Mobility Academy

Public transport, as the backbone for sustainable transport, is a broad and complex field, including issues ranging from modes of ticket purchase and passenger information to safety and security and provision of service for vulnerable citizens to the introduction of alternative fuels and electrification to the development of a metropolitan public transport authority (allowing for the purchase of a single tickets for use on multiple services) to the use of market research to improve public transport services.

Intelligent transport systems (ITS) allow a city to digitally link and share data from one sub-system with another in order to improve the efficiency of the overall system. This sometimes involves collecting and processing so-called “big data”, gathered from a range of sources (including mobile phones), and used to understand travel patterns and user needs.

Active mobility covers walking and cycling as well as other human-powered modes (scooters, skateboards, etc.) as modes of urban – or in some cases even inter-urban – transportation. These must be considered on the same level as motorised modes of transport for their ability to move people and goods.

Since the introduction of the SUMP concept by the European Commission in 2009, and the publication of the SUMP guidelines first edition in 2013, hundreds of cities across Europe engaged to make urban mobility cleaner and more sustainable. Comprehensive sustainable urban mobility planning has proven to be an effective way to tackle the climate, energy and environmental challenges that cities face in relation to transport. With a revised edition of the guidelines published in 2019, every town and city, irrespective of its size, can develop a high-quality Sustainable Urban Mobility Plan to help tackle the principal urban mobility challenges, and to improve quality of life for its citizens.

Electric mobility has been a topic of discussion for many years, but its wide-scale implementation still presents a range of challenges. Regulatory, legal and policy aspects need to be addressed in order to make the use of electric vehicles more convenient, affordable and user-friendly as compared to conventionally-fuelled ones. In what cases is electrification best deployed? What problems can it help to solve (and which does it not)? How can existing infrastructure be exploited more efficiently to expand the network of charging stations and how can we ensure the clean provision of energy that will be needed to charge large electric fleet?

Fast and reliable delivery of goods must be assured to keep our urban centres vital. At the same time, delivery vehicles are a significant cause of urban air pollution and congestion; many are also over-dimensioned for the actual delivery need. Due to the increase in online shopping, delivery vehicles can now also often be seen in residential streets – bringing transport-related impacts as well as impacts on quality of life more generally.

Transport networks exist on different geographical scales. On a large scale the Trans-European Network-Transport (TEN-T) and the national network and on a small scale the regional and local transport network need to be planned and managed. Different topics come into play such as interaction of planning institutions and stakeholders as well as data requirements to understand journey needs.

Mobility management focuses on the many ways in which journey choices can be influenced. This can be done through both “carrot” and “stick” measures, either encouraging or discouraging certain travel habits, mode choices, the destination or timing of trips. These can include ride sharing offers, improved cycling facilities (“carrot”) or road pricing or parking pricing (“stick”).

About the Academy

SUMP Self-Assessment

Sustainability projects

Enrol in one of our active courses

Enrol in one of our active courses

Public Transport

Intelligent Transport Systems

Active Mobility

Sustainable Urban Mobility Planning

Electric Mobility

Freight and Urban Logistics

Networks

Mobility Management