Over 70 international participants attended!
The first CIVITAS Summer University took place from June 26th-28th in Palma de Mallorca, Spain. Hosted and organized by the Universitat de les Illes Baleares, the theme of this year’s Summer University was sustainable urban mobility planning (SUMP). Many experts in the field of SUMP came from across Europe and Spain to share their experiences, conduct various workshops and interact with local students and young professionals. The content of the presentations and workshops was a collaboration between the university partners, measure leaders and the project management team of the CIVITAS DYN@MO project. The first day of the Summer University began with inspiring opening speeches from the Universitat de les Illes Balears, the Councilor of mobility for the city of Palma, and the CIVITAS DY@MO German project partner. Afterwards, presenters focused mainly on the French, German and British experience with SUMP. Accompanied by simultaneous translations in Spanish, English and Catalan; participants learned about the various goals, accomplishments, barriers, challenges, and solutions that these countries face in their ongoing efforts to create, implement and maintain various sustainable urban mobility plans. Experts spoke extensively about their experience with SUMP, devoting a portion of their presentations to answering questions and engaging in interesting dialogue with the Summer University participants. Also of interest was the presentation done by DYN@MO´s project partners in Croatia on the need for new mobility planning in central and eastern European countries. Participants were also introduced to the concept of SUMP more broadly, with the underlying theme of SUMP guidelines and challenges. The Lord Mayor of Palma, Mateo Isern, officially welcomed the participants in the plenary room of the City Council. He stressed the importance of knowledge sharing on SUMP for his city, since Palma is starting a new process for sustainable urban mobility planning this summer. On the second day, representatives from local Palma stakeholders discussed the challenges to be met in this planning process. The second day began with an overview of sustainable mobility in Spain, followed by a presentation on national SUMP guidelines before dealing specifically with the mobility strategies of Palma. The goal of the second day was that participants could apply the strong theoretical knowledge they learned from the first day and apply it to the concept of SUMP within the Spanish context. After the in-depth overview, participants were taken on a tour of the city as well as. Participants were given a presentation focusing on SUMP case studies in Spain, before they were broken off into working groups, focusing on the SUMP experiences of the following four Spanish cities: Sevilla, Malaga, Vitoria and Barcelona. For participants who attended any of the workshops, they were given the opportunity to work closely in small groups with leaders from each city. The workshops were led by academics, city officials and researchers who are all contributing in some important way to SUMP initiatives in their local cities and throughout the entire country. Once the workshop sessions came to an end and participants shared their experiences, an interesting round table discussion took place on stakeholder participation and citizen engagement for SUMP. On the third and final day of the Summer University, participants had the opportunity to take all of the theoretical and practical knowledge they learned over the first two days and take part in trainings that highlighted specific aspects of the SUMP process through various exercises. Participants had the option of the following three workshops: involvement of local stakeholder, social media techniques in SUMP and measure selection in SUMP and evaluation of those measures´ impacts. The workshops lasted the better part of the morning, giving participants ample time to interact with SUMP concepts and walk away with new skills on how they might be able to implement SUMP into their own professional and academic lives. After the training session, workshop leaders gave a brief summary of how their respective workshop went and some insight on how the participants input could not only benefit their own work, but SUMP goals in general. Finally, each participant was given a certificate showing that they had successfully completed the first annual CIVITAS Summer University and had a basic knowledge about SUMP. Overall, the outcome of the Summer University was a successful one. Participants were able to receive valuable insight, discussion, training and background materials during the three day event. As the CIVITAS DYN@MO project progresses, so too will the Summer University.+49 221 6060 55 20
