What's new

Making sustainable mobility stick: how cities are learning to work with human habits

Why storytelling matters for cities and regions

Final product (video): A shared journey of learning, testing and planning a new kind of urban–rural mobility

Shaping rural and urban mobility together: how community action drives practical change

On a chilly morning in Bram in southern France, families gather as the community-run Vélobus sets off. Children cycle together instead of adding to traffic at the school gate. Meanwhile, in Treviso in northern Italy, residents step into Piazza Duomo during a temporary car-free trial and experience their historic centre differently. And in Szabolcs 05 in Hungary, a small painted crossing near a village school has become one of the most valued improvements of the year.

Across Europe, these modest scenes show how small and community-led experiments can influence the way rural and semi-urban places approach mobility. They reveal that a shift in everyday travel patterns does not always require major projects. It often begins with simple actions that respond to local routines.

Rural Urban Connections Toolkit: a practical handbook to strengthen links between rural areas and cities

As one of the final outputs of the Beyond the Urban (URBACT IV) network, we have developed this toolkit to promote more sustainable, inclusive and integrated mobility, thereby strengthening rural–urban connections.

From planning to action: Beyond the Urban partners publish their Integrated Action Plans for sustainable urban–rural mobility

Beyond the Urban is an URBACT network of ten territories across Europe. Cities, regions and rural areas work together to rethink how people move —between villages and cities, to work, to school, to services— with sustainability, inclusion and digital tools at the core. Led by Osona, Beyond the Urban has been a shared journey of learning, testing and planning a new kind of urban–rural mobility.