REFOCUS

Cities and regions that have developed sustainable urban mobility plans (SUMPs) face common obstacles in the successful implementation and ongoing decision-making necessary for their planning and re-planning over time. Introducing REFOCUS, an Interreg Europe project aiming to improve decision-making in sustainable mobility. 

Cities and regions that have developed sustainable urban mobility plans (SUMPs) face shared challenges related to their successful implementation and the continuous decision-making necessary for their planning and re-planning over time. Sustainable urban mobility plans (SUMPs) are not a new trend, there are now over 1,000 SUMPs in place within the EU and this number is only set to rise as the EU aims for its ambition to decarbonise transport within our cities.

REFOCUS, an Interreg Europe project running from 2024 to 2028, aims to improve decision-making and stakeholder inclusivity in sustainable mobility planning by refining seven policy instruments from project partners from across Europe. Starting in April, REFOCUS will promote improving stakeholder engagement in the development and decision-making of existing policy instruments (SUMPs). This will be achieved through a series of local stakeholder consultations and workshops in each of the project partner cities or regions.

In line with the EU cohesion policy, six EU countries and one non-member country (Ukraine), are involved in REFOCUS where the partners from more advanced regions will engage in mutual learning and exchange opportunities that identify examples of Good Practices, which can be applied to other regions developing and refining their SUMPs.

REFOCUS will achieve its aims through the organisation of:

• Six onsite study visits in the partner cities;
• Four regional snapshots of the current state of urban mobility and good practices;
• Four interregional co-creation workshop webinars;
• Seven local stakeholder consultations

Decarbonising EU Transport by 2050

Transport is responsible for around a quarter of greenhouse gas emissions in the EU. Over 70% of EU citizens live in cities which generate 23% of all transport greenhouse gas emissions. To decarbonise transport, we must pay special attention to what can be done within our cities and the effects sustainable urban mobility development will have on the majority of EU citizens.

However, implementing SUMPs from the top down is a sure way to undermine local support for such plans' continued success and development. Therefore, REFOCUS will especially address local stakeholder concerns within functional urban areas to ensure that any updates to existing mobility planning are done with the integration of bottom-up and top-down approaches and adhere to the principles of inclusiveness, equity, and multimodality.

Local stakeholder consultations will be organised by:

• City of Poznan/Lukasiewicz Research Network – Poznan Institute of Technology (PL)
• City of Sint-Niklaas (BE)
• City of Stockholm (SE)
• Institute for Transport and Logistics Foundation (Emilia-Romagna) (IT)
• Municipal Enterprise “Susisiekimo pasalaugos” (Vilnius) (LT)
• City of Lviv (UA)
• Region of Central Macedonia (GR)

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