SULPITER Final Conference and Award Ceremony

After three years of research, transnational and comparative studies, the SULPiTER team met in  Bologna from 13-15 May 2019 for its final event. Launched in June 2016 with a budget of almost 2.5 million euros, SULPiTER - an acronym for Sustainable Urban Logistics Planning for the Improvement of regional freight transport - has placed itself at the service of Public Administrations to develop and adopt sustainable urban logistics plans (SULPs).

Our challenge was to approach the themes and problems common to the participating cities in a transnational perspective. The project examined issues such as the increase in the intensity and fragmentation of the freight transport flow, the significant increase in traffic in logistics and multimodal nodes, the conflicting relationship between passenger mobility and freight transport.

The final three-day event in Bologna was organised as follows: on Monday 13 May, at the headquarters of the Metropolitan City, the scientific committee met to present the results achieved by the transnational partnership in the presence of European experts; on Tuesday 14, two round tables were held; the first to highlight the point of view of political actors on Functional Urban Areas at the end of the project; the second on international cooperation to understand the needs and define a sustainable planning. The second day of the conference coincided with the SULPITER award ceremony, a symbolical moment to congratulate the best action plan for the development of a SULP prepared by the participants of the Enlarged Transfer Programme. The last day of the event was also our last project meeting, wrapping up with the last activities and deadlines before returning to our respective headquarters.

The partnership has involved: the Institute for Transport and Logistics Foundation (project coordinator); Municipality of 18th District of Budapest; University of Maribor;  Central European Initiative - Executive Secretariat; Unioncamere del Veneto – Eurosportello,  Brescia Mobilità, Institute of Logistics and Warehousing, Poznan; Metropolitan City of Bologna; Stuttgart Region Economic Development Corporation, Vecses, Rijeka; KLOK Logistics Cooperation Center, Maribor. To these associated partners are added: Emilia Romagna Region, Municipality of Budapest, Ministry of Economic Development - Department of Regional Technological Development, Municipality of Padua, Municipality of Venice, Municipality of Treviso, Municipality of Brescia, Municipality of Bologna, Region of Stuttgart, Municipality of Trieste, Friuli Venezia Giulia Region, Koper.