Velo-city: the role of cycling in mobility policies

The
World Summit of European Cyclists Federation is welcomed in Nantes from June 2 to 5 2015. This international event will put the bike in the heart of the debate on the transformation of urban mobility to climate challenge.

Velo-city: a conference dedicated to cycling policies

Velo-city, the World Conference for cycling policies and development of cycling, has been leaded for more than 30 years by ECF – European Cyclists’ Federation – which gathers associations and organizations promoting bicycle use in Europe and in the world. After Vienna in 2013 and Adelaide in 2014, and before Taipei in 2016, Nantes Métropole has been selected to host the ECF Velo-city conference in 2015.

Velo-city 2015 has given a strong editorial line, “bike, future maker” placing the bicycle in the global debate. More than 750 contributions from almost 58 countries were collected. Over 1,500 participants are expected, coming from all continents – experts in urban mobility, representatives of governments and international cooperation, elected officials, associations, academics and researchers, economists, industrialists, entrepreneurs …

CODATU will be represented by its executive manager, Julien Allaire, who will present the issues in terms of urban mobility in African cities and thr role left to urban cycling on this continent.

International mobilization for COP21 and Habitat III

Velo-city 2015 must enable to include the development of cycling policies and cycling for all in the priorities of the two major world conferences that are:
• The 21st United Nations Conference on Climate Change, COP 21, to be held in Paris in December 2015,
• The 3rd UN Conference on Housing and Sustainable Urban Development, Habitat III in Quito – Ecuador, June 2016.

Upstream of these two major events worldwide, Velo-City 2015 has the objective of providing solutions to plot new directions to meet the challenges of climate issues, sustainable development, urbanization and its corollaries housing, mobility, health … with the aim to build a new urban agenda for the 21st century.

In this context, CODATU continue its work to mobilize partners in the initiative “sustainable urban mobility: what is your plan?” stressing that sustainable urban mobility plans (SUMPs) are key processes in order to structure a multi-modal policy through a multi-stakeholder approach to define a programming of actions …. and because of its economic relevance, social, environmental and health the bike more and more space in SUMPs!