Venlo’s regional SUMP, knowns as Trendsportal, was established in collaboration with eight municipalities that wanted to improve the region's mobility accessibility and attractiveness and brought to life several initiatives that are now slowly turning into measures and tangible programmes marked by an increased and successful participatory effect.
Venlo is a polycentric region with urban and rural centres, an ageing population combined with increasing car use, and a lack of public charging infrastructure that falls short of the national benchmark. Also affected by transport poverty, the region decided to reverse the trend of rising automobile usage by providing cleaner, more sustainable alternatives that are available to everybody and implementing a SUMP supported by the e-smartec project.
Actively working on improving the quality of life and road safety of the region, creating an appealing transport system that is supported by green energy transition actions, and fostering spatial economic accessibility, the SUMP put major emphasis on stakeholder participation – indeed, involving stakeholders in policymaking improves SUMPs, as it builds support, and assures implementation commitment.
The Trendsportal Action Plan is developed around three main actions:
- Improving cooperation with and between stakeholders through ‘Capacity building for SUMPs’;
- Commitment to mobility management aimed at commuters through ‘Location Independent Working (LIW)’;
- Attention to transport poverty in rural areas through ‘Enhanced marketing techniques’
ACTION 1: Capacity building for SUMPs
The Trendsportal platform will allow for regular meetings with the eight municipalities to exchange knowledge on how to involve stakeholders in the drafting and implementation of measures from the regional SUMP.
During every other meeting, stakeholders of partner organisations will be invited to share their knowledge or experience on how to use marketing techniques in the drafting and implementation of measures from Venlo’s regional SUMP.
Action 2: Co-designing Location Independent Working (LIW)
Venlo is developing a scheme for Location Independent Working that will include a multi-step scanning process made of interviews and surveys - the LIW-Scan, which will allow identifying the potential for employees to work from home, as well as the measures an employer could implement to make such scheme attractive to employees working from home several days a week.
Current status
By the end of 2022, North Limburg/Venlo will perform a LIW scan of a total of 10 workplaces and 100 employees, starting from the Municipality of Gennep.
Action 3: marketing techniques
Venlo has organised one-on-one interviews with all major stakeholders involved in its SUMP to get an idea of what role these stakeholders can play in implementing measures and lobbying for co-financing from other authorities.
In addition, Venlo has issued a map-based online questionnaire for people who live and work in the region to better understand what these actors perceive as more sustainable modes of transport and what their wishes are for the future mobility system in North Limburg/Venlo.
Current status
Venlo held a total of 18 one-on-one online interviews with stakeholders and saw 541 respondents from North Limburg taking part in its map-based online questionnaire.
For more detailed information about this Action Plan, check e-smartec's online library here.
