Addressing the four Key Challenges of Sustainable Urban Mobility Planning

Project description

Achieving sustainable, energy-efficient and environmentally friendly transport systems is one of the European key aims. Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans (SUMPs) are an instrument that contributes to reaching the climate and energy targets set by EU leaders. However, cities frequently face major barriers while creating their own Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans.

CH4LLENGE addressed the four most pressing challenges in SUMP development and implementation and developed innovative and transferable solutions in the areas of:

Stakeholder participation and citizen involvement
Institutional cooperation between sectors and disciplines
Identification of the most effective policy measures
Monitoring and evaluation of progress in SUMP development

Activities

Nine European cities were involved in CH4LLENGE and they were grouped according to their status of sustainable urban mobility planning. The Optimising Cities of Amiens, Dresden, Gent and the county of West Yorkshire had all worked extensively with SUMPs and optimized their SUMP processes in the four thematic areas. The Advancing Cities of Brno, Budapest, Krakow, Timisoara and Zagreb were ambitious partners from New Member States and on the move towards sustainable urban mobility planning. The Optimising Cities assisted them in developing strategies and implementing pilots in all four challenges.

CH4LLENGE also supported 26 Follower Cities outside the consortium which were committed to improving their mobility planning. Among them Turku and Kotka from Finland, Gdynia from Poland, Kaunas from Lithuania and Tartu from Estonia and Kalmar from Sweden.

To facilitate the take-up of Sustainable Urban Mobility plans in European cities CH4LLENGE offered a great variety of training and learning opportunities:

The project organised SUMP Challenge Training workshops, National SUMP Challenge Seminars, Summer and Winter schools to local practitioners;
Four e-learning courses consisting of several modules will be developed;
CH4LLENGE kits, the key output of the project, recapitulated the lessons drawn from the cities’ pilot schemes and the results of the project’s training activities to facilitate the take-up of SUMPs in Europe. Each kit addressed one challenge and consisted of a comprehensive manual, a brochure and the relevant e-learning modules;
CH4LLENGE contributed to the knowledge consolidation between different SUMP initiatives by organizing an SUMP Exchange workshop.