Car Free Day
The issue related to “sustainable mobility” is very current and increasingly hot. It is of great importance not only in Italy, but in various European countries. Relative to Italy, several initiatives have been taken in this direction.
Milan has strengthened its “BikeMi” service, the bicycle rental service available 365 days a year from 07:00 to 01:00 (but with extended hours during special events) and at an affordable price (just think that the cost for a year’s rental is only 36 euros) with nearly 400 stations currently available, Many Italian cities, like other European ones, have joined the “Car Free Day,” an initiative that is part of the program planned for the European Sustainable Mobility Week that ended on September 22, the date of the event.
Verona has been organizing “Mobility Day” Sundays for a couple of years, during which private vehicle traffic is blocked and restricted in certain areas of the city center.
In cities that choose to join some of these worthwhile projects, the cost of tickets to travel by public transportation is often reduced so as to facilitate and encourage the success of the same. In observance of the sustainable mobility project, tourist and cultural tours followed by bicycle are also gaining in importance.
Mobility Day in Italy
As many as 12 cities have also made available to citizens, an electric car sharing service, thus environmentally friendly. The best known company to offer such a service is Share’ngo, present in Milan, Rome, Florence and Modena, but we also have the new Adduma Car active only in Florence, Bluecar in Turin, Car2go, Enjoy (also very popular and used), DriveNow and E-Vai, present in many cities, Corrente and Io Guido in Bologna, Eppy in Latina, AmiCar in Naples, 4usMobile in Lecce, Italy Green Tour (a service designed for tourists) in Catania, Playcar in Cagliari, and other similar services present in Venice, Genoa, Palermo, Padua, Brescia and Parma.
All sustainable mobility initiatives have come about with the aim of safeguarding and protecting the environment more, improving the viability of roads and trying to “push” citizens toward improving their lifestyles for the benefit of the air we breathe and thus our health. All of the recommended measures are (if placed in a sustained and prolonged or better yet permanent context) suitable for counteracting the various forms of pollution and climate changes caused by the impact of vehicles on the environment.
Along with sustainable mobility initiatives, traffic education classes are also increasingly being organized for citizens, during which the concept of mobility is explained and an attempt is made to raise awareness of the importance of taking some of the many measures to protect the environment, while also making them aware of the advantages in terms of saving money.The number of Italian cities that have given their adherence to the sustainable mobility project by intervening with measures and proclaiming initiatives has been gradually increasing, and it is hoped to reach full and total adherence in Italy within a few years.
If a collaborative network could be established among the various cities so that these protective measures could be adopted at the same time among them, the intervention would work better. If, on the contrary, a few cities adhere to it in a limited and isolated manner, it will be ineffective.For all these reasons, sustainable mobility interventions are among the main objectives of local governments that aim at obtaining and achieving more and better livability of cities, employing several economic resources.
At the municipal level, measures taken by Italian municipalities to promote sustainable mobility and to enable people to breathe cleaner air consist of creating and making available to citizens green, purely pedestrian and traffic-restricted areas. Effective actions are also carried out in a direct manner to increase and improve the living situation of citizens through improvements to the urban system and increases in public transportation available to citizens participating in the sustainable mobility project.
It is important to emphasize that with the functional and economic intervention of sustainable mobility, air and noise pollution are reduced by far, certainly, but also the risk of accidents due to overloading of roads and poor road practicability. In conclusion, all citizens should therefore stop and think about the importance of environmental protection and contribute their efforts, within their means, to implement all measures to prevent and combat the problem of pollution in favor of sustainable mobility that can grow faster and the increasing exploitation of alternative solutions.
