Digital solutions to transport challenges in rural areas: two Interreg projects join forces
The rural region Hammer Bakker, outside Aalborg in North Denmark, is not easily accessible for all transportation opportunities. This area is lacking many transportation possibilities, and virtually, it is only the car that can provide transportation as it is today. At the same time innovating digital tools can provide new opportunities to arrange transport in rural areas, which are more flexible, attractive and cleaner than traditional rural transportation.
Workshop about digital solutions to transport challenges
A creative workshop with 25 citizens between 12 to 80 years from Aalborg municipality took place on 4th March 2019 in the Hammer Bakker area.
The facilitator from PrimusMotor helped the citizens who worked in groups with the following questions:
- What are your main challenges concerning transport in the area
- Do you use existing IT- based services to sort out travel with public transport, if not why?
- Do you use Social Media to coordinate transport with other citizens?
Citizens worked individually and in groups with their ideas all evening. After presentation of the ideas the best ideas were nominated. The consultants PrimusMotor has collected and developed the ideas and presented them in a catalogue which is distributed to all participants. The local citizen group will based on the catalogue decide which ideas the will continue to work with.
Cooperation
The INTERREG project G-PaTRA aims to improve green transport in rural areas. Niels Agerholm from Aalborg University and partner in the G-PaTRA project, provided inspiration about the need for a change in transport modes and the potential benefits for the users. In that way, the G-PaTRA project adds in-depth knowledge to the public service delivery improvement of the Like! project.
Transnational collaboration
Aalborg has exchanged these valuable experiences and ideas with Suffolk County Council concerning transport in rural areas. Angus County Council is struggling with the same issues and is therefore also involved in this pilot. The acquired insights from Suffolk and Aalborg have been shared and analysed together. For both partners, this lead to the shared insight that there is no easy digital solution to transport challenges in rural areas and that several means of transport need to be evaluated.