Sustainable mobility and the transition to a low-carbon retailing economy

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Resolved to resolve. The RESOLVE project innovatively addresses two urgent challenges in European cities: the declining retail sector and the increasing need to reduce CO2. The potential is considerable: up to 64% of shopping related trips in EU are made by car and almost 100% of goods are transported by motorized vehicle. In the Netherlands alone, retail accounts for 7.2 billion car-kms every year; this equals 1.08 billion kg CO2 per year! And 34% of these trips are shorter than 5 km! Unfortunately different stakeholders often hold opposing views. For retailers the car is often seen as the panacea. Policy makers must urgently cut carbon. Moreover, retail and mobility are still separate policy fields, with little attention to their interaction. The RESOLVE partners are resolved to find ways to resolve these differences. The project’s objective is to reduce carbon emissions created by retail related traffic in town and city centres while also supporting jobs and growth in the local retail economy. We will improve regional policies through innovative new projects and by improving governance so that the different stakeholders can agree common solutions. We will do this by: * analysing partners’ plans through peer review, * identifying good practices that will improve these plans, studying them through Study Visits, importing them via special workshops and Regional Action Plans. * developing a Monitoring and Evaluation Tool that will help understanding about sustainable mobility and retailer confidence. The project’s main outputs will benefit shoppers, retailers, city-managers and public transport operators, who will all be involved in the work. They are: * New projects that innovate by reducing travel demand, using new technology, improving city-management. * Improved governance by recognising retail as a unique ‘transport policy’ topic, by improving Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans, and by using the RESOLVE Tool to measure impact.

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