Urban Sustainable Mobility in focus: student education, community involvement and participative planning Erasmus Project

Project Title

Urban Sustainable Mobility in focus: student education, community involvement and participative planning

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Strategic Partnerships for higher education

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2019

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Civic engagement / responsible citizenship; ICT – new technologies – digital competences; New innovative curricula/educational methods/development of training courses

Project Summary

The need for sustainable urban mobility has been high on the EU agenda, bearing in mind the increasing importance of energy saving, sustainable lifestyle and urban quality of life. Moreover, Sustainable Urban Mobility Planning (SUMP) is a major topic in the European Commission’s Urban Mobility Package. SUMP underlies cooperation across different policy areas, across disciplines and government levels, and emphasizes cooperation with citizens. It is important to integrate the concept and practices of sustainable mobility planning in the studies related to architecture and spatial planning, so that the students (the later professionals of urban planning and design) own the basic principles of SUMP.
The project aims to improve the quality of teaching in universities, by offering students a hands-on approach in the preparation of a SUMP for a locality in their cities, actively involving local communities and local authorities in the process. It also aims to bring the concept of SUMP closer to urban citizens, offering to them a learning package and tools to understand sustainable mobility better as well as exercise their public participation rights in the planning of sustainable mobility in their area.
The objectives of UrbanSCOPE include:
• To design an interdisciplinary learning environment for university students related to urban planning and design, with interactive links to local authorities and local communities, aiming to promote the concept of sustainable mobility.
• To extend these methodologies and tools to “family education” addressing mostly youth, their parents and other adults, and diffuse university learning innovations to the society more widely.
• To pilot-test, adapt and revise these innovative methodologies.
• To connect higher education to local communities, the civil society and local authorities, thus strengthening the role of higher education as a stakeholder in policy making with special reference to sustainable mobility.
• To change attitudes and behaviours of city inhabitants in favour of sustainable mobility, and to promote active citizenship, by proposing interactive mechanisms for public participation.
• To contribute to the creation of sustainable mobility scenarios in the participating cities, serving as a basis for future Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans.
The activities of the project are developed along 6 interconnected steps, which lead to a coherent and cohesive set of project results through the collaborative effort of the project partners.
The activities lead directly to 6 tangible outputs of the project:
1) Carrying out a local sustainable mobility audit in 3 EU countries, focusing on the mobility behavior and attitudes of citizens, addressing the needs of local authorities and educational institutions.
2) Creating an Action Plan per city, developing alternative SUMP scenarios, and involving the local communities in the process.
3) Devise a learning methodology and ICT tools for an integrated approach to SUMP.
4) Pilot-test and revise the learning methodology with university students and with secondary school students and adults.
5) Widening the methodology and tools of UrbanSCOPE through a public competition, providing core material (ideas and scenarios) for local planning.
6) Prepare and publish a Handbook for users of the UrbanSCOPE methodology.
The project implementation methods will include desk research and field surveys in 3 EU countries; dissemination and publicity campaigns and competitions led by local authorities and civil society organizations, including 4 national workshops and an international conference; the construction of education tools and methodologies based on the technologies of location-based games and augmented reality; the adaptation and pilot-testing of these tools to the needs of higher education and secondary schools/family education; the dissemination of the devised learning tools and methodologies by making them available for free, and accompany them with a Handbook. Intangible results include the changing attitudes and perceptions towards sustainable urban mobility, the awareness raising of citizens towards a more sustainable use of urban transport, and the opportunities to widen the participative planning and citizen engagement methods.
The target groups of the project include higher education institutions, secondary education institutions, urban citizens, civil society organisations, planners and policy makers at local level. These groups are expected to benefit directly from the UrbanSCOPE methodology and tools, as being end-users of the developed products.
The project benefits greatly by its transnational character, which allows the national teams to compare data, benefit from the exchange of best practice, complement each other in terms of expertise and previous experience, and create education and awareness raising tools that would have a wide application across nations and cultures.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 259738 Eur

Project Coordinator

SZECHENYI ISTVAN UNIVERSITY & Country: HU

Project Partners

• UNIVERSITEIT UTRECHT
• WISSENSCHAFTSSTADT DARMSTADT
• GYOR MEGYEI JOGU VAROS ONKORMANYZATA*MUNICIPALITY OF GYOR GYOR MJV
• TECHNISCHE UNIVERSITAT DARMSTADT
• SYMVOULOI ANAPTYXIAKOU SCHEDIASMOU EREVNAS KAI ORGANOSIS ETAIREIA PERIORISMENIS EFTHYNIS PRISMA EPE
• GLYFADA MUNICIPALITY