Wintertime usually arrives with a one-day delay from Vienna to Budapest. But what about the promotion of winter cycling? Compare this nice official approach of the city of Vienna vs. a different but still nice voluntary approach of a cycling advocate in Budapest! Although not considered to be official promotion, an important announcement was published by the BKK Centre for Budapest Transport today: Some 30 main roads, 60 crossings and 120 streets will be made cycling-friendly within the service area of Bubi until the scheme's introduction next spring. To be continued...
The final event of the PIP program was held in Wroclaw, Poland as part of the Innovation Festival.
On the last day of the festival I had the chance to introduce myself along five other Pioneers representing the different regions of the program. This was an excellent opportunity to sum up my experiences, motivation and results of my placements. I set up a rather personal presentation in order to bring the “spirit” of the program as well as the field of transport/mobility closer to the audience consisting of experts from representing various professions. Why I applied for the program? Because working locally for an „international” company like TRENECON-COWI often provides me with opportunities in learning about innovative mobility planning and management methods (like bike-sharing or car sharing), but most of the time the applicability of these are quite limited in a CEE environment. Although my enthusiasm and commitment towards life-long learning, sharing and knowledge transfer remains sky-high, we are still facing the lack of integrated smart mobility approach in CEE. Being a father of two I am well aware of the future of the youth that we are practically stealing by building cities for cars instead for people. With PIP I could put myself into different environments professionally, corporately, culturally to “test and prove” my different mindset. The new tasks and the positive feedback I received from my hosts gave me a fundamental boost for keeping up the good work! My domestic placement at REC was hosted by Greg Spencer, a great expert and well-known opinion-leader on the field of sustainable transport. A concrete result of my four-week activity is the Hungarian version of a handbook that was published in seven languages as a tool of the Mobile 2020 project in order to:
My work included the proofreading of the handbook. I was inspired by the feeling that I can make a step further after my former activity in the editor’s board of the infamous UME (Hungarian Design Standard). This time I had the chance to sink deeply into the so-important technical language of cycling-friendly planning and fine tune the text of a detailed professional material with perfectionism. Beyond that I proposed some changes for the editors (Csaba Mezei and Péter Szuppinger) and provided them with a great batch of photos and illustrations. It is so good to finish a job with satisfaction! My international host, MOVUS has got a real integrated approach with a full portfolio including the operation of a public bike-sharing and electric car-sharing service, transport planning and R/D. Thus the company has an effective influence onto mobility innovations and not only in the Valencia region. With the kind assistance and mentorship of Mauro Fiore, Isabel Espinós and Juan Bueno I got a deep insight into the company’s business activity. My consultancy was highly appreciated in relation with various activities of MOVUS on the field of sustainable mobility:
On the other hand I learned a lot about company culture and communication technics. The onsite experiences gave me a better understanding of transport system(s) I am working with as a planner. CM in Valencia reminds me to the Budapest CM's back in the "good old times". Some 500 people gathered to ride 2 hours through the city from the Plaza de la Virgen to Ayora. The mass contained a wide range of urban cyclist, young and old, beginner and pro. Local trendsetters like chic cyclists and other "girls on wheels" were quite visible but the majority (as usual) were lycra warriors. It was nice to see that several handicapped riders with wheelchairs were members of our group, too. Casual riders were using Valenbisi which is the local bike-sharing system effectively boosting the cycling culture in the city. This morning we had a short talk with an external consultant about the international strategy of MOVUS. The company is going to expand towards new markets having its Spanish opportunities been shrinked in the crisis.
As a promotional activity regarding my placement a bike trip and another visit to Bioparc which is a kind of Safari in Valencia are to be organized. These will be promotional events of MOVUS for all Pioneers in VLC. A Pioneer's task is to support support Juan, the marketing/PR manager by setting up and sending out a promo mail to all PIP's in VLC. Another Pioneer's activity of mine istThe DOROTHY project. It is an international project regarding innovative urban logistics. I'll be able to help in networking. In the lunch break (2.30 PM) I had the chance to drive a Peugeot Ion (see on the left side of the photo below), the flagship of the electric car sharing fleet of MOVUS. What a good feeling to drive without any noise! The vehicle weighs 1200 kgs though, 600 kgs the battery only...The car on the right side is a Think City car - there are 5 like this in the fleet of MOVUS Back in the office I had a short discussion i with Pablo and Gabriel. They are going to "attack" new markets with the bike-sharing business of MOVUS. |