Europe’s premier sustainable mobility conference is being held in the German spa city of Aachen this month. Held annually, the CIVITAS Forum, which Innovators Magazine is media partners with, brings together ‘experts and practitioners from across the continent to explore the role of transport in paving the way towards building climate-neutral cities by- and for citizens’.
Our urban mobility of the future needs to be fully sustainable if cities are to be climate neutral.
Matthew Baldwin
Taking place on 20-21 October 2021, the conference is a hybrid format this year, with online and onsite events that will give people the chance to quiz leaders on how mobility and transport can help deliver climate-neutral cities.
“While the European Commission recently launched a mission to achieve 100 climate-neutral cities by 2030, it is clear that reaching such a goal requires collaboration between all levels of government, and across all sectors of urban life,” said Matthew Baldwin, Deputy Director-General at the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Transport and Mobility.”
He added: “With its theme of smart routes towards climate-neutral cities as a backdrop, the CIVITAS Forum 2021 will guide participants to consider mobility through new lenses. Our urban mobility of the future needs to be fully sustainable if cities are to be climate neutral – and if we can achieve climate neutrality, it follows that we will also see much better air quality, lower congestion and road deaths. Sustainable cities are already benefiting from these collaborative and future-thinking approaches to mobility led by organisations like CIVITAS.”
The packed programme will serve up two days of ‘debate, knowledge exchange and networking’, with the winners of the prestigious CIVITAS Awards to be announced at a Gala dinner being hosted by five-time TEDx Speaker Dan Ram. The awards ‘recognise cities that have demonstrated innovative approaches and systematic transformation towards creating sustainable urban mobility in their local context’.
In welcoming the CIVITAS Forum 2021 to her city, Sibylle Keupen, Mayor of Aachen, said: “We have a very limited window of opportunity to consistently gear society toward climate neutrality. We must act quickly and, above all, together to consistently exploit the great potential of sustainable mobility towards this overall goal. Indeed, we are aware of our great responsibility towards our children and grandchildren to leave them a world fit for the future. The next generations have a right to it, therefore we must act now, we must act courageously.”
Online registration is free and open to all sustainable urban mobility and sustainable cities experts and enthusiasts.
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