SUMP II Pilotage – Final Report

In June 2023, CEUTP completed providing direct advisory support to potential entitled parties of EU funds related to the Infrastructure and Environment Operational Programme 2014-2020 in terms of preparing and implementing the concept of Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans (SUMPs) as part of the pilot project. At the same time, it has been carrying out the evaluation of SUMPs submitted by selected pilot centres for several months.

What is a SUMP?

SUMP is an urban mobility planning tool that, unlike traditional methods, puts more emphasis on involving all parties involved in developing plans and selecting projects for implementation. SUMP is an urban planning concept in which public transport constitutes a key element. In combination with a broad spectrum of issues, such as emissions reduction, environmental protection and space planning, it aims to make cities more liveable. However, developing a plan that meets the European Commission’s (EC) requirements needs to be supported by municipalities.

This is why a change in approach in mobility planning towards a green and digital transformation is highlighted in a number of top-level policy documents such as the “Strategy for sustainable and intelligent mobility – European transport on the road to the future”[1] or the European Green Deal[2] – an action plan for Europe to become a climate-neutral continent by 2050. Guides, tools to support the development and evaluation of works done so far in this area have been created. The European Local Transport Information Service[3] (ELTIS) platform has also been made available to support SUMP-involved parties. The ELTIS web-based platform enables sharing of knowledge, information and good practices in the field of sustainable mobility. Also on the national level, numerous references to the concept of sustainable urban mobility planning can be found, for example in the Partnership Contract for the implementation of the Cohesion Policy 2021-2027[4]. The development of SUMPs is proving to be a major challenge for numerous local authorities, as it requires multi-level thinking about urban mobility, where spatial and urban planning, transport and mobility, ecology and sustainability are all addressed on a par with broad public participation. It is observed that at the level of many centres in Poland there is not yet sufficient knowledge to prepare and implement such a document as a SUMP without external support. Therefore, at the governmental level, it has been decided to carry out a number of activities to implement SUMPs, in which CEUTP, among others, is involved, e.g. by launching pilot support for cities, Municipal Functional Areas or Metropolitan Areas in implementing the SUMP idea.

CEUTP piloting

The first pilot project was implemented from February 2020 to February 2022 with the support of an external Advisor and by the Jaspers Initiative (European Investment Bank) under the auspices of the Ministry of Funds and Regional Policy and the Ministry of Infrastructure and the European Commission. Its aim was not only to encourage cities to develop SUMPs, but also to standardise draft planning according to the latest European Commission methodology and to promote this tool in urban space and mobility planning.

Within the Pilot Project, support was launched for 5 urban centres for which Jaspers Initiative resources were dedicated and more than 30 urban centres including cities, municipalities, urban functional areas (UFAs), which were covered by CEUTP’s support within the scope of a two-year consultancy contract. These centres declared their interest in participating in the project and declared that they would work on a change in approach to shape urban mobility both in terms of content and financing with municipal support.

The support provided during the SUMP preparation/updating and implementation consisted, inter alia, in:

• assessment of competence of individual Recipients (centres) – e.g. in terms of organisational structure, administrative and expert potential;
• review of SUMPs in place (in case of Recipients who have developed such a document so far);
• review of the policies pursued which fulfil SUMP concept (in case of Recipients who did not have a SUMP);
• identification of stakeholders within the Recipient’s administrative bodies;
• identification and evaluation of data required to develop a SUMP held by the Recipients;
• formulating recommendations for the Recipients as part of SUMP development;
• assisting in the procurement of SUMP Contractor by the Recipients (in case of a decision to outsource SUMP implementation to an external consultant), including: assisting in the formulation of requirements and description of a subject matter of the procurement, assessing quality of the documentation and assisting in its acceptance from SUMP Contractor;
• assistance during SUMP preparation or updating by the Recipient’s in-house forces (verification, evaluation and formulation of recommendations);
• advising on the organisation of public consultations as well as mobilisation of stakeholders;
• preparation and delivery of training courses for CEUTP employees on SUMP;
• organisation and conduct of SUMP workshops for Pilot participants and other potential entitled parties of EU funds representing urban areas;
• substantive cooperation with the Jaspers Initiative within the Pilot to ensure coherence of the actions undertaken, including cooperation in the workshops.

Upon completion of the first pilot project, support continued for 34 urban centres until the end of Q2 2023 as part of a new contract. It was concluded in February 2022 with the contract to continue provision of direct consultancy services on:

• formulating recommendations in SUMP development;
• assisting in development of a consultant contract and in acceptance of a mobility plan, as well as when preparing or updating a SUMP with own powers;
• advice on organisation of public consultations and stakeholder activation;
• participation in meetings at the premises of the Recipients as well as by videoconference.

The scope of support provided by the Counsellor was selected in a way that responds to specifics of a centre and addresses properly identified problems.

It should be emphasised that the Pilot has borne notable benefits in the form of advanced work on Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans in all provincial cities, as well as in other Recipients. Some of the plans have already been enacted and sent to CEUTP for evaluation in accordance with the principles of SUMP quality management in Poland, which were adopted by the Steering Committee for SUMPs operating under the Minister of Infrastructure. In addition, the experience from the pilot was used to design a new method of support for local government units in the form of a project entitled “Support for Urban Functional Areas in the Preparation of Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans.” This project is coordinated by the Representative for SUMPs, while supported by the SUMP Competence Centre established in the Ministry of Infrastructure.

Evaluation of Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans by CEUTP

SUMPs can be submitted for evaluation along with the application documentation for urban mobility investments or earlier, before commencement of application for EU funding.

The essence of this assessment is to verify that SUMP principles are met, but also to provide relevant and detailed feedback to the representatives of the local government units (lgu) on the activities that improve the quality of sustainable mobility planning in their case.

All elements of SUMP may be subject to recommendations by the evaluation team. Taking the recommendations into account at a given time determines whether future investments can be supported, i.e. submitted for funding at a time when the recommendations should already have been implemented.

Current observations and experiences from the ongoing SUMP evaluation

CEUTP has carried out an evaluation of the first Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans. The assessment concerned SUMPs whose preparation was covered by the above-mentioned pilot. The SUMPs evaluated were submitted to CEUTP at the pre-submission stage of the application for project co-funding. Their analysis was carried out independently of the future evaluation of the projects. The evaluation was carried out based on uniform, accepted principles and a SUMP evaluation form[5].

Individually prepared recommendations were made for all submitted documents. Nonetheless, some common points can already be identified at this stage, accompanying the documents submitted to CEUTP, in relation to which recommendations were formulated during evaluation, requiring documentation supplementation, i.e.:

• in most cases there was a shortage of complete documentation required for SUMP, i.e. adopted resolutions of relevant bodies confirming formal acceptance and readiness to implement SUMP.

For the purpose of initiating SUMP assessment prior to submitting a grant application, i.e. outside the investment project selection, a SUMP without a set of required resolutions can be submitted. A minimum requirement in this respect is to provide a resolution of the PC core city council (core cities in the case of polycentric centres) on the adoption of SUMP,

• failure to indicate specific actions which may be taken for the period of SUMP’s validity. The point here is to formulate a list of projects planned for implementation and to present it in such a way that during project appraisal for co-financing it is possible to clearly link them to the list included in SUMP,
• failure to provide a detailed financing plan for the activities mentioned in the appraisal form, concerning the provision of funding for individual activities in the budgets of individual municipalities. It is worth emphasising at this point that complementary actions planned of an operational nature should also have funding secured.

An issue to which special attention should be given during SUMP preparation is the proper conduct of consultation at the SUMP preparation and adoption stage, ensuring fulfilment of the principle of public participation.

In order to address issues raised by the units responsible for developing and submitting SUMP, it was decided that at this stage the “in time” recommendations determining the acceptance of specific projects for assessment and co-financing will focus on formal supplementation of SUMP documentation in the form of supplementing necessary resolutions of the local government units (lgu). In case of other recommendations related to indication of, for example, a list of projects/investments as well as development of an appropriate plan for their financing (with indication of financing sources), their fulfilment should take place at a SUMP activation stage.

In August 2023, the Closing Report was finalised, summarising the work of the pilot project, as well as including a list of the biggest challenges in implementing the pilot, recommendations for the future separately for each Recipient, as well as horizontal recommendations that may apply to other urban centres interested in implementing the SUMP idea.

One of the appendices to the Report is the General Description of the Object of Procurement and elements of the Terms of Reference for the development of the Sustainable Urban Mobility Plan, which we recommend to the attention of all centres developing/planning to develop a SUMP.

Feel free to visit the SUMP Pilot website.

[1] Strategy for sustainable and intelligent mobility – European transport on the road to the future {SWD(2020) 331 final}; https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/PL/TXT/?uri=CELEX%3A52020DC0789.

[2] See https://commission.europa.eu/strategy-and-policy/priorities-2019-2024/european-green-deal_pl.

[3] See https://www.eltis.org/mobility-plans.

[4] The Partnership Contract for the implementation of the Cohesion Policy 2021-2027 in Poland; https://www.funduszeeuropejskie.gov.pl/media/109763/Umowa_Partnerstwa_na_lata_2021_2027.pdf.

[5] See this.