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Exchange of experience – this request always appears when an expert community begins to assess the needs of a sector. All organizations accumulate knowledge, but how to ensure its continuous exchange to give it volume and perspective? Transnational projects can be one of the answers here, providing examples of effective institutional capacity building, novel technologies implemented in the region and efficient low-cost solutions.

The City of Tallinn has been involved with INTERREG BSR project HUPMOBILE which has a holistic approach to planning, implementation, optimisation, and management of integrated, sustainable mobility solutions that will be developed in Baltic Sea port cities.

Cities play an important role in the successful implementation of the UN Sustainable Development Goals - how do UBC member cities work with this framework?

The Baltic Sea Day, launched by the John Nurminen Foundation, was celebrated by scores of people all around the Baltic Sea on 27 August 2020.

The five European cities Turku, Stockholm, Munich, Madrid and Ruse, together with a variety of supporting partners, have implemented 51 measures and tested innovative sustainable mobility solutions in the living laboratory areas. To give some deeper insight to the project results and achievements, CIVITAS ECCENTRIC will end its project lifetime together with the CIVITAS sister projects DESTINATIONS and PORTIS during a 3 week event.

The networking highlights for the European sustainable mobility community, the annual CIVITAS Forum and the SUMP conference have always gathered a great number of participants to exchange, network and create new connections.

International environmental campaign "Clean beach" is carried out in the frame of cooperation between Saint-Petersburg and Tallinn, Helsinki and Turku with the aim of developing youth cooperation in the field of environmental protection. This year, the campaign was held for the 7th time on the southern-west coast of Kotlin island (Kronstadt) in the Gulf of Finland, with ca. 500 participants.

The Riga Municipal Agency “Riga Energy Agency” has launched the first mobility point in Riga and Latvia in the VEF district, connecting different sustainable modes of transport and offering convenient access to micro mobility and public transport opportunities. The mobility point will also serve as a pilot area for deployment of innovative, data-based solutions, including both a bicycle and pedestrian counter and a testbed for smart city solutions.

In Linköping earlier this year, new guidelines were adopted by the board of urban planning to take an important step towards being carbon neutral. By 2025, all vehicles used for construction and maintainance of infrastructure, maintenance of green areas, snow removal etc will run on fossil-free fuels.

Lahti – next year’s European Green Capital – has its sights set on being the first big city in Finland to become carbon-neutral and on achieving this goal by 2025. Lahti completed its energy transition last year and now also has a personal carbon trading system for local residents. The city is certainly a worthy winner of the European Green Capital Award, but getting there has taken a lot of work.

Developing public transport to serve inhabitants profitably and ecologically is especially challenging in small cities like Kemi. Almost all the households own a car or two, as well as cycling and walking are popular. With the public transport having a strict competition with other ways of moving, how can we decrease cars with only one passenger?

Within the HUPMOBILE project, City of Turku is working on a reorganisation of passenger rail transport in the port area. The goal is to develop a concept and a detailed plan for new railway access to the passenger harbour in the Linnanniemi (Castle Town) area. When developed, the area would be predominantly focusing on recreational activities and tourism as well as facilitating the resident’s access to the river and sea.