PAC Meeting 13-15 March, Odense – Denmark
The CIVITAS Political Advisory Committee, composed of 13 elected representatives on urban mobility affairs from local authorities across Europe, met in Odense mid-march in order to draft a two year workplan as well as to visit Odense.
Considered as “the cycling city” in Europe with a wide range of biking activities and incentives, the city of Odense is well-known for its investments in bikes and security material for elementary school, a comprehensive bike-sharing schemes and the special attention paid to elderly people mobility with the provision of three wheelers as well as seated bikes driven by volunteers to ensure their mobility on a daily basis.
The study visit also allowed PAC members to further analyse the current transformation triggered since 2008 by the “tramway project” which encapsulate 38 initiatives for a total investment of 40 Billion DKK (5,38 Billion EUR). This is mainly composed of an underground parking in the city centre, the tramway infrastructure and operation, as well as the reorganisation of buildings along the tram line, including a new University Campus in the South of Odense. Looking beyond the end of this massive project which finishes in 2020, Odense is also committed to prepare the urban infrastructure to fully integrate driverless buses and cars as well as having a 100% fully electric car public fleet.
The PAC also sent a strong signal during this meeting to further reinforce its cooperation with other CIVITAS structure such as the Thematic Group and the upcoming Advisory Groups, but also acknowledged and welcomed the idea to invite political representatives from Innovation Action Projects to join the PAC as observer in order to better feed-in PAC discussion and policy orientation paper with concrete recommendations from local demonstration measures.
More information on the study visit, the PAC meeting and presentation made during this event will be available shortly on the CIVITAS Website in the PAC page: http://civitas.eu/pac.
