Transport Malta announces winners of the 2017 Permanent Sustainable Mobility Measures competition
The local councils of San Lawrenz and ĦadDingli are the 2017 winners of the Permanent Sustainable Mobility Measures competition which is launched annually by Transport Malta as part of the European Mobility Week.
The objective of this award is to encourage local councils to come up with, and ultimately implement, innovative schemes and measures that address sustainable transportation within their localities. Proposed measures are adjudicated against pre-set criteria ranging from the environmental, planning and transport perspective.
As part of this year’s competition, San Lawrenz local council has been awarded the first prize for the proposal Green Mobility at San Lawrenz. The measure to be implemented throughout 2018 using the €50,000, made available as a result of this grant, shall introduce shared electric mobility in the locality of San Lawrenz. Vehicles to be deployed include one electric vehicle to be used to transport the elderly and mobility impaired citizens and four electric bicycles to be deployed primarily for the use of tourists and visitors who frequent the locality and the heritage and natural trails surrounding the village. Although, the electric bicycles are aimed at tourists visiting the locality, this service is also available for use by locals. The electric vehicle and bicycles shall be charged at a location close to the local council thus utilising the photovoltaic investment the local council had already carried out at the premises.
In parallel with the physical deployment, the San Lawrenz council shall also be launching an awareness raising campaign to promote sustainable and electric mobility in the village as well as engage stake- holders in discussion as part of the first steps to compile a sustainable urban mobility plan for the locality.
Ħad-Dingli’s Sustainable Transport Measures has won second place in the 2017 competition thus entitling the Ħad-Dingli local council to €30,000 to implement a public bicycle renting facility within the locality. This project accompanies a more extensive investment which will see the restructuring, lighting and refurbishment of the Misraħ il-Mafkar area, including planting of trees and plants, fixing of pavements and enlarging facilities to accessibility-for-all standards.
San Lawrenz and Ħad-Dingli now join the local councils of Valletta, St Paul’s Bay, Ħal Qormi, Bormla and Għajnsielem who have also benefitted from these funds in previous years.
In a bid to continue the promotion of sustainable mobility planning at local level, in 2018, Transport Malta shall be launching a series of workshops directed at local councils in order to assist them in the compilation of strategic plans in the field of Sustainable Urban Mobility at locality level. These workshops will be organised with the support of the Civitas Destinations, a project aimed at addressing the problem of high seasonal tourist mobility demand in smaller touristic destinations. Apart from the assistance to be given to local councils, the project shall implement a set of mutually reinforcing, innovative mobility solutions in the northern and southern harbour districts of Malta. The project is funded under the Horizon 2020 Civitas Funding Programme and shall run between 2016 and 2020.