that cause accidents and chaos in public spaces.

People who voted to keep shared e-scooters believed that they contribute to reducing pollution, reducing the use of cars and easing crowding on public transport. People in favour also recognise the need to better regulate shared mobility, as well as to increase awareness and training on how to properly use shared e-scooters.

The organisation of the consultation has been criticised by the three companies that currently offer the shared mobility service in Paris, as the consultation did not provide the opportunity to vote either online or by proxy. Fearing that they would be kicked out of the city, the operators had launched a campaign to encourage their users to vote in favour e-scooters. A few months ago, the operators also announced new measures to reassure local authorities, such as identity checks to avoid users being under the legal age, the use of license plates and an increase in the number of agents to check that vehicles were being parked correctly.

In order to address concerns, local authorities had already imposed several regulations. Since June 2019, e-scooters are considered as “motorised personal vehicles” and thus are subject to traffic regulations; their speed has also been limited to 10-20km/h. In addition, they can be ridden by only one person at a time and cannot be used in public parks or on pavements, while the minimum age to use them has been set at 12 years’ old and they have to be parked in dedicated parking spaces. These measures, however, have not been enough, according to the City Council.

Luxembourg is celebrating three years of free public transport. Since 2020, Luxembourg has made all public transport free (a system of interconnected trains, buses and trams), the first country in the world to do so.  A ticket only needs to be purchased for first class train travel or for cross-border journeys into Germany, France or Belgium.

According to the World Bank’s latest 2021 data, this tiny state has a population of 0.6 million and a GDP per capita of USD133,590 per annum (compare this to France, USD43,659 and Germany, USD51,203).

Funded from tax revenues, Deputy Prime Minister, François Bausch, stated: “There is greater equity in this because those who pay little tax pay nothing or very little in this system, it’s really free. And those who pay more tax, obviously, they have a price that is perhaps a little higher.”

Free public transport is promoted as an action towards the city’s climate change targets by encouraging people to use public transport rather than cars. In December 2020, Luxembourg adopted its climate law, which introduced a climate neutrality target for 2050 and a 55% emission reduction target for 2030. However, despite Luxembourg’s free and interconnected transport network, the majority of the population still own a car.

“Since it’s free, it’s easier to make a decision quickly, to choose between public transport or a private car. This means that it is very positive for the environment and practical,” responded one happy tram customer.

Other cities in Europe are also experimenting with free public transport schemes. For example, Montpellier in southern France is expected to introduce free public transport from the end of the year, which would make it France’s largest city to give local residents a free transport pass to use across the city’s bus and tram system. Free public transport schemes target emission reductions by reducing car use, and improve transport accessibility for residents.

Link: 

Who do you picture when you think of a certain toy, a job, a sport, or even a colour? Gender stereotypes are deeply ingrained in our culture and are a root cause of gender inequalities and missed opportunities. Often, we are not even aware of them, but they affect all of us. Gender stereotypes can limit our ability and our aspirations to choose a field of study or training, pursue a professional career, and make simple life choices, like picking a hobby. Gender stereotypes limit everyone’s freedom. That is why it is important to question them.

Discover our educational toolkits to #EndGenderStereotypes: available in 24 languages, they show that the opportunities on offer within the rapidly changing transport sector are not restricted to a particular gender. Currently, only 22 % of the people working in the transport sector are women. Many girls do not consider a career path in transport because gender stereotypes and expectations lead them in a different professional direction. The toolkits aim to encourage learners to challenge gender stereotypes, explore the world of opportunities and develop transferable skills critical for the 21st century.

To find out more, visit the European Commission website here.

On the 14 March 2023, the National Road Safety Authority (ANSR) hosted the launch meeting of the new EU Road Safety Exchange Project at its premises.

This project, managed by the European Transport Safety Council (ETSC), aims to promote synergies to effectively achieve the common goal of zero deaths on the roads.

Founded in 1993 and headquartered in Brussels, ETSC is a non-governmental organisation dedicated to promoting road safety culture and reducing road accident casualties in Europe. As a specialist consultant to the European Commission and Parliament, as well as governments of Member States, ETSC relies on international scientific research to develop reports and technical information, including statistical data, on the best measures and practices to reduce road accidents.

From 2019 to 2022, ETSC implemented the pilot project “EU Road Safety Exchange Program” (EURSE) involving twelve EU Member States – Austria, Bulgaria, France, Greece, Ireland, Lithuania, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Spain, and Sweden. The project aimed to foster institutional exchange of knowledge and good practices and to mitigate differences in road safety among countries. Transport experts from these countries collaborated to share best practices for speed reduction, pedestrian and cyclist safety in urban areas, building secure infrastructure, and improving application and data collection.

This year marks the beginning of a new three-year phase of the project, with the goal of expanding participation to more countries and covering new road safety topics.

The original article can on the Autoridade Nacional de Segurança Rodoviária website here.

The 19th meeting of the Coordinating Group (CG) of the European Platform on Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans (SUMPs) took place in Brussels on 20-21 March 2023.

As the headquarters of SUMPs at EU level, the CG is a unique body which has played a considerable role in boosting the uptake of quality SUMPs, which provide an effective multi-sectoral framework for towns and cities to tackle common urban mobility challenges.

The highlight of this 19th meeting was the introduction of 10 new SUMP-related projects to the CG! These projects – some of them are large scheme projects dealing with urban mobility, such as NetZeroCities, the coordination platform of the Cities Mission – “revive” the CG and reflect the wish to integrate the SUMP concept into the wider mobility picture which now focuses on new themes such as climate neutrality, for better liaison and coordination.

This meeting was also the opportunity for the CG to get updated on European urban mobility policies and initiatives, including the reformed Member States Expert Group on Urban Mobility (EGUM) and its SUMP Sub-Group, the recently published SUMP Recommendation, the upcoming Urban Mobility Days in Spain, etc.

The latest SUMP-related activities of the European Investment Bank (EIB/JASPERS) were presented, as well as latest developments around EU guidance on SUMPs (new language versions of SUMP Guidelines, new SUMP Topic Guide on Decarbonisation, CIVITAS HARMONY Guidelines on Modelling Tools for SUMPs, etc.).

All projects of the CG also updated each other on their latest achievements and next steps in terms of SUMP activities, e.g. via interactive project speed updating sessions.

The Coordinating Group brings together representatives of around 20 SUMP-related projects and Commission services. Current members include:

• Eltis
• EIT Urban Mobility
• CIVITAS ELEVATE
• MobiliseYourCity
• ETSP
• ProSUMP
• TAP
• TRANSFORMER
• UPPER
• FastTrack
• SCALE-UP
• MOVE21
• SPINE
• DECARBOMILE
• SUMP Turkiye project
• DUT
• NetZeroCities

While individual member projects have a limited lifespan, their legacy and key deliverables remain within the Mobility Plans section of Eltis on behalf of the SUMP Platform Coordinating Group. Such an inspiring and inclusive ‘round-table’ approach to EU-funded projects working in the same area can certainly serve as a good practice example for other fields of activity.

The objectives of the SUMP Platform Coordinating Group include exchanging best practice on SUMPs, creating synergies between SUMP projects, and identifying and addressing key topics, such as data, financing for SUMPs the link with climate-neutrality goals.

Members of the Coordinating Group exchange on SUMP developments and events, and agree on a common approach to the further development of SUMP guidance and tools. In addition, the CG promotes the EU’s SUMP concept to a wider audience within and beyond Europe, via the projects themselves and by inviting selected organisations to join its meetings twice a year. The CG also cooperates with other projects and platforms, such as the CIVITAS ELEVATE Policy Support Groups (PSGs), the CIVITAS National Networks (CIVINETs) and the European Commission’s Expert Group on Urban Mobility (EGUM).

As part of Eltis, the SUMP Platform Coordinating Group has been chaired by TRT Trasporti e Territorio for the last five years, which has supported best practice exchange and encouraged, together with all members, the widespread uptake of SUMPs in Europe and beyond.