G-PaTRA and SHARE-North proudly represented at the #SUMP2019 conference
By Elke Vandenbroucke from Taxistop and G-PaTRA project partner
See the event website for more details. Header image © Taxistop vzw
The conference about Sustainable Urban Mobility Plan brought mobility managers and policy makers from throughout Europe together in the city of Groningen. Alongside the amazing infomarket, showcasing a variety of European projects (G-PaTRA, Share-North and Inclusion for example), there were numerous sessions taking place for supporting sustainable cities in their SUMP - In particular for making cities more walk- and bicycle friendly…
Plus, where sustainable mobility is high on the agenda, a mobihub can’t miss out on the action. So we hosted an infobooth with a not-to-be-missed mobihub audiotour…
At the infobooth of Taxistop (together with project partners Autodelen.net and Infopunt Publieke Ruimte), participants were invited to sketch their very own #mobihub on a location of their choice. Inspiration on the concept was found on the digital pillar, in a variety of good practices of European projects and the run through of a "how to" audiotour on the infobooth.
So hands up for the projects that made this happen.
The following 2 projects are working on the concept of a transport hub in particular..
The Interreg North Sea Region Project SHARE-North
SHARE-North includes activities for developing, implementing and promoting car-sharing, bike-sharing, ride-sharing and other forms of shared mobility and improving accessibility and social inclusion in urban and rural areas. Living labs integrate modern technology with activities to support changes toward more sustainable mobility behaviour. A mobihub is completely in line with this project’s goals.
What’s a mobihub? Hub? Mobilpunkt? Mobipunt?
The idea was first implemented by the SHARE-North project in Bremen, Germany as Mobilpunkt and later in Bergen, Norway as Mobil.Punkt. And as not to confuse you any further, in Flanders, Belgium, it’s called a mobipunt…
“A mobilpunkt is a transport hub on public street space that is based at a neighbourhood level. The strategic focus is on providing citizens with attractive alternatives to private car-ownership, freeing up urban space for other uses and reducing transport-related emissions. The hubs are easily accessible by foot, bike and public transport and significantly improve the accessibility and visibility of shared transport modes – particularly car-sharing.”
The Interreg North Sea Region Project G-PaTRA
Within the G-PaTRA project, Taxistop (BE) and the OV Bureau Groningen Drenthe (NL) promote sustainable transport in rural areas, by adopting the mobihubs as a solution to provide a better public transport for the community and strive for pooling options, apps and quality neighbourhoods. Check out their lighthouse projects on the site.
Martin, of the OV bureau Groningen Drenthe and projectpartner in G-PaTRA, noticed during SUMP 2019 that many cities and regions are looking into transport nodes (like hubs, multimobil or mobipunten). Most nodes simply focus on shared bikes or cars, but the concept of a hub in addition provides a combination of transport for specific target groups with public transport.
We all seem to be working on the same topic: a tailored made transport node. Thanks to the G-PaTRA project we have a change to better communicate about why these hubs provide better sustainable accessibility for the city or region. So feel free to subscribe to the G-PaTRA newsletter.
© Province of Drenthe
I could keep talking about hubs forever, but we need to have a little throwback on the SUMP sessions as well.
So here are some top picks of what we picked up during the SUMP sessions
- Only 80% of the people is active online. Yet it’s that lacking 20% that we want to reach when working inclusively towards all target groups. Too eagerly we choose the online approach with digital surveys. For our next survey we consider doing a door-to-door, more personalized interview, in a neighbourhood setting.
- Children, adults and policy makers form three different groups who have their own idea on mobility, but too often this division is overlooked. Policy makers only have eye for the adult target group. How children perceive mobility issues needs to better voiced in our mobility themes, services or projects.
- For rolling out freefloating shared systems (e.g. bike or steps), it’s important to have the goodwill of the citizens, the end users and the providers. The stakeholders of this shared system should be compliant with the regulations to keep providing their mobility. That way you avoid situation where the transport mode is left behind at inconvenient places and is stored at – let’s say – a central hub maybe…
It has proven to be a fruitful conference with instructive session and interesting interactions at the infobooth. If you would like to experience the mobihub audio tour yourself: the mobihub pillar will also be showcased at the Shared Mobility Rocks conference on the 8th of October 2019!