Best Practices for Urban Mobility Planning

MobiliseYourCity Organises Sustainable Urban Mobility Event at the Better Air Quality (BAQ) Conference

Many cities face major challenges due to the negative impact of increasing motorisation and fast urban growth. During the Better Air Quality Conference in Kuching, Malaysia, GIZ and the Wuppertal Institute, on behalf of the MobiliseYourCity Partnership, advocated for setting cities on a sustainable course through National Urban Mobility Programmes (NUMPs). These NUMPs do not only lay out a vision for the cities, but prioritise sustainable urban transport improvements. In doing so, they enhance the capability of cities to plan, finance and implement sustainable transport projects and measures.

In his keynote address, Dr. Christian Mettke (GIZ) highlighted that a paradigm shift of urban mobility planning needs to happen to attain sustainability in transport, emphasising that the focus of planning needs to shift from traffic, to people. NUMPs could support such a paradigm shift. Patricia Mariano (GIZ) added that a prerequisite for this to happen is to arrange collaboration between local and national governments, as well as across sectors. Alvin Mejia (on behalf of Wuppertal Institute) also underlined that sustainable transport planning would not be possible without financing mechanisms within the countries to ensure that implementation of plans can be realised.

The participants, who represented at least ten different Asian countries, actively took part in the discussions during the plenary. They shared their challenges and experiences, particularly in financing mechanisms, where many were interested in Public-Private-Partnerships as a way to finance sustainable mobility. The participants concluded that NUMPs are indeed an essential tool for governments to support and encourage cities to use sustainable urban mobility measures in their transport plans and strategies.