Innovators Magazine was a media partner with this month’s CIVITAS Forum – Europe’s premier sustainable mobility conference – held in Aachen. One of the highlights of the event was the CIVITAS Awards. This year’s winners were Parma, which picked up the Climate-Neutral award, Aachen – winner of the Transformation award, and Gdynia, winner of the Legacy title.
Parma’s new Low Emission Zone was one of the reasons the Italian city came out on top.
“We want to promote a new mobility culture, centred on our citizens’ needs, while being more sustainable and environmentally-friendly,” said Tiziana Benassi, Deputy Mayor for Environmental Sustainability from the City of Parma. “Limiting access for the most polluting cars with the introduction of a Low Emission Zone across the entire urban area is our first step in the systemic transformation to make Parma a green and carbon-neutral city. The Green area, whose heart is the historical city centre (Blue area), will contribute to a higher quality of life of everyone visiting, working and living in Parma.”
The host city of Aachen won the Transformation gong for implementing a raft of smart innovations, including the introduction of the first hydrogen garbage trucks in Germany.
Uwe Müller, Head of the Traffic Planning and Mobility Division, in Aachen, said: “The CIVITAS – Transformation Award for Aachen shows that change in mobility happens. Mobility infrastructure does turn towards people: more space for safe, calm and environmental-friendly mobility, creating spaced with a high liveability.”
And for its roll out of clean buses and impactful mobility campaigns, to name just two of its initiatives, Gdynia bagged the Legacy award.
Marek Łucyk, Deputy Mayor responsible for sustainable development in Gdynia, added: “Since joining the CIVITAS community, we as a city have had the great opportunity to learn, develop and implement innovative solutions, as well as to share our knowledge on sustainable mobility. This has increased the quality and accelerated the process of our city’s development towards a green and people-friendly city. We constantly strive to provide new and better mobility solutions and enhance citizens’ sustainable ways of life and we are happy that this has been acknowledged by the CIVITAS Initiative.”
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