Braga has been chosen as one of the 100 cities participating in the Intelligent Cities Challenge (ICC) by the European Commission. This selection highlights the city’s commitment to innovation, mobility, and quality of life, aligning with our vision for a smarter and greener future.

July, 2023 – Braga, a historic city in northern Portugal, has recently emerged as one of the shining stars in intelligent cities. With its rich cultural heritage, stunning architecture, and a strong focus on technological innovation, Braga has positioned itself as a frontrunner in the European Commission’s Intelligent Cities Challenge (ICC).

Braga’s inclusion in the ICC is a testament to the city’s commitment to embracing digital innovation and leveraging technology to create a smarter, more sustainable urban environment. The city has made significant strides in various domains, including smart mobility, sustainable energy, and citizen engagement. Being selected as one of the 100 cities in the Intelligent Cities Challenge is a prestigious recognition and a responsibility for Braga. The city is now part of a vibrant network of like-minded European municipalities, exchanging best practices, sharing knowledge, and collaborating on common challenges.

Pedro Moreira, Head of Transport Authority and Mobility Management Unit at Município de Braga Smart Cities , highlights that the ICC will provide Braga with valuable resources, best practices, and support to enhance its sustainable urban development efforts. Leveraging data, smart mobility, and citizen engagement, aim to shape a better future for their community.

European Commission’s Intelligent Cities Challenges

The Intelligent Cities Challenge is a Commission initiative that supports European cities to move towards transforming their economies to be green and digital. It helps European cities simultaneously tackle the power of cutting-edge technologies as they improve their economic competitiveness, social resilience and citizens’ quality of life. These communities will begin their two-year journeys through Local Green Deals to establish an effective strategy and creative solutions to position the city at the forefront of the green and digital twin shift.

More information is available here: https://www.intelligentcitieschallenge.eu/

Stay tuned for updates on their journey as they embark on this exciting endeavour!

• EIT Urban Mobility’s city partner, Braga has won the EUROPEANMOBILITYWEEK award in recognition of its work on sustainable mobility
• The award recognises outstanding municipalities for promoting green and active transport during the previous year’s European Mobility Week, the European Commission’s flagship awareness-raising campaign.
• The Portuguese city picked up the prize at a ceremony in the Belgian city of Ghent on 23 March

The city of Braga in Portugal has won the prestigious 2022 European Mobility Week Award for its commitment to promoting sustainable mobility. The award recognises cities for their efforts to promote sustainable urban transportation and reduce the environmental impacts of cars and other motorized vehicles. The European Commission announced the award as part of its annual European Mobility Week celebrations. Braga was selected from dozens of European cities for its commitment to developing sustainable urban transport solutions. The city has implemented a range of innovative initiatives to reduce car use, including the creation of a city-wide bike-share system, the introduction of electric buses, and the promotion of public transport. Braga is also making progress in developing alternative forms of transport, such as electric scooters and e-bikes, as well as encouraging citizens to use more sustainable modes of transport like walking and cycling. The award is a testament to Braga’s dedication to creating a more sustainable and healthier urban environment. By investing in green and innovative transport solutions, Braga is demonstrating that cities can take action to reduce car use and promote healthier, greener lifestyles. 

EU judges were impressed with Braga’s commitment to raising awareness on sustainable mobility with many stakeholders, including residents, local businesses, and educational institutions. With this award, the city of Braga is paving the way for other cities to follow in its footsteps and create more sustainable and liveable urban environments.

“It’s an honour to be here today and celebrate Braga’s achievement in promoting sustainable mobility and co-creating synergies among various organisations to provide clean and appealing mobility options for our citizens and families,” Olga Pereira, Braga’s Mobility Councillor said in her acceptance speech.

The other finalists in the category were Sofia (Bulgaria) and Zagreb (Croatia). Offering her congratulations to the various winners of the EUROPEANMOBILITYWEEK awards, Adina Vălean, European Commissioner for Transport, told them: “Your inspiring activities really show how cities and towns across Europe can improve people’s wellbeing by offering more sustainable mobility options for all.”

EUROPEANMOBILITYWEEK runs from 16-22 September every year, providing towns and cities with an opportunity to try out innovative traffic and transport planning, promote new use of infrastructure and raise awareness on sustainable mobility within their communities. (1)

The Municipality of Braga and EIT Urban Mobility – a winning and strong collaboration

The Municipality of Braga and EIT Urban Mobility have partnered to collaborate on multiple projects to improve urban mobility in the region. In 2023 the Portuguese city was selected as part of our #ChallengeMyCity programme, a European self-designed programme that enables European cities to tackle their most pressing urban challenges by testing market-ready innovative mobility solutions.   Enhancing bike safety and monitoring cyclists´ flows, Understanding and promoting active mobility in the city centre, Improving monitoring and use of on-street parking spaces and encouraging alternative transportation for school commuting to decrease private car usage are the four challenges that will be solved in the city, thanks to the #ChallengeMyCity programme. More info available here.

In 2022, Braga implemented the Bicification project, which was supported by EIT Urban Mobility, an initiative to turn traditional transportation into a more sustainable form of travel by supporting a modal shift towards green, active mobility through a reward-based gamification programme.

More info available here

(1 – article from the EuropeanMobilityWeek website)

In this article, you will understand:
– how we have the ability to address urban mobility professionals’ upskill needs and to guide them every step of the way, from discovering specific mobility challenges to overcoming them with industry experts and peers.
– how the pandemic taught us to tailor our online and on-site learning to fully benefit urban mobility professionals
– how we developed an extensive and diverse portfolio of courses and methodologies suitable for a variety of audiences.
– how we developed courses on a wide array of other urban mobility-related subjects, with perspectives ranging from social and tech to environmental. View our full catalogue here.

A high percentage of the urban mobility jobs we’ll do in 2030 haven’t been invented yet – does that fact excite and inspire you? Do you want to be a trailblazer, leading the way towards a better future in a career you love? Do you have an unquenchable thirst for knowledge?  We can help.

Now more than ever, we are changing the way our cities and transport are planned: think breakthroughs in new technologies, digitalisation of the industry and championing zero-emission cities. Mobility professionals know the importance of delivering thriving and attractive living environments to citizens of the cities they work in. They also know that their line of work demands learning and implementing new skills and gaining a better understanding of the swift and sometimes abrupt changes this sector faces.

Here at EIT Urban Mobility, we want to be at the forefront of knowledge sharing for urban mobility professionals every step of the way. We are constantly developing state-of-the-art applied training courses that empower sector professionals, decision makers and businesses at every level across Europe to upskill in a way that suits them.

We offer courses perfect for a variety of different people, from local authorities and transport providers to those in the mobility industry, academia and beyond – so if you are looking to upskill, chances are we can help.

As Jim Moran once said, “The future belongs to those who prepare for it” – are you ready to own the future?

From Micro-Mobility and Electric Vehicles to Last Mile Logistics: What Will Become Your Specialisation?

We believe learning should happen in three steps:

1. Discovering – Your introduction to urban mobility, helping you to uncover the different aspects of this field and discover what you find most interesting
2. Understanding – Delving deeper into the topics you enjoy the most and developing an in-depth understanding
3. Overcoming – This final step takes your learning to the next level, bringing you together with experts and other industry peers to overcome specific mobility challenges

We have the ability to guide urban mobility professionals every step of the way, from discovery to implementation. Our Urban Mobility Explained initiative and our online courses facilitate keen students to learn at their own pace, allowing them to properly solidify their knowledge of urban mobility – they are the ideal for the discovery and understanding steps.

The overcoming step is where our applied courses come into play. They are a fantastic way to empower urban mobility professionals to overcome mobility challenges together with industry experts and peers. These courses bring people together, both online and on-site, allowing learners to take the knowledge they’ve gleaned and put it into action.

Our applied courses can take place on location (ideal for experiencing local infrastructure, workshops, networking), online (good for theory or to get together without having to travel) or a mixture of the two. They are the final step in truly and deeply understanding urban mobility while addressing your challenges at work.

The impact of the pandemic

We took away three key lessons from the pandemic:

1. The understanding part of learning can be done at home, at your own pace
2. Some of the overcoming step will always need to be done on-site, especially when we are looking at infrastructure and transportation – for example, each specific city will have its own unique features to discover
3. Parts of on-site courses can also be moved online, but they have to be completely re-thought to achieve the benefits and impact our students deserve – a ‘copy and paste’ approach just won’t work

All this means that we have been able to tailor our online and on-site learning to fully benefit urban mobility professionals like you. No matter where you are in the learning process, we understand exactly what you need – and how to give it to you.

Bridging an Educational Gap with Our Cycling Courses

One great example of how we’ve taken a learning opportunity from discovery to implementation is our cycling courses.

We know that there has been a rapid increase in cycling as of late, as individuals move towards more active mobility post-pandemic. Now is the time for cities to update their infrastructure to make it more inclusive and accessible for all types of travellers.

Cycling is of the utmost importance in urban mobility for a variety of economic, social and environmental reasons, and is changing cities and lives. By collaborating with leading European experts and organisations to develop impact-oriented courses, we are empowering a new generation of ambitious professionals to find the solutions we need to make our mobility greener and our cities more sustainable.

By researching what is important in the world of urban mobility today and discovering and bridging an educational gap, we’ve been able to give learners what they want and need: a proper understanding of cycling in relation to urban mobility.

The lifecycle of our cycling courses

We identified a need for cycling-friendly cities, which was exacerbated during the COVID pandemic. We wanted to empower urban mobility professionals of all levels, as well as spark a change in society, so we developed an extensive and diverse portfolio of courses and methodologies suitable for a variety of audiences.

Our goal? Easy – to make cycling a bigger part of city mobility.

Some of our cycling courses include:

• An online MOOC on cycling, disseminating the unique cycling experience and expertises of The Netherlands and Denmark; good for beginners
• A custom blended course for Transport Malta, taking the local infrastructure, mindset and current capabilities into careful consideration to ensure it was as beneficial for this city as possible; ideal for local professionals
• An open course on designing the cycling city in Rotterdam, based on the content from the original MOOC; excellent for design professionals and mobility students
• Two courses developed by other providers on the topic of cyclologistics: one in Belgium (next held in April 2023) and one in Italy (2023 date to be confirmed); great for urban mobility professionals
• A course based on the Danish experience/school of cycling, designed and run by the provider Copenhagenize: held in Copenhagen in English and Paris in French; generally for design and engineering professionals, graduate students and those with a personal or professional interest in bicycles
• The original MOOC on the cycling city offered to a Slovakian audience with online workshops, held over the summer; good for local professionals

And cycling is just the beginning! We’ve also developed courses on a wide array of other urban mobility-related subjects, with perspectives ranging from social and tech to environmental, such as:

• Planning for Autonomous Vehicles – Delving deep into how to plant or autonomous vehicles
• Mobility and Digitalisation – It’s key to understand the role new technologies play in an urban environment
• Virtual Reality – How does virtual reality fit into the world of urban mobility?
• And much, much more!

View our full catalogue here.

Take Learning to the Next Level with EIT Urban Mobility

Are you ready to take on the future and carve out the perfect role for yourself in the world of urban mobility? Take the first step today with EIT Urban Mobility.

If you are an individual looking to upskill, why not view our full selection of educational opportunities here? If you are looking for tailored training for your corporation or city, please get in touch with us to discuss how we can create the ideal course for you.