+ATLANTIC is a Collaborative Laboratory that transforms scientific knowledge into practical solutions for ocean, coastal, climate, and environmental challenges. By combining Earth observation, data science, AI, and numerical modelling, it delivers user-oriented products that support governance, innovation, and public awareness, all with the mission to drive a sustainable transition across the Atlantic region. 

The challenge

Mediterranean cities face multiple climate risks, from heatwaves to sea level rise and storms, all amplified by coastal urbanisation, tourism pressure, ageing populations, and migration trends. These vulnerabilities affect health (heat-related mortality and pollution-linked illness), energy (changing demand and reduced hydropower during droughts), and infrastructure (damage from unpredictable floods and storms driven by growing climate variability). 

The satellite solution

Earth Observation provides essential data to anticipate and manage climate-related risks in Mediterranean cities, particularly heat extremes and sea level rise. By analysing satellite-derived information on land use, vegetation, and built-up areas, EO helps detect and quantify the Urban Heat Island effect, where heat accumulates in densely built environments. Long-term geospatial datasets feed into data-driven models that improve local weather forecasts and enable the creation of early warning and adaptation tools. These EO-based systems are strengthened by in-situ measurements and computing power, with many initiatives supported through European public funding. 

The results

The integration of EO data into local planning enhances cities’ awareness and preparedness for climate-induced extremes. Beyond heatwaves, the approach supports a broader understanding of interconnected hazards and their impacts on health, infrastructure, and energy. Through +ATLANTIC’s multi-hazard platform AtlanticSENSE, decision-makers and citizens can now benchmark local risk profiles, access transparent and traceable information, and strengthen their literacy on environmental and climate risks, fostering more resilient and informed urban communities. 

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The Maltese Planning Authority is the national government agency responsible for land use and spatial planning in Malta. It also serves as the country’s national mapping authority, providing essential cartographic data to support the development permit system and ensure that urban development aligns with planning regulations.

The challenge

For over a decade, the Planning Authority relied on aerial photography to produce maps of the Maltese Islands. However, with rapid and constant urban development — new constructions, extensions, and land-use changes — there was an increasing need to update maps more frequently and monitor change across the entire country.
Aerial imagery, while detailed, posed several obstacles: it required special flight permits, favourable weather conditions, and costly equipment. Drone surveys offered flexibility but covered only urban areas, making them impractical for nationwide mapping. The Planning Authority therefore sought a simpler, faster, and more scalable solution that could provide regular, high-resolution imagery over Malta as a whole.

The satellite solution

To meet these needs, the Planning Authority adopted high-resolution commercial satellite imagery: satellite data provides synoptic coverage — capturing the entire island in a single snapshot — and can be acquired regularly (one to two times per week), with access to a rich archive of past images. This allows them to select cloud-free images for specific time periods and conduct change detection analyses, supporting urban planning policies such as modification of development zones. Although commercial imagery involves a cost, it remains more affordable than aerial photography and offers greater temporal flexibility. Transitioning to satellite-based mapping required a mindset shift and specialised training for the Planning Authority’s geomatics team, enabling staff to interpret and integrate satellite data effectively into existing workflows.

The results

The use of satellite imagery has significantly improved the efficiency and accuracy of urban monitoring in Malta. The Planning Authority now produces value-added datasets, including national land-use maps, derived from satellite analyses. The Authority is also exploring the use of AI-based tools for automatic building detection, further enhancing its capacity to track and analyse urban change. By embracing satellite technology, they have strengthened their ability to plan sustainably, leveraging both current and archived imagery to maintain an up-to-date view of the country’s evolving landscape — a model that could inspire other national mapping agencies across Europe.

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The Department of Energy Planning of the City of Vienna

In 2019, The Economist ranked the City of Vienna, in Austria, as the city with the highest quality of life worldwide. Indeed, the City’s administration believes in the value of innovation to cope with climate change and reach excellence in the delivery of public services.

The Department of Energy Planning of the City of Vienna is responsible for implementing sustainable policies in the energy sector, allocating funds and testing innovative solutions to produce energy out of renewables, increase the use of waste heat and promote energy-efficient and climate-friendly mobility.

Among other tasks, the Department issues a periodical Energy Report aimed at raising residents’ awareness on the status of energy and climate-related issues in Vienna.

The challenge

Urban areas are generally warmer than their surrounding areas. This phenomenon, known as “urban heat island effect” can cause health risks and higher energy consumption in cities.

In the past years, the urban heat island effect in Vienna has been exacerbated by a growing population and an increase in urban development, which led to the loss of permeable open green spaces and to higher temperatures.

In 2003, the city experienced 44 heat wave days, which were responsible for 180 deaths. Forecasts predict that between 2021 and 2050, there will be an average of 19 heat days in Vienna, while the population is expected to increase from 1.8 million to 2 million by 2029.

To prevent health risks to the residents of Vienna, the Energy Planning Department was hence looking for ways to identify urban “hot spots” and take measures to mitigate the consequences of increasing temperatures in the city.

The satellite solution

In 2019, the Department asked ECOTEN Urban Comfort, a company based in Prague and specialised in urban and environmental engineering, to map heat islands in Vienna to help them identify where action was the most needed.

After assessing the needs of the Department, the company defined the relevant indices to assess the city’s vulnerability to heat waves. Exposure, which is the prevalence of high temperatures across the city, was calculated by looking at images from the Landsat 8 satellite from 2015 to 2019.

Sensitivity was measured based on the density of vulnerable people (younger than 14 and older than 65) with data derived from Vienna’s Open Data portal.

Finally, adaptive capacity, which represents the ability of the urban ecosystem to cope with heat events thanks to the presence of greenery and waterbodies, was calculated by using imagery from the Sentinel 2A European satellite, which carries information to estimate both the enhanced vegetation index of the city (the density of urban vegetation) and its normalised difference water index (measuring water-bodies).

The indices were then combined to create a Heat Vulnerability Map of the City of Vienna.

The map shows which areas in Vienna are more affected to heat (in orange and red), providing information about temperatures and vulnerable people in the 250 districts of the city. In total, ten heat vulnerable areas have been identified in Vienna.

The results

The map created by ECOTEN Urban Comfort on the basis of satellite data and released by the City of Vienna is meant to serve as an operational tool by the Department of Urban Planning and other city authorities to implement mitigating measures in the neighbourhoods that are more vulnerable to heat events.

Indeed, the map contains information on high temperatures in Vienna and on areas with low vegetation and waterbodies and with a high number of vulnerable people. Furthermore, the analysis carried out by Ecoten Urban Comfort showed that, if no action was taken, temperatures in Vienna would increase of 8°C by 2050.

The Urban Heat Vulnerability Map initiated a series of public reactions via social media and mainstream media which ultimately led to a political debate over initiatives that the city can take to protect its citizens from extreme heat and provide comfortable eco-friendly urban districts for urban dwellers that are most vulnerable to extreme heat.

Based on the Urban Heat Vulnerability Map, in 2019 the City of Vienna launched the “Coole Straßen” (Cool Streets) project, aimed at lowering temperatures in the three districts identified as the most vulnerable to heat. In these areas, the City authorities created open spaces with trees and brighter surfaces, which reflect less heat, and installed mist showers to cool the asphalt and humidify the pavement. In addition, parking was banned in selected streets.

“For the first time we have a map that shows us where cooling is urgent and allows us to take specific measures.” Birgit Hebein, Former Deputy Major, City of Vienna

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The Lyon public transport network Transports en Commun Lyonnais (TCL) is managed by the public transport authority SYTRAL. Its task is to build and set up the agglomeration’s transport policy, carry out investments, determine pricing policy and adapt the transport offer in the Rhône and Lyon region in France.

The Challenge

As the number of people living in cities is growing, local authorities fear a rise in the number of vehicles and pollution. To respond to the increasing urban congestion, cities are exploring smarter and greener mobility solutions. One of the main challenges to encourage the use of public transport, is to bridge gaps at the edges of existing transit systems. This challenge is also known as “the first and last kilometre”. It represents the distance from a specific starting point to a transport network, or the distance remaining from a transport network to a final destination.

Lyon’s public transport network is the second largest in France. Nevertheless, in some areas of the city, commuters still face the first and last kilometre barrier. For example, the large majority of those working in the Gaulnes business park still prefer to use the car, while only 15% rely on public transport. To face this challenge, rather than increasing the number of traditional bus lines, the city decided to expand the coverage of the existing infrastructure.

Lyon has a strong history of innovation in public transport, starting in 1862 with the introduction of the first funicular railway. This innovative mindset led SYTRAL to contact the Keolis Group and NAVYA, a company based in Lyon that specialises in autonomous electric shuttles. The driverless shuttles offer a cost-effective way to encourage the use of public transport.

To be guided safely through the trafficked streets of Lyon, all the shuttles have a GNSS antenna. Thanks to satellite navigation, the position of a vehicle is constantly monitored by the control centre. Moreover, to ensure constant monitoring of the buses also where the satellite connection is interrupted, the vehicles are equipped with additional guidance and detection systems such as cameras and sensors.

In September 2016, Lyon launched its very first autonomous shuttle service named NAVLY in the Confluence district, complementing an urban renewal project overlooking the Saône River. The NAVLY shuttles, running at an average speed of 15 km/h, make five stops on a public route of 1.3 km. The vehicles are freely accessible, carry up to 15 passengers at a time and circulate regularly every day. For the moment, an operator is present on the bus. To know the position of the shuttles in real time and to consult the schedule, an application called “NAVLY” is available for free.

In March 2019, another autonomous shuttle line was added. The Mobilité Intelligente & Autonome (MIA) service connects the offices in the Gaulnes business park with the nearby tram station. This 2.4 kilometre route, which includes three stops, runs during rush hours and at lunch time. The objective is to offer an alternative to the car and encourage the use of public transport for those working in the area. A third line, N1, was launched in November 2019: two more autonomous shuttles provide a regular service between the Décines Grand Large tram station and the Parc Olympique Lyonnais stadium.

The results

The autonomous shuttles offer a cost-effective response to the challenges of urban mobility, in addition to conventional means of public transportation. Overall, the autonomous shuttles in Lyon have been used by over 70 000 passengers to date, while the N1 shuttles transport an average of 80 passengers every day. These first and last kilometre services mark the first wave of autonomous vehicle adoption in the city. This project is part of the EU-funded project Autonomous Vehicles to Evolve to New Urban Experience (AVENUE), and more autonomous vehicles will be deployed in other European cities in the future. Local transport in rural areas, or on specific sites such as university campuses and hospitals, can benefit from this smart mobility service as well.

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ANCI is the National Association of Italian Municipalities. ANCI Tuscany is the organisation in charge of enhancing the institutional, regulatory, financial and organisational autonomy of Municipalities in the Tuscany Region, and of representing the interests of Tuscan municipalities in their relationships with the Tuscany Region and the Italian Government.

ANCI offers consultancy, training and support to the Tuscan municipalities, collecting their instances and bringing them to the regional and national levels.

The challenge

The acronym WEEE indicates the waste of electrical and electronic equipment. Nowadays, the growing production of electronic equipment with an increasingly short lifecycle generates an ever growing amount of WEEE. These are not only composed of metals and plastics, but also contain heavy metals and substances which are particularly pollutant, threatening the environment and human health.

Even in regions like Tuscany, where waste separation is well spread, these materials often end up in the undifferentiated waste bin. Indeed, the general public has little knowledge of how to dispose of their electric waste. At the same time, public authorities know very little about the way they are disposed, while the companies dealing with the installation or distribution of electronic equipment are rarely involved in their collection.

The satellite solution

In 2017, with the objectives of fostering the collection and disposal of electronic waste and to sensitise private companies and citizens on the issue, ANCI Tuscany launched the LifeWeee project. The project is co-funded by LIFE Environmental Governance and Information, the European Commission’s financial instrument for the environment, and is implemented by ANCI Tuscany in collaboration with the Tuscany Region, the Department of Information Engineering and the Department of Civil Engineering of the University of Florence, the Trade Chambers of Tuscany and Seville (Spain), and Ecocerved Scarl. It aims at generating a behavioural change in the disposal of electronic equipment and at engaging private companies and public administrations in the design and implementation of an adequate WEEE’s collection system, as a first step towards the recycling of WEEE’s components.

Among other actions, the project partners developed a software to help companies managing the paperwork related to the transport of WEEE and to allow the collection of WEEE on their premises. Moreover, they developed the LifeWeee mobile App, geolocating all collection and disposal sites in Tuscany with satellite navigation.

When electronic devices end their lifecycle, their owners can localise the closest disposal site on the App and calculate the best itinerary to reach it. This is made possible by the satellite navigation system embedded into their mobile devices. The users can then select the kind and number of WEEE to be disposed within a list of items. The App will tell which materials will be recycled, the amount of CO2 saved thanks to the disposal and the number of corresponding kilometres by car.

The results

The App represents an important tool to engage citizens and private companies in the collection and disposal of WEEE in Tuscany and provides ANCI and all project partners with important information to better target policies aimed at managing electronic waste in Tuscany. For the time being, the App only includes disposal sites in the Tuscany region, but its geographical coverage could be extended to neighbouring regions and to the whole national territory. The App is available for free and will continue to exist after the completion of the LifeWeee project in August 2020. The Department of Information Engineering of the University of Florence will take care of updating the list of disposal points in the App.

As of today (April 2020), 423 collection points in the Tuscany Region and 224 collection points in Andalusia are recorded in the App.

Thanks to the LifeWeee App, residents can identify and reach the closest collection and disposal sites for WEEE, hence facilitating the work of public administrations and private companies to recycle the materials contained in electronic devices”, Rosa Schina, ANCI Tuscany

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Turkey’s 4th largest metropolis is located in the north-western Marmara Region. Nestled at the foothills of Mount Uludag, south of the Marmara Sea, the city is famous for its place in Ottoman History. Between 1335 and 1363, Bursa acted as the first major capital of the newly Ottoman Empire, and has been at the crossroads of trade and cultural routes ever since. Its rich historical heritage is attested by 27 archaeological sites and more than 2000 unique cultural and architectural monuments across the province. Despite being one of the most industrialised cities in Turkey, the city also hosts an extensive green patrimony of parks, greeneries and thermal waters.

The Challenge

Due to its location and burgeoning economy, the city’s metropolitan area is rapidly and constantly changing. In parallel, the city’s population also grew substantially. From approx. 61,000 in 1927 to more than 1, 8 million people today, as new residents flowed in enticed by the growing manufacturing and textiles industries. This exponential growth has in turn strained the capacity of existing urban infrastructure and public services.

The rapid expansion of industrial zones threatened also natural conservation areas. As the city expanded, concrete took over green areas, causing a significant loss in biodiversity and agricultural land. Heavy industrialisation also translated into higher air pollution levels and population health risks. Mitigating these challenges alongside others, such as, water contamination risks or illegal housing, became a complex task for the municipality’s GIS Department. Moreover, city authorities need to cater for their citizens’ wellbeing and maintain high quality of live standards though stable employment and economic growth. To navigate all these needs the city needed a one-stop shop for information.

The Satellite Solution

To assess the impact of the city’s rapid expansion on the urban landscape and green spaces, the municipality turned to satellite imagery. In 2011, NIK System, a Turkish company providing both acquisition and Earth Observation imagery processing services, captured the municipality’s 11,000 sqkm area with WorldView 2. Fourteen days were enough to obtain the required 0, 5 m resolution data. On-site GPS measurements and topographic maps helped further data corrections and improved accuracy. Additional colour balancing and mosaic applications were also carried out. Having been acquired for the municipality, the high resolution data is not shared with other public authorities.

Once processed, the images were integrated into the municipality’s geo-information system (GIS). Thus, complementing the existing layers of Landsat data used. The web-based software, which includes several types of data access, is used and shared externally and internally, among the municipality’s departments. Every year or second, the municipality refreshes its datasets with new layers of information. Depending on the budget and their needs, city authorities decide what type of imagery to purchase. For example, in the past years, the municipality preferred to acquire aerial images to satellite ones for their updates.

The Result

To support citizen driven initiatives, the municipality shared parts of its data for the Bursa 3D City Information System project. Older satellite and aerial images, address data, important places (hospitals, schools, touristic facilities, etc.) and transportation data, which are owned by the Metropolitan municipality, can be accessed easily, quickly and clearly on a web portal. The portal also comes with its own visualisation tools which can be freely downloaded. As such, by using the available open software, anyone can create their own maps of Bursa.

Information on soil subsidence, green and water areas, agricultural lands, illegal buildings, as well as urban sprawl obtained through satellite and aerial imagery are all contained in the GIS system. As such, by merging data from various sources, the municipality can monitor landscape changes faster and more efficiently. Subsequently, satellite derived information also support plans for new infrastructure or cadastral projects. Thus, feeding into the municipality’s plans to turn Bursa into Turkey’s first smart and sustainable city. Railway refurbishment to improve urban mobility and relocating industrial zones outside the city, are amongst the envisioned actions for the future.

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KERMAP is a spinoff of the University of Rennes 2 and the LETG laboratory set up by the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS). The company, founded in 2016, provides solutions to support cities in their ecological transition, offering a broad range of services, such as vegetation and air quality monitoring, and carbon storage estimation, among others.

The challenge

Every city is an ecosystem, and maintaining its good status is crucial for the health and happiness of city residents. This implies granting a good balance between green and built areas, sustaining biodiversity, restoring natural habitats and providing ecological corridors for wild species. The city of Rennes, where KERMAP is based, counts 12.700 trees. Among them, many are ancient specimens that need to be cut down to prevent damages to the infrastructure. To plan such works, the city needed a precise map of the trees and their species, in addition to information on air quality, infrastructure and buildings in the concerned areas.

KERMAP wanted to assist the city of Rennes in planning its tree management works. Hence, the company started looking for a viable solution to map and monitor the vegetation status.  The data on green areas had to be scalable and comparable over time and be made available online to local communities, public administration, and private actors.

The satellite solution

In 2017 KERMAP used satellite imagery to map and qualify green areas in Rennes. Satellite imagery reveals to be useful to map wide portions of territory in different time gaps and conditions. The images used are provided by the French Centre for Space Studies (CNES), the Bretagne province and its academic labs. The urban vegetation is monitored at least once a month to model the vegetation development cycle.

Thanks to the data collected, KERMAP prepared a demo map of the city, showing green areas and the kind of trees and plants present in different neighbourhoods, together with the percentage of vegetation compared to built-in areas. In addition to this, at the end of 2017 KERMAP realised a new demo that shows the impact of urban morphology on the local climate (KERMAP- Urban Climate of Rennes).

The users of the demo can see different local climate zones and the impacts of the urban planning on the local climate. The demo mainly shows that the urban vegetation is essential for local climate regulation. The maps are free and publicly available online, on the website of the Company (KERMAP- Green areas of Rennes). The first deliveries of the demos for the city of Rennes are expected for mid-2018.

The results

The satellite-based map will help the City of Rennes to monitor the evolution of the vegetation in different areas, the increasing of house units to the detriment of green areas and climate change issues. The map will allow city authorities to understand which trees need to be cut and to decide on where they will be replanted and on which species are more suitable for different areas of the city. The information on the vegetation cover collected through satellite imagery will also help the city to prepare its future Local Plan of Urbanism (PLU). Indeed, according to the PLU, each neighbour of the city needs to have a mandatory percentage of green areas.

Our objective is to offer a free showcase of information on the vegetation of big cities. This is possible today thanks to satellite imagery.

Antoine Lefebvre, Founder and President of KERMAP

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Daniele Quercia and Luca Maria Aiello, researchers at Nokia Bell Labs in Cambridge, and Rossano Schifanella, Professor at the University of Turin, started their scientific cooperation in the field of urban informatics in 2014. This partnership was to bring on “happy maps”: a project looking at what type of information or data would make city life more enjoyable for dwellers. The success of their initial project, determined them to expand it to a bigger platform.
Good City Life thus collects several sensory mapping projects with the goal of improving the quality of life in urban areas.

The challenges

Today satellite navigation data, such as GPS, is enabling us to better manage our time and perform tasks more efficiently. The most classic example could be seen in the numerous apps that help citizens find the shortest and easiest way to get from A to B, avoiding more complicated routes. Nevertheless, efficiency does not always correspond to quality and gaining extra time does not mean improving our everyday life.

The satellite solution

For this reason the team of researchers decided to create a service which provides citizens with tailored routes. As our senses play an important role in how we perceive our environment, the team went on to analyse the relation between our environment and our emotions. Crowd sourced data, geo-tagged social media pictures and open street map were thus merged. Based on the collected data the team moved on to provide cities with three types of maps: “Happy”, “Smelly” and “Chatty”.

The results

Using the geo tagged photos, the “Happy Map” inventories the city’s most pleasant spots and provides users with the happiest route to follow to their destination. The “Smelly one”, computes social media tags to capture an entire urban smellscape. Last but not least, the “Chatty map”, creates routes according to the city’s sounds.Depending on their interest, users can thus choose to get more out of their daily travelling experience rather than just getting from A to B.

The Good City Life platform is now available for around 12 cities in Europe and the US. If from the scientific point of view the value of this service is the capacity to quantify sensorial quality data, the relevance of this innovative mapping project lies in the opportunity to use the maps for land-use applications and services, as well as for urban planning and environmental health.

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Vasto is a hilltop town on the Adriatic coast in southern Abruzzo, Italy. The City counts 41.000 inhabitants on an area of 70.65 km2. With a notable medieval centre, several buildings dating from the 15^th century and a long coast including a natural reserve, the City is one of the main holiday destinations in Abruzzo, especially during the summer season.

The Department of Transport, Sustainable Mobility and Smart City of Vasto was created in 2014 with the task of designing and implementing the Sustainable Urban Mobility Plan (SUMP). The SUMP should facilitate intermodal transport in town, regulating and coordinating all urban mobility options, including trains, public buses, areas with traffic restrictions, parking spots, etc. Moreover, the Department is in charge of promoting green transport modes.

The challenge

The guidelines provided to local administrations by the European Commission foresee that Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans are developed in cooperation across different policy areas and levels of administration and with citizens and other stakeholders.

Hence, in order to build the Plan, the Municipality must screen needs and perceptions of inhabitants concerning urban mobility. The first step to collect such feedback is to provide stakeholders with all available information on mobility in the city.

The satellite solution

During the consultations organised by the City Hall to discuss the implementation of the SUMP, the Youth National Confederation of Artisans (CNA) proposed to build a web portal making available information on urban and regional mobility. Launched in November 2018, the VAMOS portal (Vasto Sustainable Mobility) will include all available information on public transport, free and paying parking, parking for persons with impaired mobility, green areas, restricted traffic areas, walking paths, cycling routes and electric bikes, among others. All these assets are geolocated through satellite navigation and users can click on the online maps to calculate their itineraries and be guided to their destinations.

Moreover, the portal includes information on iBike Abruzzo, the service of electric bike sharing recently created. The service is based on the MyCicero App, allowing users to register, manage payments and discover itineraries and charging stations in the territory. So far, five electric bike stations have been set up. Both the stations and the bikes are geolocated with satellite navigation, allowing users and service managers to know the position of the bikes in real time and to collect information on users’ itineraries. The iBike system has been implemented with the financial contribution of the Abruzzo region by a local SME working in the field of sustainable buildings and the consortium of commercial and tourist actors of Vasto Marina, the lower part of the city facing the Adriatic coast.

The results

The VAMOS platform allows inhabitants and visitors of Vasto to plan their itineraries within and around the city by combining different transport modes. The platform is currently being presented to the citizens through consultations and meetings. The feedback collected through such activities will be used by the Department of Sustainable Mobility to design the Sustainable Urban Mobility Plan.

In the future, the VAMOS platform will also include information on the car sharing service to be created and on the bus regional routes. Regional buses are already geolocated through satellite navigation. Indeed, the regional bus company Di Fonzo is part of the Polo Inoltra, a cluster of over 70 regional companies aimed at enhancing innovation in the sectors of mobility and logistics. When regional buses will be included in the VAMOS platform, users will be able to check their exact position in real time and to better plan their trip to Vasto. Today, the company includes the transport of a bike in the bus ticket. If current initiatives will be sustained, the VAMOS platform will allow the city to attract a greater number of cycling enthusiasts.

Moreover, the geolocated shared bikes are already providing the Department of Sustainable Mobility with precious information on cyclists and their itineraries. Such data could be used by the City to plan for the construction of new cycling routes according to users’ needs and even to adjust to traffic fluxes the price of advertisements on public routes.

Making available and geolocating all the information concerning mobility in the city is a crucial step in enhancing intermodal transport and green mobility. In particular, the information provided by the built-in GPS on electric bikes will allow us to better manage existing cycling routes and to plan for improvements in the future”.

Paola Cianci, Minister for the Environment, City of Vasto

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Bologna is the capital of the Emilia-Romagna region, in Italy. The city has a population of about 386,298, for an area of 140.7 km2. Its metropolitan area hosts about one million inhabitants.

The Agency for Mobility and Local Public Transport – SRM was established in 2003 to manage the public transport infrastructure in Bologna. Among other activities, the Agency plans and promotes integrated transport policies and sustainable urban transport, in collaboration with other relevant local bodies.

The challenge

Bologna does not face the same transport difficulties as bigger Italian cities. It can rely on an efficient public bus network covering the entire greater urban area with a frequent service. Nevertheless, private vehicles remain the most common mode of transport for daily movements in town. As a consequence, traffic and pollution are among the main causes of discontent for local residents and commuters.

To improve mobility, air quality and citizens’ well-being, the Agency for Mobility and Local Public Transport was looking for means to reduce the use of private vehicles, especially for daily itineraries of less than five kilometres. Moreover, the Agency needed up-to-date, reliable information to plan the construction and improvement of cycle lanes, and to facilitate intermodal transport.

The satellite solution

In 2011, Bologna was the first European city to organise a cycling challenge between teams from different neighbourhoods. The initiative received communication support from the CIVITAS and Polis networks. Since then, the challenge took a European dimension and is currently implemented in 39 cities.

The European cycling challenge takes place every year during the whole month of May. Individuals, teams and cities can join the competition through a web portal and a free mobile app (Cycling365) to track their biking itineraries. The web portal stores all the information on the number of kilometres cycled, as well as the itineraries run. Each participant, team and city is able to visualise their rank compared to other participants, which stimulates competitiveness and engagement. Thanks to satellite navigation, all the information is recorded and made available in real time. At the end of May, prizes are awarded to participating individuals, teams and cities.

An important feature of the initiative is that the itineraries tracked with satellite navigation are used to generate daily updated “heat maps” of the routes most covered by cyclists, which are also available on the web portal.

Bologna Heat Map 08/05/2015 Source: www.cyclingchallenge.eu 

The results

Since its first edition, the challenge raised an increasing interest, involving a growing number of cities and cyclists. Not only did the initiative succeed in changing behaviours by promoting biking (in 2014, biking accounted for 10% of total urban movements), but it also provides cities with information that can be used to enhance sustainable mobility. 

All the data recorded belong to the city authorities and are used to plan construction and improvement of cycle lanes, or to facilitate intermodal urban transport. Furthermore, the challenge allows participants to reclaim public spaces as a place to meet, exchange and interact within the community, thus improving quality of life in general.

By tracking cycling itineraries during a whole month, we are able to collect information on a phenomenon – urban cycling – that is usually not very visible. These data allow us to better monitor and to plan measures to improve sustainable mobility in Bologna”. Dora Ramazzotti, General Affairs Manager, Bologna Agency for Mobility and Local Public Transport 

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