The 1st Policy Dialogue Event of the European Union Support for Sustainable Urban Mobility in Cities Project (SUMP Türkiye) Was Held in Ankara with the Participation of Decision Maker and Implementing Institutions
The 1st Policy Dialogue event of the SUMP Türkiye project, funded by the Republic of Türkiye and the European Union with the main objective of promoting the transition from individual transport to sustainable, accessible and inclusive mobility modes at national and urban level, took place on 10 May 2023 at the Union of Municipalities of Turkey premises in Ankara.
The opening speeches were delivered by Dr. Hayri Baraçlı, Secretary General of UMT and Dr. Tijen İğci, Head of the European Union Investments Departmentof the Directorate General for European Union and Foreign Affairs of the Ministry of Transport and Infrastructure; and the closing speech was delivered by Göktuğ Kara, Transport Policy and Climate Change Team Coordinator of the EU Delegation to Türkiye.
Right after Dr. Baraçlı's speech, in which he drew attention to the necessity of addressing the issue of sustainable urban transport as a matter of cultural transformation. He informed the stakeholders about the SUMP Türkiye Working Network which will be gather all cities working on SUMPs under the umbralle of the SUMP Türkiye Project to experience Exchange. Dr. İğci mentioned that the concept of sustainable urban transport is at a point of rapid development in Türkiye and that they are pleased that the issue is being addressed with special importance and sensitivity and with an intensive work programme within the Ministry.
The opening session of the 1st Policy Dialogue event, which consisted of three separate sessions, started with a presentaion by Marco Stancec, Transport and Urban Mobility Expert from Polis Network in Belgium. He explained what and how the project is aiming to achive through policy dialogue and emphasised the importance of collaboration between the national and international stakeholders. In the second part of his presentation, Stantec presented strategic approach, new revisions and SKUp support programs within the scope of the EU Commission's new vision of urban mobility.
The event continued with an interactive session to gather information about Türkiye’s priorities in Urban Mobility as well as the priorities as a result of the recent disaster and pandemic. The last interactive session focused on identifying the important internatioal stakeholders for the Project to connect for policy dialogue based on needs and prioritites.
In the last session of the event, Chris Wensink, an urban mobility expert from Panteia in the Netherlands, shared the details of the methodology for developing a Green Policy and White Policy Papers on Sustainable Urban Mobility in Türkiye.
Questions and answers session was moderated by the Project team leader Dr. Nazan Koçak Rye of Rupprecht Consult, Germany. Some of the discussion points included the importance of the link between urban planning and urban mobility; road safety and Türkiye’s vision zero approach in road safety; importance and lack of urban mobility data and the need for standardised key performance indicators for monitoring and evaluation of SUMPs.
The Policy Dialogue Events of the "European Union Support for Sustainable Urban Mobility in Cities Project" (SUMP Türkiye) will be organized twice a year. The 2nd Policy Dialogue will be held in September.