Over 45 participants from all over Europe attended CH4LLENGE’s second SUMP Challenge Training Workshop which focused on institutional cooperation in sustainable urban mobility planning.
CH4LLENGE organises four theme-specific workshops which address the key challenges in sustainable urban mobility planning. In the first workshop (Gent, July 2013), European transport planners learned more about stakeholder participation and citizen engagement. The workshop in Leeds, held in November 2013, dealt with the second challenge ‘institutional cooperation’. The workshop aimed to understand the different forms and levels of cooperation, to identify local, regional and national actors relevant for SUMP development as well as appropriate methods for institutional cooperation that have been applied in European cities.Prof. Dirk Lauwers from Ghent University, Belgium was invited as a guest speaker and looked at institutional cooperation from a scientific perspective. His inspiring lecture on facts and theory of institutional cooperation did not only cover academic research but also compared actual case studies to scientific models and approaches. Further, the workshop host and CH4LLENGE project partner Metro, which is the Strategic Transport Authority for the five West Yorkshire local district authorities, gave insights into its internal and external cooperation processes. At the workshop, Metro illustrated the governance and cooperation arrangements at political, senior management and technical levels for the development and delivery of the West Yorkshire SUMP (Sustainable Urban Mobility Plan). Metro and the Leeds Health Department also presented their cooperation arrangements within the recently started Highway to Health Cycling programme which set the ground for governance innovation and public sector change management.In addition to that, the CH4LLENGE Follower Cities and the project’s city partners received information and advice from the CH4LLENGE Expert Team which assists the cities in the development of SUMPs.All presentations and minutes are available for download: <link http: www.sump-challenges.eu content leeds-workshop-institutional-cooperation>www.sump-challenges.eu/content/leeds-workshop-institutional-cooperation