Meet our Mobility Champions!

Sustainable city transit not only cuts emissions. Less traffic noise, better air quality, and safe spaces to walk or cycle fundamentally shape our quality of life.

Across Europe, Mission cities are redesigning their transport systems with exactly this in mind. By making energy, spatial planning, and citizen engagement core features of their approach, cities likewise systematically reshape urban life.

With the support of NetZeroCities, experimental approaches, new data and governance models, and policy mixes are emerging to lead the way.

Explore our five mobility champions who embody cities’ dedication to confronting challenges, creatively designing solutions and harnessing their people power to bring climate ambitions to life.

 

Find a solution for your city today.

Ioannina, Greece

Bologna, Italy

Kranj, Slovenia

www.photocorax.com

Tampere, Finland

Six-city policy sprint

Lahti, Finland

Ioannina, Greece

“We’re running neighbourhood-scale experiments to move towards our net zero vision, using a zoning approach to create a sense of climate security for citizens and visitors. Car-free zones, low-speed areas, and mixed-use streets – these can be difficult infrastructurally. But it opens up so much public space for people. We can’t underestimate how transformative that can be.”

 - Giorgos Antoniou, Project Coordinator for the Ioannina’s participation in the Pilot Cities Programme 

How did Greece’s Ioannina simulate a greener city using the nation’s first standardised methodology for Climate-Neutral Zones? 

In 2019, Ioannina’s emissions stood at 352,000 tonnes of CO₂ equivalent. But the city committed to cutting that by 80% by 2030 – an ambitious target that surpasses national goals and positions Ioannina as a frontrunner in Greece’s climate transition. 

To reach its targets, Ioannina undertook an exciting first step. Through the NetZeroCities, Pilot Cities Programme, the city received funding and technical support to pilot the CRISP project, which delivered a clear win. The city created its first-ever standardised methodology for “climate-neutral zones” (CNZ) – distinct areas within the city where deep, locally tailored interventions are tested and refined.  

The methodology marked a first for Greece: a structured framework for identifying, scoping, and modelling neighbourhood-level decarbonisation, closing a gap that had existed at both the municipal and national level. Putting the method to the test, the city ran simulations – modelling energy upgrades, green space, and mobility changes – on screen before laying a single cycling lane or pedestrian street. To carry those ideas from drawing board to street level, Ioannina created a consortium composed of a law firm, urban planners, engineers, and academic researchers, grounding its plans in both technical and legal reality from the start. From there, the city turned to its residents, running co-design workshops and engaging local schools to shape the final design.

The result is a model for inclusive climate governance now poised to inform national CNZ regulation – and one that’s already found its way to Athens, Kalamata, and Kozani.

  • The city used a Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis combining land use, mobility, energy, demographic, and environmental data to identify the Ampelokipoi neighbourhood as the testbed for the pilot. The selection process itself shifted the Municipality’s approach to climate planning: from top-down selection to a transparent, defensible, data-driven methodology for site prioritisation that can be replicated elsewhere.
  • Simulating potential changes across mobility, urban greening, and energy efficiency of municipal buildings, including 598 metres of pedestrianisation and a 4.2 km cycling network, gave municipal departments, technical partners, and elected officials a common spatial and analytical basis to work from for the first time.
  • Over 200 citizens participated in workshops, public consultations and co-design sessions on Ampelokipoi CNZ simulations for proposed pedestrian streets, cycling infrastructure, green space additions, and energy improvements, marking a major step towards participatory governance.
  • The city engaged four secondary schools near Ampelokipoi, serving 962 students. Compared to adult-only consultations, school communities gave richer input on safety, accessibility, and inclusivity that helped shape Bike2School and Walk2School routes designed in the CRISP simulation.
  • Building on the CRISP pilot, Ioannina is now mapping a Demand-Responsive Transit (DRT) network for its northern and southern areas, while linking the effort to the Horizon Europe ALTHEA project and planning a workshop with other Greek Mission cities to explore DRT as a peri-urban mobility solution.

  • Map legal constraints in parallel with site selection to identify constraints with pedestrianisation, green space reclassification, and EV charging infrastructure to overcome any implementation obstacle early on.
  • Plan city interventions based on regulatory ease. Active mobility measures move through legal pathways far more easily than energy interventions, which require coordinating with national grid and building code frameworks. Prioritising what’s legally accessible first helps prove CNZ viability while pursuing the more complex reforms in parallel.
  • Don’t wait for a dedicated CNZ law to act. Existing Greek legislation on urban planning, environmental protection, traffic management, and energy efficiency already provides enough legal basis for municipalities to start neighbourhood-scale interventions. Municipalities that hold off risk missing a window for local action that could help shape national regulation later.

Bologna, Italy

How did four new tram lines inspire Bologna to treat parking as a launchpad for their sustainable mobility strategy? 

In 2023, Bologna launched construction on its Red Line, the first of four planned, battery-hybrid tramlines that extend roughly 60km, set to serve 300,000 commuters per day. Residents can look forward to gliding on the Red Line’s inaugural journey by the end of 2026. 

But laying the track left the city with a new challenge in its wake – parking spaces would be lost. As an EU Mission city, Bologna called on NetZeroCities’ City Expert Support Facility to help overhaul its urban parking and traffic framework as part of its Climate City Contract. 

But before the city began, leadership made two institutionally transformative decisions. Leverage the disruption. And treat parking, not as a regulatory problem, but as a gateway to take back public space and reach broader climate goals. 

This flip in perspective led the city to pair their parking strategy with tramline development to cut private car use, expand transit hubs, and boost active mobility, like cycling. That link holistically tied parking policy directly to the city’s Sustainable Urban Mobility Plan, setting in motion their shift towards a fully integrated, low-carbon mobility system. 

  • Expert teams carried out a comprehensive assessment of Bologna’s parking system – supply, demand, user behaviours, revenue patterns, occupancy, turnover – equipping the city with evidence that became the backbone of their new Parking Plan.
  • Rather than just a regulatory framework, the Parking Plan expanded into a broader city-management tool – reforming parking rules, pricing and permits, improving logistics management, expanding park-and-ride options, and gradually introducing smarter digital and monitoring tools. Importantly, the plan also supports intermodal transport (switching smoothly between car, tram, bike, and walking), freeing up public space, and cutting environmental impact.
  • To win over sceptics, Bologna struck the heart of something citizens value and defend: parking removal along the city’s UNESCO porticos restores cultural heritage. That reframing made a hard political sell easier to accept, and it’s a playbook other historic cities could use too.
  • Following the Parking Plan, the city is developing a sustainable Urban Logistics strategy with local stakeholders to align on needs and priorities, advancing an integrated approach to net zero mobility policy.

  • On-street rates were raised in May 2025 to nudge drivers out of the historic centre.
  • Parking zones and pricing are being designed around the tram routes, with rates set by demand, location, and time, steering drivers toward interchange hubs rather than the city centre.
  • Two new park-and-ride hubs are rising along the Linea Verde, offering roughly 400 spaces for commuters to swap car for tram before reaching downtown.
  • From January 2026, hybrid vehicles belonging to non-residents lost automatic access to the historic Zona a Traffico Limitato (Limited Traffic Zone), tightening the net further.
  • In August 2026, management of the city’s entire regulated parking network – nearly 66,000 spaces, including ten multi-storey structures – passed to a new operator. The handover folded in investments beyond parking: expanded cycling infrastructure, bike-theft marking services, new traffic-flow monitoring, and a 24/7 call centre for residents.

Are you a Mission city and need technical support to realise your climate ambitions? Contact us at infocities@netzerocities.eu and request our City Expert Support Facility. Are you a Mission-minded city? Discover our Technical Helpdesk.

Kranj, Slovenia

How did Kranj transform transport data into better public mobility?

For almost 30 years, Kranj’s public transport system changed very little. Decisions were often based on fragmented information, making it difficult to understand how people actually moved and which solutions to target. Through the NetZeroCities Pilot Cities Programme, the city launched the UP-SCALE pilot project to change that, partnering with fellow Slovenian cities Ljubljana and Velenje to develop a cloud-native mobility as a service (MaaS) module within the Smart Kranj platform. The MaaS app links different transport modes, like cycling, walking, and buses, to reduce people’s carbon footprint, as well as nudges users toward more sustainable choices. 

But when the city began to upgrade its public transport network, it ran into a new challenge. Limited data-sharing from the city’s transport concessionaire made its integration impossible. The city pivoted, instead equipping buses with on-board computers and sensors to collect data independently. 

In doing so, the city enhanced its digital route planner, with data so far being used to analyse and improve bus routes, stops and timetables. Insights on users’ most-searched routes now feed back into both the app and broader transport planning. The city also introduced free bus travel during major public events and expanded its CeKR Smart City Card – already used for services like city bikes, parking and the library – to include public transport to make sustainable travel easier and more attractive for residents.

The pilot fundamentally changed how mobility decisions are made. Urban planners, transport operators, municipal departments and communication teams can now work from the same evidence-base of real travel patterns to plan upgrades. That approach is now shaping the city’s long-term mobility strategy and provides a model for other municipalities aiming to overcome similar challenges.

“Changing how people move around a city doesn’t happen overnight. So we made it easier to try something new with an MaaS app that brings together different mobility options, like cycling, walking, and buses. We also talked to residents and organised activities to encourage them to try new ways of getting around. Step by step, we’re collectively making the city a better place to live.”

Polona Prosen Šprajc, Project Manager, UP-SCALE

  • The city integrated multiple transport datasets, including ticket validation, GPS information, traffic counters and passenger flow data, creating a single evidence base for planning and optimisation of the public transport network.
  • Created an MaaS Application that provides inter-city routing across the national public transport network; multimodal navigation that integrates walking, cycling, shared bikes, bus, and cars; personalised routing based on CO₂ emissions, energy use, or shortest time; and environmental impact data showing CO₂ emissions and energy consumption for each option.
  • Launched new monitoring technologies, including anonymous Wi-Fi and Bluetooth passenger counters, door sensors and passenger information screens, giving the municipality a clearer understanding of travel behaviour and network performance.
  • Open-data requirements were embedded into the city’s transport contracts, ensuring mobility data remains accessible through machine-readable APIs to support future planning and innovation.

  • Fill data gaps and ensure access to data. As real-time data is essential, where missing, cities must invest in their own collection systems.
  • Make data sharing part of governance. Requiring transport operators to provide open, standardised data ensuring that evidence-based mobility planning becomes institutionalised.
  • Build partnerships and a learning ecosystem through feedback and peer exchange. Early collaboration with local authorities, technology partners, and frontline workers, such as bus drivers, is crucial.
  • Build public trust about digital tools. Transparent and tailored communication about why and how mobility data is collected strengthens public acceptance of smart mobility solutions, as well as supports adoption of tools and thereby behaviour change.

Tampere, Finland

In Tampere, Finland, young people are designing how the city moves – one Lego piece at a time

By 2030, Tampere wants walking, cycling, and public transport to account for 69% of all trips. And by 2023, the Finnish city already reached an impressive 62%. But the distance matters. Most trips under 1 km are made on foot. Yet nearly half the trips between 2-5 km are made by car, even though many of those distances are fit to cycle. With transport sitting at 36% of the city’s CO₂ emissions, more than half from private cars, the city looked towards its future – the youth.

As a vibrant university city, Tampere welcomes scores of students who’re shaping their routines for the first time. But when the city conducted a survey on transport habits, they found something surprising: students already move sustainably. Trams deliver them right to campus. Could the city help maintain those habits as they graduate, build careers, and start families?

Through the NetZeroCities Pilot Cities Programme, Tampere piloted the Mobility Mindshift project, which invited upper-secondary students to plan through play. Through an ambassador network, speculative design workshops, urban gamification, and direct school engagement, students were invited to co-create a greener, more sustainable city – one they’ll be excited to live and move in. The city’s approach offers a creative model for harvesting young people’s ideas and dedication as well as institutionalising the methods that bring it to life in the classroom and the city.

“Young people’s vision of the future can be bleak – unemployment, climate change, war. But our workshop let them share ideas about greener streets, better mobility, and more welcoming public spaces. By exploring positive futures together, they can see that change is possible and that their ideas matter. Building a greener city once – together – can shape a lifetime of greener habits.”

Maiju Juntunen, Project Manager, Mobility Mindshift

  • The city surveyed 753 young people to learn about how they move around the city and tailor behaviour change activities to it.
  • Speculative design workshops across four schools engaged 120 students in imagining and building a model of a “Future Tampere”. Greenery, community, and sustainable mobility appeared in nearly every design. The format was later turned into a reusable guide teachers can run on their own.
  • At Hakametsä Sport Campus, a major redevelopment, young people used Legos, Play-Doh, drawings, and site maps to design bike lanes, pedestrian paths, plazas and more in the public space they stood in. Persona cards of residents, such as wheelchair users and dog walkers, helped tailor the designs to different needs.
  • A workshop run by the University of Tampere brought together politicians, city experts, and young people – who rarely share the same table – in a similar map-based design exercise focused on the future of Tampere as a whole, opening up conversations around hopes, dreams, and concerns, with all sides asking for more events like it.
  • Thematic days at schools and university campuses offered free bike maintenance, cycle-to-school breakfasts, and a city-bike giveaway, with mechanics teaching riders basic upkeep skills alongside the repairs.
  • Parking space experiments composed by young people were implemented during summer 2026. By turning parking spaces into experimental urban living rooms, the projects bring young people’s ideas into the heart of urban planning and help create a city that is more social, enjoyable, and people-centred.

  • On the whole, the city keeps young people actively involved in shaping their city over time, on the logic that seeing themselves as contributors to change can help them maintain sustainable mobility habits long-term.
  • Youth contributions for Hakametsä Sport Campus were assessed by the city and planners as imaginative and realistic, with several ideas expected to be built.
  • Thematic days inspired the further development of an eco-pedagogy model for upper-secondary schools, where students will have a weekly lesson on sustainable mobility, institutionalising its importance.
  • Prioritising school-based engagement, with an already-assembled audience, as well as on-site workshops, demonstrated that outreach works best when embedded in existing spaces.

How did six Finnish cities unify their policy approach to transform urban logistics?

Transport, as part of urban logistics systems, remain one of the most stubborn sources of emissions in Finnish cities. Tackling them is central to achieving climate neutrality by 2030. Because transport is split across city, national and regional governments, and involves businesses, delivery companies, and residents, progress depends on coordinated, multi-level responses to shape the policy environment and market predictability.

To achieve that, NetZeroCities, alongside partners Demos Helsinki and Dark Matter Labs, launched a “Policy Sprint” running October 2025 to August 2026. As part of the sprint, six Finnish Mission Cities – Espoo, Helsinki, Lahti, Lappeenranta, Tampere and Turku – united to reveal gaps and opportunities within urban logistics policies and forge a multi-city, multi-actor approach set to influence local, national and regional regulation. Lahti and Helsinki acted as ‘lead cities’, as part of NetZeroCities Enabling City Transformation Programme. 

Cities were key decision-makers, contributing local expertise and defining joint priorities, while outside experts handled research and facilitation. Each city led a different focus area, coordinating working groups that mapped existing projects, identified who holds the power to act, and testing draft policies. Experts organised workshops for cities to share knowledge and compare notes; researched what other cities and countries have already tried; identified the biggest gaps and opportunities; stress tested draft policy ideas; and advised on how decision-making should be organized across government levels.

As a result, a multilevel policy process was built from scratch. By testing policies against real-world pressures, the cities developed three refined policy mixes – a combination of policies used together to make logistics more efficient and sustainable. Each was then evaluated on three factors: desirability, feasibility, and institutional and political sustainability. As a landmark achievement, this allowed cities to align across three domains – low emissions zones, night-time deliveries, and urban delivery consolidation – as well as across governance levels.   

  • Cities can use public procurement and contracting to shape the market, which is the most immediately actionable lever. Longer, more predictable contract periods give the market investment certainty. Regulation faces higher political and legal barriers, but a multi-city approach ushers in the opportunity to proactively amplify cities’ position.
  • Finland needs a domestic version of a shared logistics hub system, like the Urban Consolidation Centre. European models don’t transfer directly.
  • Small businesses need protection. The low-emission zone group raised concerns about squeezing out smaller logistics operators, proposing targeted support and risk sharing (e.g. guarantees) instead of blanket restrictions.
  • Scale matters: pilot projects that are too small or premature often do not create transferable results that other cities can apply. Pilots must be ready move through a consistent phasing logic – pilot, adopt, scale – and from the beginning be prepared to connect to wider goals, within one city or across multiple.
  • Governance capacity, not technology, is a recurring constraint. Across all three policy areas, the biggest challenge was political and operational, including decision rights, enforcement responsibility, and multi-level coordination.
  • Cities can set the direction and rules, but collaboration is key. Sustained collaboration with logistics operators, real estate and property managers, energy and charging infrastructure providers, and national government underlies success.

Lahti, Finland

How is Lahti laying the groundwork for zero-emission urban logistics?

Road transport remains Lahti’s toughest emissions challenge, with heavy vehicles responsible for 42% of road transport emissions. The city recognised that cleaner trucks alone would not solve it. Logistics companies also need charging infrastructure, viable business models and enough certainty to invest. 

Through the NetZeroCities Enabling City Transformation Programme, Lahti launched ZERO-TRAIL, a project to accelerate the shift towards zero-emission freight and urban logistics. The city worked with logistics companies, businesses, researchers and residents to develop its Sustainable Urban Logistics Plan, setting out eight priority measures to cut freight emissions while supporting competitiveness and growth.

The work goes beyond planning. Lahti is mapping logistics flows and emissions, identifying charging needs for electric freight, developing business models for charging infrastructure and assessing policy measures that can accelerate the transition fairly. The long-term framework also creates the conditions for future zero-emission logistics zones. 

By combining infrastructure, investment and policy in one approach, Lahti is giving logistics operators a clearer pathway for investing in zero-emission transport.

  • The city developed a Sustainable Urban Logistics Plan with eight priority measures, creating a long-term framework for reducing freight emissions and supporting the electrification of heavy transport.
  • Logistics flows and their emissions-reduction potential were mapped, providing an evidence base for deciding where interventions can have the greatest impact.
  • Charging needs of electric freight vehicles were mapped and business models developed for charging infrastructure, helping overcome a major barrier for logistics companies investing in cleaner fleets.
  • The city assessed regulatory and policy measures that can support low-emission logistics, while its long-term framework keeps open the possibility of introducing zero-emission logistics zones in the future.

  • Beyond the vehicle challenge, electrification requires charging infrastructure, investment conditions, regulation and operational changes developing together.
  • Give businesses predictability before asking them to invest. Freight operators face significant upfront costs when replacing fleets and infrastructure. Cities can accelerate investment by providing a clear long-term policy direction and operating environment.
  • Coordinate beyond city boundaries. Logistics systems cross municipal and regional borders, making shared approaches between cities and different levels of government more effective than isolated interventions. The Finnish cities’ policy sprint is explicitly built around this challenge, and based on combined key learnings, Lahti and Helsinki have proposed the introduction of zero-emissions zones for lorries and vans.

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